“American Mary” is one of my most anticipated horror films of the year. It’s the second feature from sisters Jen and Sylvia Soska. The same duo behind the crazy film “Dead Hooker in a Trunk”. This is a change of pace from that film, as this is a more serious horror film.
The film follows Mary Mason (Katherine Isabelle) a broke medical student who has become more and more disillusioned with her teachings and everything that she liked about becoming a doctor. Then one day, she’s offered an opportunity to do a body modification on a person. This leads to easy money, which she needs. It sends her down a road into the dark world of underground surgery and body modification, which she may never get out of.
Going into this film, I thought it would live up to some of my expectations. Never did I think that this film would be very good enough to be consider as one of the best horror films of 2013, but it did. “American Mary” is one of those rare films that lives up to my expectations and then some.
The direction was very good. Jen and Sylvia Soska both did a very good job with the way that they handled the direction. They made the dark tone of the story work well on screen. From the dark images to the way that they handled their direction, the Soska sisters made everything feel dark and gloomy. Something helps makes this film interesting. But one of the two things that makes this film for me was the performances. The Soska sisters did a very good job with the way that they handle the performances. The performance help keep this film very interesting especially with the subject matter. They make sure the performances of each of the cast made their characters stand out from each other. It helped add to the weird tone of the film and also made them interesting as characters. This was a much more mature effort than their last film.
Speaking of the performances, they were very good. Katherine Isabelle is amazing as the lead character, best performance in horror film that I’ve seen this year. She makes her character very dark and gothic like. The performance helped the tone of the character work, as it made the character more interesting as the film went along.
This is easily her best performance since “Ginger Snaps” back in 2000. The film also has very good supporting performances from Antonio Cupo and Tristen Risk. Both of their performances also helps move the film, as they brought personality to their characters that keeps your interest.
Jen and Silvia Soska’s screenplay is the other thing that stood out for me. It felt original and didn’t feel like the carbon copy horror screenplay. They did a very good job with coming out with a story that had a serious tone while creating characters that stand out. It made the film have its identity. By doing that, it makes everything feel like something that you’ve haven’t seen before. The other thing that made the screenplay good was the way it develops it main character. It focuses on the character, as she goes into the very dark world of body modification and how it affects her and her state of mind. That’s done very effectively, as it makes you interested in the character considering all the twisted stuff that goes on during the course of the film.
“American Mary is clearly in the running along with “The Lords of Salem” as one of the best horror films of the year so far. With a great performance from Katherine Isabelle and very good direction from Jen and Sylvia Soska “American Mary” is a twisted and shocking horror film.
“American Mary” is available through various VOD platforms and in limited release.
Review Rating: Five Stars
