I watched a lot of slasher flicks in my teens. I mean, a LOT. So many that I pretty much burned out on them by the time I graduated high school, and even now it takes a lot to get me to watch a new one. For some reason I can revisit the old classics fairly easily – Friday the 13th or Halloween or Nightmare on Elm Street. NEW slashers, though? They usually have to do something special or different for me to give them a shot. Like Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon or You’re Next or Happy Death Day.
So I tend to go into any slasher movie with low expectations Make of that what you will.
The Medium
Disclaimer: I received a streaming screener of He Never Left. I like the opportunity to see films this way, but I’m not beholden to them and I have chosen not to review films I’ve received like this in the past.
He Never Left will be released to theaters for a limited run on November 1 and on VOD starting November 5.
The Movie
We start off with introductory text telling us about about the “Pale Face” killer, who terrorized the town of Larsen City until 1997, when the murders suddenly stopped. He was never caught. This all vaguely reminds me of The Town That Dreaded Sundown. I like the way the title reveals itself out of the text. We’re then taken to a small motel where a murder is taking place. A man in black stabs a woman, she fights back but is overpowered. We fade to black, and the opening credits start.
The murder scene is a bit underwhelming – I’m not sure if it’s the pace or the staging, but it didn’t convey the sense of drama or excitement or fear that I would expect from the opening kill of a slasher film.
The opening credits, though, are pretty good. It’s Halloween season (as attested to by the decorations and jack-o-lanterns in the first scene), and we’re treated to long, slow drone shots of a car moving through some absolutely beautiful scenery. It’s all in shades of orange and black (or dark green), and it sets the mood very well – assisted by the soundtrack, which is moody, but not distracting. The scenery is beautiful enough that I find myself wondering where it was shot, and if I can go there.
This is how the movie progresses for me. Scenes that are simply… there. That get the job done, but nothing more. Followed by scenes with something really good about them – a performance, the way it’s shot or edited, a nicely paced bit of plot.
The car finally arrives at a motel – the same motel from the opening murder? I’m inclined to think so. A woman named Carly (Jessica Staples) checks in, and things are sketchy from the outset. The motel is cash only, for one. (Having had a near-slasher experience in the boonies of Prince Edward Island once, I’m big on making sure you leave an electronic trail of where you’ve been. You can hear about in in the Psycho Canon podcast if you want to hear more details.) For another, the wifi password is “noturningback” (all one word, all lower case). I mean, that’s just not cool. You see what I mean? Sketchy.
Carly, it turns out, is renting the room for her boyfriend Gabriel (Colin Cunningham). He’s on the run, having done something bad. Something very bad. Gabriel, the ex-con, is perfectly played by Cunningham. He’s all wife beater t-shirt, twitchy movements, too-fast talking and a weasely face that looks both tortured and kind of mean. Carly is worn down by life, and with a boyfriend like Gabe it’s pretty easy to see why. Gabe has been trying to walk the straight and narrow since he was released from prison, but it hasn’t been easy. And whatever he’s done is bad enough that he puts a towel over the mirror, rather than look at himself.
Carly can’t afford to be seen with Gabe. She’s trying to get her kid back. And Gabe can’t be seen either, as he’s wanted by the authorities. He’ll lay low in the room until he can get a friend to get him out of town. And then that night Gabe hears someone get murdered in the next room.
I’m all in at this point. I love this setup. Gabe can’t call the cops, can he? He can’t even let the manager know he’s there – his face is all over the news. Things get even weirder when Carly shows up with supplies and goes over to check on the person – and the woman answers. Gabe is already seeing things – the bloody apparition of someone he can’t look at – is he hearing things too? And I can’t say enough about Colin Cunningham. He’s fantastic. Maybe a little too jittery at points, but he’s believable and even likeable. I’m invested in Gabe and his fate.
Not so much the cops that are introduced after that. They look fine, but I don’t believe them as cops for a second. Every time they’re on the screen I’m pulled out of the narrative. It doesn’t help that their part in the story – the investigation of Gabe’s crime and pursuit of him – also contains the myth building for the Pale Face killer. This is a series of abductions and (presumably) murders that occurred more than 25 years ago, yet the missing posters we see are all brand new. The locals react to any mention of the killer as if he was taking people yesterday. Details matter, and those posters should be faded, tattered. Even if people are putting them up over and over there should be layers of older versions below the new ones. The locals should have turned all this into a legend by now. An “oooh, the bogeyman!” story. I believe Gabe. I don’t believe this town or these cops.
Things start out fairly tight, storywise, and get looser and looser as the film progresses. I get the feeling that director (and actor/screenwriter) James Morris wants to fit a number of different twists and turns in the film, as well as elements that are homages to other slasher films. It’s a commendable intent, but I don’t feel like it completely works. Things don’t quite dovetail as murders pile up and “Pale Face” makes his inevitable return. Characters say and do things that don’t make sense, at least to me. There are moments and elements of import that aren’t made clear. And in the end, the film takes a turn into a different kind of slasher film – one I didn’t expect and that I don’t think works without more buildup of other characters in previous scenes.
The Bottom Line
He Never Left has some good bones, some good performances and the occasional outstanding piece of cinematography. There are enough twists and turns to the plot to keep things interesting, but you may feel like they don’t always line up as well as they could. Another pass or two at the screenplay could have tightened things up, made the dots connect a bit more clearly. That being said, I enjoyed the movie, and Colin Cunningham is excellent as the main protagonist, Gabriel, but there are missteps in both casting and storyline that prevent the film from entering the upper tier of indie slashers.
