SOME KIND OF HATE (2015)

Studio:       Image Entertainment
Director:    Adam Egypt Mortimer
Writer:       Brian DeLeeuw, Adam Egypt Mortimer
Producer:  Amanda Mortimer, Adam Egypt Mortimer, Gabriela Revilla Lugo, Dallas Sonnier, Jack Heller
Stars:     Ronen Rubinstein, Grace Phipps, Maestro Harrell, Lexi Atkins, Sierra McCormick, Noah Segan, Andrew Bryniarski, Spencer Breslin, Michael Polish

Review Score:

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Summary:

A troubled teenager inadvertently summons a vengeful ghost to take on the bullies at a reform school camp.

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Synopsis:     Show/Hide Spoilers

Troubled teenager Lincoln Taggert is sent to Mind’s Eye Academy reform camp after stabbing a bully in the face with a fork during an altercation at school. Former students Krauss and Christine assist head guru Jack Iverson with teaching at the New Age disciplinary camp.

Isaac is assigned as Lincoln’s roommate and the two boys become friends. Kaitlin takes a romantic interest in Lincoln. Willie emerges as the camp bully and continually antagonizes Lincoln.

Following a fight with Willie, Lincoln retreats to a seemingly abandoned cellar. While wishing his tormenters were dead, Lincoln hears a girl’s voice echoing as blood begins dripping from the ceiling. After having sex with Christine, Willie follows flashing lights into one of the buildings and is attacked by a ghostly young girl.

In the morning, Kaitlin finds Willie dead from apparent self-inflicted wounds, along with the word “bully” carved into his arm. Lincoln begins seeing visions of the ghostly girl and learns that her name is Moira from a message written by her in blood on a wall.

Moira attacks Willie’s sidekick Derek while Derek works in the barn. Isaac’s internet research reveals that the girl Lincoln believes he saw is Moira Karp, a bullied teenager who supposedly killed herself while attending Mind’s Eye Academy. Lincoln rushes to the stables to warn Derek and ends up confronting Moira. Lincoln pleads with Moira to stop, but Moira counters that she is only doing what Lincoln wanted. Lincoln learns that Moira is able to harm others by harming herself when she slits her own throat with a razor blade only for Derek to die from the wound. Moira then plants the blade in Derek’s hand while telling Lincoln that she is his and he is hers.

Kaitlin asks Christine about Moira. Lincoln tells Kaitlin that Moira killed the two boys. Kaitlin initially believes Lincoln is responsible for the deaths, but supports him by saying that the bullies deserved it. Lincoln is upset when Kaitlin confesses that she used to be a bully who regrettably drove a classmate to suicide.

Lincoln returns to the basement to summon Moira and to plead with her to stop killing. Moira tells Lincoln that his anger is what brought her back and that together their vengeance can be unstoppable. When Lincoln tells Moira that he doesn’t need her anymore, Moira’s skin bubbles with blood and she doubles over in pain. Moira flees screaming.

After Lincoln leaves, Kaitlin sneaks into the cellar. She and Moira return to Kaitlin’s cabin. There, Moira cuts herself so that Kaitlin can willfully experience the pain.

The sheriff warns Iverson about potential trouble for Mind’s Eye Academy after having to collect a second body. The sheriff’s throat is then supernaturally slashed on his drive back to town.

Moira confronts Iverson while he meditates. Iverson says that Moira gave them no choice before hitting her over the head with a whiskey bottle. However, the wound appears on Iverson’s head and he collapses. Moira breaks her teeth on a rock to further torture Iverson.

Krauss tries leaving the campus, but discovers that Kaitlin slashed his tires. Moira attacks Krauss. Krauss limps to the greenhouse to seek help from Lincoln and Isaac. Moira resumes her attack and kills Krauss. When Lincoln again protests that he does not need her anymore, Moira bashes her head against a support beam to kill Isaac. Lincoln threatens to cut himself in order to hurt Moira.

Lincoln runs away. Christine confronts him at gunpoint over presumably murdering Willie and restrains Lincoln to a faucet.

Kaitlin finds Moira cutting fellow student Samantha. Kaitlin protests Samantha’s innocence in the bullying, but Moira continues torturing the girl. Moira pleads with Kaitlin when Kaitlin angrily insists that she no longer needs Moira.

Christine finds the two girls. Kaitlin leaves, allowing Christine and Moira to face each another. Moira confronts Christine about lying to her parents regarding how she actually died. It is revealed that even though Moira was depressed over being bullied while alive, Christine actually killed her. Krauss and Iverson were witnesses who aided with the suicide cover-up. Christine shoots Moira thinking she will kill the ghost but ends up blowing off her own head.

Kaitlin finds Lincoln, professes her love, and frees him. Together they confront Moira. When Moira begins gaining the upper hand against Kaitlin, Lincoln sets himself on fire to kill Moira. Kaitlin puts out the flames on Lincoln’s dead body and angrily uses the fire extinguisher to bash in Moira’s head.

In a mid-credits scene, a young girl alone in a high school bathroom wishes for her tormenters be dead, inadvertently summoning Moira as blood drips from the ceiling.

