[Rating: Swiss Fist]

In trying to bridge the gap between twee and horror, writers/directors Dan Berk and Robert Olsen have made a movie that is neither and struggles to find an identity as a result. The story of a pair of young outlaws on the run who happen upon a set of actual, real-deal criminals, Villains boasts a great set-up, and has a crackerjack cast behind it. