Return to Sender

Not Even Decent Gore Can Save the Orphan From its own Gimmicks
by Morgan P Salvo

 Opening with an over-the-top bloody delivery room dream sequence Orphan, shows some promise. But quickly dissolves into formulaic horror movie 101 with an insulting script destined to make you roll your eyes over fifty times.

This insidious stab at the genre takes everything beyond believability, losing any credibility almost immediately. Troubled wife (Vera Farmiga) has demons to exorcise from her past revolving around the loss of her daughter. With two kids already and the blessing of a worthless psychiatrist (inadequately played by Margo Martindale), she and husband John (Peter Sarsgarrd) are off to an orphanage to pick smiling and lonely Esther (Isabelle Fuhrman). Artistic intelligent and world-savvy, Esther is no regular small fry. Unconvincingly enamored the couple takes the child home to ruin their lives with one despicable act after another.
When things go dastardly wrong around them like accidents and murders, it becomes unclear (not to mention maddening) as to why it’s so difficult for the parents to connect the dots. These smart people don’t believe, trust or support one another to any degree. That aside the biggest question remaining is that with all the psycho babble and soap opera discourse, why a dysfunctional family would be allowed to (or even want to) add another member to their family, let alone a 9 year old anti-social loner that they don’t even test drive with the entire family. The futile wedge that Esther seemingly draws between family members is already there and poorly conveyed. First time writers David Johnson (screenplay) and Alex Mace (story) want us to believe that Mom is going crazy without one iota of imagination in the storytelling. Not even any surreal images to confuse us, just by-the–book dialogue that borders on defective. The poor script and laughable dialogue along with actors tugging on real emotions just made this movie more pathetic as it progressed. When one of the lines describing a character’s level of deafness is, “She can hear good enough to read lips”, you know you’re in trouble. I kept thinking of what a treat this movie would’ve been if it was made in the late 60’s or 70’s. With bad acting and crummy sets this could have been a grade-z drive-in classic. As it is, the best part of this movie is Esther’s artwork and the creepy credits.
Director Jaume Collet-Serra (House Of Wax remake) tries his darnedest to make this movie look cool and delivers a few decent jolts but can’t raise any life from the dead predictable script. Even with all the horror movie scare tricks (including the dreaded medicine cabinet mirror closing scene), stylish direction and snowy scenery this movie goes in the direction of completely ludicrous way too many times. Bad cinema gimmicks abound: a poorly hidden diary, a Russian bible containing secrets, ribbons covering scars, bludgeoning, car wrecks, pigeon abuse, stabbings and fires are all tossed into the mix of conventional clichés. On the plus side, Orphan does deliver some gruesome gory scenes and doesn’t skimp on the blood. It’s The Omen gone turbo with a serial killer flair, rather than supernatural demonic possession.
The cast members perform way too intensely, as if believing they're actually in a good film. Farmiga expresses a myriad of emotions--- in fact too many for one character to ever have in any one movie: love, rage, joy, self-confidence, self-pity, self righteousness and super-doubt as the beleaguered wife and mother. Fuhrman is great as the sinister smarty pants, and both kids Max and Daniel (Aryana Engineer ,Jimmy Bennett) act genuinely frightened as tormented children. The main exception is Sarsgaard who whines his way through his role like he wishes he was in another movie.
There is a supreme twist ending that had me chuckling to myself, though I wouldn’t say it falls under the heading of a shocker. The tag line says, “You’ll never guess her secret.” By the time it’s revealed my guess is you’ll be passed the point of caring. Orphan needs its adoption papers revoked and deserves solitary confinement.

Orphan
Starring Vera Farminga, Peter Sarsgaard, Isabelle Fuhrman, Aryana Engineer, Jimmy Bennet
Directed by: Jaume Collet-Serra
 1 star for the ludicrous trick ending and artwork