Masters of Horror: Jenifer [reviewed by Lackey]

Season 1 episode 4
Dario Argento, 2005
My rating:
IMDB

An enjoyable episode, no thanks to Dario Argento.

* * *

Premise

While on duty, policeman Frank Spivey is forced to shoot and kill a homeless man to prevent him from brutally murdering a horrifically deformed and possibly mentally retarded woman named Jenifer. Finding out she has nowhere else to go, he takes her in—an action he later comes to regret…as Jenifer is not as simple, or innocent, as she seems.

Critique

“Jenifer” is probably the weirdest episode of Masters of Horror so far. It’s based on a comic story, written by Bruce Jones and drawn by Bernie Wrightson (although only Jones is credited here), that appeared in the pages of Creepy in 1974. (You can read the story here—and I apologize to Cloud 109 for stealing the panel at right.) The teleplay’s by Steven Weber—that’s right, the same Steven Weber who played Brian Hackett on Wings for eight seasons, and he also stars. Now, Weber’s done a bit of dabbling behind the camera—he directed two episodes of the Outer Limits revival (including “Revelations of Becka Paulson,” based on a Stephen King story that ended up being worked into The Tommyknockers), but since he’s not a Master of Horror, the directorial duties go to someone else.

That someone else ends up being Dario Argento. I have some mixed feelings about Argento. As I mentioned a while back when I reviewed Suspiria, I have a hard time getting into his movies because, while I admire his visual aesthetic, that aesthetic isn’t impressive enough to make up for his consistently weak storylines.

“Jenifer” has a stronger storyline than pretty much any Argento feature I’ve ever seen, but it’s got a lot of potential it doesn’t really live up to. It’s tempting to go after Weber’s script first, but actually I think it’s the strongest aspect of the production. Yeah, its attitude towards gender relations is incredibly reductive (oh look, here’s another guy who just can’t bring himself to stop screwing the villain of the piece, even when she hasn’t wiped the blood off her face after eating the cat) and borderline misogynistic. (Weber alters one significant aspect of Jenifer’s character from the original story, which on one hand makes the episode slightly less sexist but on the other hand tightens up the all-men-think-with-their-genitals angle.) And I’m not too fond of the “ugly equals evil” assertion, either, even if it is symbolic.

But, in the end, Weber preserves the power of the original story. Masters puts a lot of focus on social commentary in its first few episodes, and social commentary is great, but it’s nice to see a more personal story every once in a while. Jenifer is, at her core, the psycho ex you can’t bring yourself to break up with because she needs you so damn bad, but not as bad as you need her to need you. (And I think it illustrates beautifully the difference between the portrayals of men and women in modern horror—compare the dynamic between Frank and Jenifer to the dynamic between Ellen and Bruce in “Mountain Road.”)

“Jenifer” gets a fair amount of stick for being predictable. It’s true that you can probably figure out within the first ten minutes how the story’s going to end, but as I’ve said before, there’s a difference between predictability and inevitability—the latter is a defining aspect of tragic fiction, and there’s definitely elements of tragedy in “Jenifer.”

Weber probably isn’t anyone’s idea of a vital and dynamic actor, but he does a good enough job with the material he gives himself. The rest of the acting, on the other hand, is all over the goddamn place. There are a couple of actors who don’t seem quite sure whether they’ve been cast in a serious horror movie or one of the bad episodes of Tales from the Crypt. Unfortunately, Carrie Fleming is one of them—and she’s the one playing Jenifer. (To Fleming’s credit, she does get her act together during a couple of scenes, and it’s hard not to feel for her at those times.) And the less said about the guy who plays Frank’s partner, the better.

The score is totally at war with the visuals. It’s provided by Claudio Simonetti, who doesn’t seem to have figured out when he should be brooding and subtle and when he should be loud and bombastic. He also makes heavy use of a set of samples I’m pretty sure is entitled Horror Music Clichés (Vol. 5). Yeah, I realize I’m probably uttering blasphemy by criticizing the keyboardist for Goblin, but it’s true.

Ultimately, though, this all goes back to Argento, the guy behind the camera and nominally in charge of the operation. He needs to keep the actors all on the same page. He needs to be able to match the music cues to the appropriate scenes. Most importantly, he needs to direct this with a little bit more flamboyance and flair—and he’s strangely muted here, save for a couple of interesting camera angles.

Still, the end result isn’t all bad, and there are a couple of people who put in a bit of work above and beyond—not just Weber, but also Nicotero and Berger, who do some wonderful work with the Jenifer make-up. If everybody had put in that level of effort, we would have something really special instead of merely enjoyable.

Season 1 Episode Ranking

1. “Incident On and Off a Mountain Road” (1.01)
2. “Jenifer” (1.04)
3. “Dreams in the Witch-House” (1.02)
4. “Dance of the Dead” (1.03)

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