LITERAL REMAINS

Is Grace weird?  Yeah.  Is Grace unsettling?  Yeah, in places, but it may be more so from the male perspective.  If you’re tired of some of the dumb horror offerings of late, then you need to see this movie.  Graceis the kind of movie you just have to watch, and it will mean different things to different people.  What I took away from it will, most likely, be different than what a lot of others will perceive.  Whatever it is, despite it’s few shortcomings, it’s good.

Michael and Madeline Matheson are in an automobile accident.  Madeline is pregnant and not far from her due date.  The accident kills Michael, and their unborn child.  Madeline decides to carry the baby to full term, utilizing a midwife and rejecting modern hospital birthing.  When Madeline gives birth to her stillborn daughter, a miracle happens:  after holding her child, the baby begins to breathe and cry.  Madeline names her Grace.

It’s not long before Madeline discovers some peculiarities to her new baby.  Grace has a smell about her.  Grace attracts flies.  Oh, one other thing, Grace can only tolerate blood.  Human blood.  It’s poor Madeline left alone to suffer, literally bleeding for her child.

Luckily, there’s Vivian, Madeline’s nosy, bossy, mother-in-law.  Vivian has some issues all her own; one can fairly say they are serious issues.  The idea of her only grandchild living alone with Madeline (to whom she never gave the stamp of approval anyway) doesn’t gel with her.  Vivian sets into motion a plan to have Madeline deemed unfit, thanks to Vivian’s doctor friend, and thus delivering Grace into her caring, motherly, arms.

Grace has a clinical atmosphere that nearly alienates the audience from the characters.  It’s a hindrance at times, such as when Michael dies (you really don’t miss him, but after seeing his mother, you see where he gets it from).  But as Madeline bonds with Grace, so do we with the movie.  It’s not perfect, writer/director Paul Solet has a tendency to show off a little too much, creatively, with the camera.  But overall, this is a rare, smart, find in a genre teeming with lousy remakes and endless, idiotic, sequels.

4 out of 5
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