The main title sequence that opens `Willard' is one of the most visually striking open title sequences in recent memory. The camera is panning across small tables, and picture frames with 2D or object animation playing within them. The only way I can accurately describe it would be that it seems like a stylization of a camera looking around the nooks and crannies of an old wooden cellar or basement. It was created with good old fashioned stop-motion animation model work. Shirley Walker's opening title music is nothing short of magnificent, and the accordion-laden composition perfectly anticipates the character we are about to meet.
`Willard' is a very well observed story that intimately knows it's lead character. It's a film that's quirkily disturbing, and funny too. Crispin Glover's Willard character has very dark eyes, is very pale, and has a slick, short, combed-back haircut. He almost looks like he stepped out of a silent film. His performance brings pain and longing right in your face with his twitches, the way he responds to anger, how he wants to say something but doesn't, and especially by the way he walks. There is also real wit in the performance, and Glover is overall a delight to watch.
Willard is a sensitive, deeply disturbed grown man who is constantly being mentally tormented by the people around him. His mother talks down on how much of a waste he is, his boss is arrogant and enjoys threatening him at work, and nobody else seems to pay attention to him. Nobody, except for Catherine (played by Laura Elena Harring of `Mulholland Drive'), a fellow emplyee who seems to be a potential social isle for Willard, as she shows sympathy for him and actually talks to him at work, but he never pursues a friendship. While in the cellar setting rat traps, Willard beings to sympathize with the rats he's laying traps for, and befriends them, particularly one white rat, who he has named Socrates.
Shirley Walker's score is undeniably the heart and soul of the film. It's a powerful, thematic work that's one of the finest film scores of recent years, and the finest horror score in ages. As some modern-day viewers are aware of when watching newer films, an orchestral score for a cultish horror piece is a rare and sublime gift. The approach and feel of this score is a brilliant homage to Bernard Herrmann. The music knows exactly what emotions it's attempting to bring out in the viewer as it digs deep inside the story and the inner feelings of our lead character. It's a terrific segueing of music and image, and it's Shirley Walker's greatest achievement.
I can see people having problems with the ending. I personally thought the ending was campy and creepy, with Glover at his most insane, though some may complain that it runs a few minutes longer than it's natural climax. On a narrative level, I was satisfied with this ending, I got the same vibe that I felt during the ending of the silent film `The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari' (both films end in similar settings).
`Willard' was a $22 million dollar film, but it made barely $7 million back. The film didn't find it's audience, which is a shame. Part of the problem was that it opened in March, which isn't the time of year to release a film like `Willard' (October is the ideal time). Thankfully, New Line Cinema seems to feel that the film deserves a second life on DVD, because the `Willard' DVD is jammed-pack with goodies. A highlight is a music video of the song `Ben,' sung by Crispin Glover. The music video is striking and marvelous, and surprisingly visually owes just about everything to Federico Fellini (which was indeed surprising, since the film itself has no Felliniesque quality). Crispin is seen flying down on a stage, the audience composed of strange-looking people looking at the camera with mocking or deadly serious expressions. Fellini is alive in this, right down to the very sexually suggestive nature of the music video. IT'S REALLY GOOD STUFF!!!!
`Willard' is a rare kind of film in these days. It's an obscure curiosity, a film most studios wouldn't gamble with, and it's wildly vast difference from everything else we see these days is one of the reasons why I love it.
`Willard' is a very well observed story that intimately knows it's lead character. It's a film that's quirkily disturbing, and funny too. Crispin Glover's Willard character has very dark eyes, is very pale, and has a slick, short, combed-back haircut. He almost looks like he stepped out of a silent film. His performance brings pain and longing right in your face with his twitches, the way he responds to anger, how he wants to say something but doesn't, and especially by the way he walks. There is also real wit in the performance, and Glover is overall a delight to watch.
Willard is a sensitive, deeply disturbed grown man who is constantly being mentally tormented by the people around him. His mother talks down on how much of a waste he is, his boss is arrogant and enjoys threatening him at work, and nobody else seems to pay attention to him. Nobody, except for Catherine (played by Laura Elena Harring of `Mulholland Drive'), a fellow emplyee who seems to be a potential social isle for Willard, as she shows sympathy for him and actually talks to him at work, but he never pursues a friendship. While in the cellar setting rat traps, Willard beings to sympathize with the rats he's laying traps for, and befriends them, particularly one white rat, who he has named Socrates.
Shirley Walker's score is undeniably the heart and soul of the film. It's a powerful, thematic work that's one of the finest film scores of recent years, and the finest horror score in ages. As some modern-day viewers are aware of when watching newer films, an orchestral score for a cultish horror piece is a rare and sublime gift. The approach and feel of this score is a brilliant homage to Bernard Herrmann. The music knows exactly what emotions it's attempting to bring out in the viewer as it digs deep inside the story and the inner feelings of our lead character. It's a terrific segueing of music and image, and it's Shirley Walker's greatest achievement.
I can see people having problems with the ending. I personally thought the ending was campy and creepy, with Glover at his most insane, though some may complain that it runs a few minutes longer than it's natural climax. On a narrative level, I was satisfied with this ending, I got the same vibe that I felt during the ending of the silent film `The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari' (both films end in similar settings).
`Willard' was a $22 million dollar film, but it made barely $7 million back. The film didn't find it's audience, which is a shame. Part of the problem was that it opened in March, which isn't the time of year to release a film like `Willard' (October is the ideal time). Thankfully, New Line Cinema seems to feel that the film deserves a second life on DVD, because the `Willard' DVD is jammed-pack with goodies. A highlight is a music video of the song `Ben,' sung by Crispin Glover. The music video is striking and marvelous, and surprisingly visually owes just about everything to Federico Fellini (which was indeed surprising, since the film itself has no Felliniesque quality). Crispin is seen flying down on a stage, the audience composed of strange-looking people looking at the camera with mocking or deadly serious expressions. Fellini is alive in this, right down to the very sexually suggestive nature of the music video. IT'S REALLY GOOD STUFF!!!!
`Willard' is a rare kind of film in these days. It's an obscure curiosity, a film most studios wouldn't gamble with, and it's wildly vast difference from everything else we see these days is one of the reasons why I love it.