Released in the general era of the Pandemic, Malignant is one of several films that got pushed out there either for a limited theatrical release or were moved to streaming, and like so many of those movies I don't think too many got widely circulated. Malignant in particular feels like an interesting throwback: it's an old school horror film in the sense that its a balls-to-the-wall 80's style supernatural slasher film that also manages to grab some of the modern horror film energy. I had read somewhere that the director James Wan really wanted to make a gonzo throwback horror film....and I have to say, he totally did it.
Malignant opens up on a suitably spooky sanitarium somewhere on the pacific coast, one of those immense and impossibly malevolent looking facilities practically ready to fall into the ocean. Something bad is going on here, and a patient who appears to have bizarre supernatural powers is subdued, though we never get a good look at them. Cut to years later, and we meet Madison, a woman who lives in her own form of impossibly large house is having problems with her lousy boyfriend who injured her in a fight. Not long after, she begins to experience horrific visions in which she witnesses a killer's actions while finding herself paralyzed. She seeks answers, even as the real murders begin to pile up. Can she aid the police before the killer finds her?
I'll stop here. I loved this movie. It's another one of those guilty pleasure movies I mentioned. I think I'd rank it a solid B+ but deep down inside I think this one is so close to an A that I award the B only grudgingly. If you like gonzo throwback horror with weird supernatural twists, check it out!
Okay then....
SPOILER ALERT
Yeah so Madison is not seeing through the eyes of the killer. Well, not exactly. She IS the killer! Or more accurately, her insanely evil, suppressed vestigial twin which primarily exists as a secondary face that was hidden by very effective cosmetic surgery on the back of her head. Her twin is awakened after her head injury, snapped back into awareness, and it slowly begins to take possession of Madison, subsuming her control in the fugue states she experiences. Because the twin is on her "back" it moves backwards....I believe they got a noted contortionist to do a lot of these scenes, because they are quite wild. There's an entire sequence in the police precinct that is ridiculously over the top, and if you are prone to watching spoilerific content online you have probably seen clips of it. Believe me....just watch the whole film, it is 100% a complete psycho trip and I loved every minute of it.
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