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Review:

After retaliating against a high school bully by putting a fork in his tormenter’s face, troubled teenager Lincoln Taggert is shipped off to Mind’s Eye Academy, a combination reform school and seeming cult compound at an isolated camp in the California desert.  The location changes, but the situation doesn’t.  Even though he gains a new friend in bunkmate Isaac and romantic interest in cheerleader-gone-bad Kaitlin, Lincoln trades one problem for another when Willie emerges as the new troublemaker throwing insults into his ear and punches into his face.

Lincoln retreats to a cellar for solace and wishes out loud for Willie to be dead.  Someone hears him.  And she wants to oblige.

It turns out that Lincoln is not the first bullying victim to descend into desperation on the campus of Mind’s Eye Academy.  Moira Karp once found herself in the same place too, and her apparent way out was through a razor blade to the wrist.  Inadvertently conjured by Lincoln’s boiling hatred and teenage frustration, Moira returns as a supernatural spirit ready to carry out Lincoln’s desire for revenge and then some.  Lincoln now has an even greater problem of figuring out exactly how to put this genie back into her bottle, if such a thing is even possible.

One way to quickly categorize director Adam Egypt Mortimer’s “Some Kind of Hate” is as a vengeful teenage ghost story, not entirely unlike somewhat similarly themed thrillers such as “Ouija” (review here) or “Unfriended” (review here).  Whereas films like the latter two are designed to attract high-schoolers looking for R-rated fun on a Friday night, “Some Kind of Hate” doesn’t have the same Cineplex sheen of popcorn appeal.  That’s a good thing.  More conventional youth-centric thrillers might have an edge as mainstream draws with their prettily populated casts and hollow jump jolts.  “Some Kind of Hate” has its sights set on mood and meaning over empty scare tactics, setting it apart in the subgenre as a more mature supernatural teen slasher.

Not only does “Some Kind of Hate” take terror seriously, it has the professional passion to execute on ambition without exceeding abilities.  The setting is simple, yet the photography is stark, dark, sharp, gritty, and polished in equal doses, maintaining cohesive atmosphere no matter the moment.  The cast is never campy, uninspired, or out of tune with the tone.  Most important of all, the theme of bullying is not cheaply exploited.  There is no heavy-handed messaging, but “Some Kind of Hate” respects the importance of its idea by creatively exploring guilt, retribution, redemption, and the limits of justifiable vengeance.  This is a slasher film with style and substance.

Consider the indie horror box covers touting their films as introducing “the next” Pinhead, Freddy Krueger, Michael Myers, etc.  More often than not, attempts to specifically engineer slasher icons settle on marketable looks, maybe even a catchphrase or distinguishing tagline to boot, without devoting the same attention to backstory or murder motivations.

Moira does have a necklace made of razor blades, an arguably on-the-nose inclusion, but her purpose is otherwise unconcerned with an action figure-ready appearance or merchandising hook.  Moira is a traumatized teenager instead of an empty-masked incarnation of all-purpose evil written to wordlessly wield a bloody blade.  Although serving as an embodiment of vengeance made flesh, Moira’s most meaningful value is to center the story’s tragedy on relatable notions of sadness, sympathy, empathy, and emotion.

A misunderstood, brooding bad boy.  A round-stomached, tech-savvy nerd-type for his de facto best friend.  A sultry sass-mouth to give him a lip bite and a raised eyebrow for sexual tension.  Despite fitting familiar biographies, “Some Kind of Hate” turns these descriptions into realistic characters instead of clichéd stereotypes.  Rather than employing archetypes out of laziness or lampooning them as meta-commentary on horror tropes, Mortimer and co-writer Brian DeLeeuw simply utilize embodiments of typical teenage traits without drawing unnecessary attention by trying too hard to “be” that description.

Another reason why “Some Kind of Hate” transcends stereotyping is because it burns through its exposition rapidly.  The film has enough respect for its audience to not loiter longer than necessary on establishing obvious relationship ties.  Some disorientation goes along with how fast Lincoln and Isaac become friends, or Lincoln and Kaitlin become lovers for instance, but “Some Kind of Hate” is rightfully content in assuming you simply get it.  That gap-hurdling pace ensures that there isn’t time for anyone to overstay a rote introduction, although the condensed pace ends up as both a boon and a hindrance.

Down the backstretch, timeline compression trades on believability.  One character professes intense feelings for another under the pretense of loving him more than she has ever loved anyone, even though their total screentime from first meet to dramatic proclamation is probably about six minutes.  Then comes a slow-motion “phoenix rising” sequence set to an operatic aria.  The climax begins rattling into disappointment as it slips into conventions when the movie had previously demonstrated such deft efficiency at avoiding them.  Some of these missteps taken to mount towards the resolution become more than the movie needs without staying in step to the style.

A retooled final 10-15 minutes might make “Some Kind of Hate” exceptional.  That isn’t meant to diminish what it already achieves as a slasher film that is head, shoulders, and torso above its competition.  Even with a bumpy road of underdeveloped subplots that see some characters coming and going too quickly, “Some Kind of Hate” finishes strong as a memorable, meaningful movie whose slasher is not a boogeyman, but a conduit channeling context into the commentary and heft into the horror.

NOTE: There is a mid-credits scene.

Review Score:  80

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