Longlegs, written and directed by Osgood/Oz (Gretel & Hansel/The Blackcoat's Daughter) Perkins, is an occult-slanted, serial-killer yarn set in the 1990s, which highlights a long-time psycho who once encountered a little girl, who's now grown into a Clarice Starling surrogate named Lee Harker, portrayed by Maika (It Follows/Watcher) Monroe. As a FBI agent, she's intent on squashing the titular fiend and the theorized, satanic sect that abets him. (There's an insinuation, as well, that her intuitions may be psychic-prone, and if so, this gives her an essential edge.)
The enigmatic Longlegs, who performs like an invasive arachnid, taunts the authorities with coded notes (more or less in tune with the Zodiac Killer and Jack the Ripper) and is played with expected, esoteric flavor by the masterful Nicolas Cage, who also coproduced. Longlegs' influence manifests in rural locales to prompt fathers to murder their families, with the daughters of such all born on the fourteenth of various months. For added creepiness, Longlegs projects a pasty persona that's in league with the Chainsaw Massacre clan and perhaps one of Rob Zombie's sadistic ensembles, but with the hypnotic draw of Poltergeist's Reverend Kane. To boot, he's a songster cut from a T. Rex/Tiny Tim cloth, with the specialized skills to create ultra-realistic, life-size dolls.
Though Cage's "cuckoo" is as magnetic as he's repellent, it's Monroe's Harker who leads us into his demented dimension. (Her eyes are ours.) Harker is easy to appreciate for her intelligence and determination, even if anchored by a quirky, religious mother, played with guilt-ridden anguish by Alicia (Dune 1984/Urban Legend) Witt. There are times when it appears the twisted circumstances could break Harker, particularly when they allude to an unsettling link to her past and the weird memories attached to such, but this only makes us root for her more, as Longlegs applies an incessant, nail-biting pace to the chase.
The rest of the cast supports the investigative segues well: Blair Underwood as Agent Carter (Harker's paternal boss); Michelle Choi-Lee's Agent Browning; Dakota Daulby's Agent Fisk; and Kiernan Shipka's snippy, institutionalized Carrie Anne Camera, the only documented, Longlegs victim to deflect death.
Since Longlegs springs from Hannibal Lecter's lurid escapades, the Psycho saga, Se7en, Dexter, The Usual Subjects and at various points (due to its slow-burn build), Hereditary, Barbarian, The Lure, Stopmotion and (because of its peculiar, vibrational devices) Phantasm, it lacks wall-to-wall originality. However, it does work as a magnificent, Grand Guignol mystery, with a pervading air of palpable foreboding, crafty scares and distinct personalities, thanks in huge part to Perkins' astute artistry. (Perkins, the son of Norman Bates actor, Anthony Perkins, has stated that the movie's concept was, in part, inspired by aspects of his father's "complicated" life. This only adds to the movie's baleful mystique, which should attract curious fans of the revered actor.)
It's not hard to infer that I enjoyed Longlegs. If you possess a penchant for probing, psychological horror, you'll enjoy it, too.
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