Warning, this movie deals with subject matter similar to last year’s Daniel Isn’t Real and the cult classic, Drop Dead Fred. It deals with imaginary friends. Second warning, I’m going to embarrass myself. Here goes nothing. The subject of imaginary friends is something found more in an only child or perhaps children of divorce. Before I go any further, it should be worth noting, that is pure observation and nothing actually grounded in science. I, like most kids, played pretend. Growing up, I wanted to be an actor. If I was ever actively using my imagination, it was to reenact a scene from a movie that I had just watched. Like when I saw Tim Burton’s Planet of the Apes as a kid, I walked on all fours like an ape for a month. Movies just profoundly impacted me in that way.
I entertained myself a lot of time, like the ape walk, as a young child. I pretended that I was head of my own movie studio called “Perfection Studios”. I’m not entirely sure where that nonsense came from but I made a logo and plastered it over all my VHS’. Of course with fake fame comes fake girlfriends. I didn’t have imaginary friends, I had an imaginary life with imaginary girlfriends. To be fair, a large portion of this time came as a result of losing my grandmother. In my teen years, I still had dreams of Hollywood. Though the older I got, the more I realized that it probably wasn’t truthfully for me. Eventually, my passion for film led me here to write reviews of them. Sometimes it’s the imaginary that can be the most dangerous. Co-writer and director, Brandon Christensen, tackles such dangers in the horror film, Z.
Z tells the story of a young boy (Jett Klyne) who creates an imaginary friend, simply named “Z”, who brings destruction and a mysterious past to the young boy’s family. While this is a subject we’ve seen before, see the aforementioned films in Daniel and Fred, Z brings a new spin to the mythology. What helps separate Z from other films is that Klyne stays a young child throughout the duration of the movie. We never once see the aftermath that follows him into adulthood - making this horror film refreshing to say the least. Also, having a child at the center of your story is always terrifying. While that’s a thread within horror that isn’t always properly executed well, Christensen proves that his vision is the exception.
He has such a subtle way of dropping hints and clues for the turn of the young boy’s character. The opening sequences are some of the most pure that I’ve seen in a film in a while. It’s a soothing piano tune, featuring the score by Brittany Allen, and a host of scenes with Klyne playing with trains. By the time, that we actually get to the destruction of his character, enough has been planted to make it effective. What helps Z stand out from other films like it is the theme of legacy and mythology that Christensen brings to the film. I would compare his approach to the mythology that Jon Watts, and Christopher Ford, brought to 2014’s Clown. At the center of that legacy is incredible Keegan Connor Tracy. Tracy plays the Klyne’s mother - however, there is a twist with her character that I won’t divulge here. It’s in that twist that the film takes on new life, making the horror even more effective, and promoting Tracy’s role to one of the best performances she’s given in her entire career.
Overall, Z might be imaginary as the film’s antagonist, but the horror is anything but imaginary. Z is as terrifying as it is riveting. Co-Writer and director Brandon Christensen breaks the mold of the imaginary friend horror trope to bring the film into new grounds. Setting a young boy in Jett Klyne at the center of your story is both brave and unsettling, which in the long run makes the horror effective. Add in the performance from Keegan Connor Tracy and you have yourself a horror delight that will place you on the edge of your seat and scare you to death. Z is marvelously unsettling and a horror film that is worthy of cult status.
RORSCHACH RATING:
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Victims and Villains is written Josh "Captain Nostalgia" Burkey (and produced by), Caless Davis, Dan Rockwood, & Brandon Miller. Music by Mallory Johnson and others. Z is property of RLJE Films & Shudder. We do not own nor claim any rights. Z is streaming exclusively on Shudder, beginning & is also available on physical Sept. This review was edited by Cam Smith.
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