Know why I love movies in conjunction with
the Internet? Because they educate me. This movie
'Playback' is a convoluted mess of a demon possession film,
but it did introduce me to Louis Le Prince, the man credited
as the father of motion pictures who I learned via research
was on his way to America to demonstrate this awesome
technology he pioneered until he disappeared from the train
station in 1890, without a trace, never to be seen
again. Now if somebody wants to tell a story, go ahead
and devise a tale where a man who stood a good 6'4", and
weighed in at over 200 pounds disappeared off the planet after
arguably engineering the most significant technology in the
history of everything. Next thing you know Thomas Edison
is taking the credit. Hmmm…. But this about
'Playback' which is a convoluted mess of a demon possession
film, but we said that already.
In '94 certifiable whackjob Harlan Diehl was in the process of
murdering his mom and his sister while doing something really
freaky with his sister's baby and a television. Hell if
we know what. The cops show up, kill Harlan Diehl and
that story is over. As if.
Fast forward to the present where long in the tooth high
school student Julian Miller (Johnny Pacar) is finishing up a
class assignment about showing something awesome about his
small town by recreating the Diehl murders via a short slasher
film. Awesome. I see a definite A+. The
thing is Julius just isn't getting all the info he needs, so
he asks his ultra weird buddy Quinn (Toby Hemingway) to get
some kind of archival footage from the TV station he works at,
which Toby does but unfortunately in this footage he found, a
dead Harlan Diehl looked at him in the eye and now he's all
possessed and stuff.
How in the heck did that happen? It's
got something to do with Louis Le Prince, and camera's
capturing the soul and being possessed by the devil.
Hell if I know. What I do know is that Quinn is off his
rocker completely possessing people, killing people and
torturing people even if we don't know exactly how or why he's
doing it. But Quinn, who might be Harlan… I'm not
sure… has big plans for Julian… who might be Harlan… I'm not
sure. What I am sure of is that Christian Slater is in
this movie. Now if you were to ask me why he's in this
movie and what purpose he actually serves… well we're right
back in hazyville. Hell if I know… which would pretty
much be the running theme of 'Playback'.
The basics for writer / director Michael A. Nickles horror /
thriller 'Playback' are pretty standard. Crazy dude
killing teenagers. We got that. In addition to the
basics, the acting level was above average for this kind of
film, some of which we could probably credit to the maturity
level of these 'high school' students, particularly Toby
Hemingway who was really creepy from the word jump in this
movie. I'm thinking some of this just might be genetics
since the young man just looks creepy generally
speaking. Director Nickles also knows how to frame a
picture and place his camera in the right spot at the right
time, and I guess the basic concept of the narrative was okay,
but the execution of this narrative is where Michael A.
Nickles the writer kind of let Michael A. Nickles the film
director down a little bit.
Louis Le Prince probably got the short end of the stick and
all, being labeled as satanic and stuff, but I dig that we're
trying to build a mythology here. They take one of his
ten second short films of people walking in a circle and
inform us that something about this short film is diabolically
evil in some way. I'm sorry but all of the eerie music
in the world can't make a ten second black and white film
about people walking in a circle look evil. They're
walking in a freaking circle and nothing remotely interesting
happens while they are walking in this circle. How this
walking in a circle launched one man's soul into the camera,
into another man, resulting in mass murder and crazed
incestual relationships was a concept that needed some serious
fleshing out and we got none of that.
Even if you just resign yourself to buying into the evil
walking in circle people and Louis Le Prince jumping in the
camera for no other reason than he's just an evil dude, then
we have to navigate through the vague nature of the psycho
high school kid and all of that nonsense. I think he's
possessed by Louis, he might be the lost baby, but when he
possesses somebody else… is that a power he has or is Louis
possessing them too? Or maybe Julian is the lost
baby. But I think they said only a direct bloodline can
be possessed by Louis. I think. Maybe Julian and
Quinn are brothers. It doesn't matter what wacky concept
you can dream up because anything goes and it's not like this
movie was helping us clear any of it up.
It's too bad really because all 'Playback' really needed to
push itself over the Mendoza line was just a touch of
clarity. But then I'm not really all that bright so
maybe it was clear, just over my head. That's always a
possibility.
