Film Review: Jarring (2009)

SYNOPSIS:

After dialing a wrong phone number, callers are perplexed by the bizarre messages left and then haunting harasses them after their dates go missing. The caller taunts them with eccentric, disturbing prophesies leading them into a man hunt into the rural areas of southern Florida.

REVIEW:

Directed By: Ivo Raza
Starring: Geovanni Gopradi, Thomas Dunn, Lynda Lurei, Leif Lynch, Tamara Rutter, Holly Warren

Somewhere deep within the annals of cult classics in horror cinematic history there remains a permanent spot for Jarring. Without misinterpretation, this film is so awful it has to be good. Perhaps there is some artistic integrity that I’m simply not getting. Yet on every level from cinematography to directing, acting, special effects, musical score, sound effects, set and wardrobe Jarring is positively putrid. It’s comical at first then a certain sense of frustration resonates with the audience. With a premise so potentially haunting as this film the realization comes that a truly ominous tale could’ve been delivered.

Anytime a film boasts that it is based upon actual events, the set up and initial psychological ploy has found its mark. The audience’s belief system is suddenly suspended and the ‘what if’ factor is born. Apparently in southern Florida there was a bona fide maniac that had bizarre poetic, prophetic and disturbed incoherencies left on his answering machine and began to harass callers with a spree of missing people and their skin filleted from their bodies and stuffed into jars for preservation. Such a disturbing depiction belongs right up top of the list with Texas Chainsaw Massacre and other mass murder tales based upon actual events. Instead Jarring is so ridiculous one has to suspect if the director had caught a whiff of expired preserves while shooting the production at a break neck time frame of twenty days.

The villain, mysterious caller or antagonist, however you wish to label him has something chilling to say, “Everyone wears the mask of sanity simply because it is part of their vanity. They say it’s ill to kill. But who are they? Put to death. Deprive of life. Rule out. Delete, erase. Extinguish my flame. Ah, you have no clue. No money, no power, no pull. I veto your bill. I thwart your finale. I dress to kill. I’m on top of my game. You can’t. You can’t. You just simply can’t. Distinguish my name. So I asked Jack and he had to rip. Ed had no gain. What a trip; to have killed in vain. Kenny was white, Angelo good, someone’s always watching. You know you should, would, could?”

Some pretty disturbing dialogue without question. I can only hope one would begin to agree with my sense of frustration in a poorly executed production that already held so many key components to a brilliant final product. The would be killer is so bizarre its enthralling, putting the fun back into dysfunctional. His poetic prose and visions are so brilliant they’ve clearly based over the fine line into insanity.

Really the only other redeeming quality of Jarring is the attractive cast. Relative unknowns unto the film industry, perhaps they’ll look back one day with a hearty laugh over such an obscure, very humble beginning. Yet as it stands right now there is nowhere to go but up for our budding, aspiring thespians as this had to be some of the worst acting ever captured on film. The detectives appear to be distracted in most scenes either forgetting their dialogue, adding lib or reading from cue cards. The whining, sniveling, pathetic exchange between the two male leads is corny and just does not reign true of what a genuine interaction would be. They are both self-professed Mack Pimp Daddy’s yet go pursuing relentlessly after two women either of them hardly know.

The cameras often pan off into a man dressed in bio hazard gear on black and white, skewed security footage fussing about. It’s strenuous to decipher what the relevance to the plot is as it lacks any grasp of cohesion or purpose.

Even the musical score had everything from glam metal to hip hop, rap, dance and country. It’s comical to try and determine what editing or the director was going for here but the end result appeared as though they were trying too hard to appeal to a wide audience in all the wrong areas.

As initially mentioned I’m positive Jarring will be held in high revere somewhere in a cult classic collection but for this fan I’d rather see the lid remain tight on Jarring.

-One out of five tombstones

Jarring (2009)