Film Review: Malignant
James Wan’s gruesome ode to giallo and camp
More Saw and Dead Silence than The Conjuring and Insidious, James Wan’s Malignant takes a gruesome detour from mass appeal horror back into the land of subversive terror. A Frankenstein’s amalgam of giallo, camp, and body horror, Wan’s latest takes pages from Argento, Cronenberg, and even De Palma to deliver the wildest of gory rides. Nothing will really prepare you for the nasty surprises Malignant has in store for you. Minor spoilers ahead…
In 1964, during the famous obscenity case of Jacobellis v. Ohio, Supreme Court Justice Potter Steward notably wrote about pornography: “I know it when I see it.” The same can be said about camp cinema. Some will define the camp mode of filmmaking through its irony and perceived tastelessness - a winking detonation of high art. Others will find camp in the subversion of earnestness - sober storytelling gone wildly off the rails in hilarious and unhinged ways. But for many of us, camp is ephemeral: we know it when we see it.
It may not seem like it, but horror maestro James Wan has danced around the line of camp his entire career. More so in his early, transgressive filmography - with Saw, Death Sentence, and Dead Silence - than his recent domination of wide-appeal horror, but Wan has always taken great pleasure dabbling in boisterous irony. Even his foray into superhero storytelling - 2018’s Aquaman - leaned into kitschy excess: a giant octopus plays the drums, and Depeche Mode blares while Yahya Abdul-Mateen II builds his arsenal of Atlantean weapons. His latest film, Malignant, is camp horror at its finest, a leaky cauldron of influences that mix into a wild third act as gory as it is unpredictable. From its murder mystery to its flickering neons to its wide-eyed, fragile protagonist, Malignant is first-and-foremost an ode to Italian giallo. Perfectly capturing the spirit of 80s and 90s B-horror, Wan conjures the forms of Dario Argento, David Cronenberg, and even Brian De Palma to craft his gory masterwork.
“From its murder mystery to its flickering neons to its wide-eyed, fragile protagonist, Malignant is first-and-foremost an ode to Italian giallo.”
Malignant opens with a not-so-unfamiliar setting of the stage: an eerie, gothic hospital pulled right from the storyboards of Scooby-Doo houses a dangerous, unseen patient. A doctor - along with security armed with tranquilizers - responds to an emergency, only to find that the patient, named Gabriel, has massacred the entire staff with otherworldly efficiency. Fast-forward to the present, where we meet the meek and perpetually doe-eyed Madison (Annabelle Wallis), in the throes of an abusive relationship with her partner. When a particularly nasty confrontation, along with a harrowing home invasion, sends Madison to the hospital with a gushing head-wound, she inexplicably forms a psychic bond with Gabriel in the midst of one of his killing sprees. Now, Gabriel’s victims - all sharing a murky history with the killer and his newfound psychic host - play out their deaths in front of Madison’s very eyes in the form of paralyzing visions.
Sure, the performances are on-the-nose and its supporting cast is nothing more than a hodgepodge of stock characters, but camp or not, there’s meticulous craft underneath Malignant’s sanguine excess. Alongside director of photography Michael Burgess, Wan knows how to assemble his set-pieces for maximum impact. An early chase sequence finds Madison on the run through her own house, filmed from a bird’s-eye view that makes her creaky abode look like a dollhouse. Everything looks and sounds great, even its score, which you’ll find either completely immersive or hilariously overbearing. Composer Joseph Bishara combines deep, classical strings oh-so-familiar to the genre with booming, electronic synths, and as a bonus, he throws in an orchestral mix of Pixies’ “Where Is My Mind” as the film’s foreshadowing leitmotif, which is sure to be divisive.
“Behind the film’s surrounding reticence? A nasty, nasty secret. Malignant’s third act careens into one of the gnarliest, bloodiest swerves in modern horror.”
I tend not to talk about a film’s marketing in reviews, but Malignant marks a special case: Its first and - in my recollection - only trailer left viewers underwhelmed, myself included. Sold as a by-the-numbers slasher flick with tints of the supernatural, nothing about it screamed what James Wan promised - a love letter to giallo and 90s serial killer fare. Coupled with scant and meager promotion, it would seem that Malignant was a looming disappointment quickly being buried. Nothing could be further from the truth. Behind the film’s surrounding reticence? A nasty, nasty secret. Malignant’s third act careens into one of the gnarliest, bloodiest swerves in modern horror. Gross, subversive, and completely over-the-top, James Wan delivers the giddiest embodiment of camp; rife with shriek-inducing body horror, a stunning physical performance from Annabelle Wallis (with likely help from a stunt double), and wanton disregard for limbs and appendages, one can only imagine Wan cackling behind the camera. And if you’re watching, you’ll cackle right alongside him.
Malignant doesn’t deliver the chills or spooks like Insidious or The Conjuring, nor is it meant to. There’s pure glee as the narrative teases out its Grand Guignol denouement, and taken at face value, Malignant is as ridiculous - and ridicule-worthy - as they come, but if you can keep your tongue in your cheek, it’s a blast from start to finish.
