After launching a home-invasion franchise with the simple premise of three masked figures terrorizing a couple on the rocks, “The Strangers” creator Bryan Bertino has maintained his sensibility as a writer-director, spinning other original horror chamber pieces unmoored by sympathy. Now, the horror helmer’s latest effort shows characteristic daring in its detachment.
Generically titled “Vicious,” the film offers a spare setup — a depressed young woman is wracked by hallucinations — with little definition of what is afflicting her or why. The writer-director doesn’t solicit sympathy for Polly (played by Dakota Fanning) or impose meaning on her suffering. It’s a very naked approach to horror, entirely propped up on formal execution. In other words, he risks leaving the audience with nothing. And that comes to pass in “Vicious,” which trickles down to Paramount’s streaming service after being slashed from the studio’s theatrical slate.
Bertino finds an ample engine in Fanning, at least. The opening introduces her character aglow in red light, complemented by a narrated monologue, vaguely written but delivered as pure, possibly suicidal despair. It’s clear that something is eating away at her, and that impression sticks in proceeding scenes, with the holiday season shut-in Polly half-heartedly preparing for a job interview and calming down her concerned mother over the phone.
These early, somber moments cast a mood, but the film is eager to hold Polly’s feet to some fire. “Vicious” has the devoted attention for its lead that Roman Polanski’s domestic horror classics “Repulsion” and “Rosemary’s Baby” did, but Bertino has a more gung-ho gameplan. Instead of gradually boiling into insanity, the film hits fever pitch hallucinations right away and quickly exhausts itself attempting to keep pace.
The rubber meets the road when Polly receives a mysterious box from a bewitching, raspy old woman (Kathryn Hunter, the current go-to for that type of thing — and deservedly so). It comes with a ticking hourglass and a series of vague challenges: Give the box “something you hate, something you need, something you love.” It’s an instruction brimming with technicalities, forcing Polly to excavate her most personal traumas. It also leads to some sliced body parts and grimy-looking strangers, who tap Polly on the shoulder for a scare before disappearing.
That’s all disappointing, familiar horror imagery, but “Vicious” gets by on atmosphere for a good while before that. A crackling fireplace casts a dull pall over Polly’s living room, but it’s the only warmth in her stupendously cavernous home. The house appears to exist at the end of the universe, so much so that it comes as a surprise when Polly briefly dashes to a neighbor’s place seeking a lifeline. But when that stranger ends up possessed within minutes, stabbing herself in the face and sending Polly back out into the cold, it seems like no other development would’ve made more sense. There are no helping hands when the entire movie may or may not be unfolding inside someone’s head.
That credo reasserts itself as Polly begins to be haunted by visions of her loved ones. Bertino strictly withholds from elaborating on her personal history — a self-imposed limit that ultimately keeps the film from getting under the skin, but does serve to further emphasize Polly’s isolation. One memorable moment comes early, when another call between Polly and her mother tilts into dread as the voice on the phone morphs into a more callous, sinister being. It’s a trick that “Vicious” is smart to return to, with its scant side characters offering Polly brief warmth before revealing themselves as vessels for the demon haunting her. Fanning’s tensed, squirrelly performance comes to life in these spots, with Polly’s waning trust and fear of betrayal cluing into a wounded self-loathing that becomes the film’s best lasting impression.
But “Vicious” is mostly a numbing slog. Fanning flatlines when left to be a solo show as Bertino whacks her around like a pinball, hitting big, loud scares that seem to keep resetting. As Polly excavates the darkest parts of herself, the film can’t string together a build to match the depths of her soul-searching. The movie devolves into something inexact and thoughtless, without anything distinct to recenter it. It’s hardly a sin for cruelty to be the point, especially in horror. But you have to at least land your punches.
“Vicious” is now streaming on Paramount+.
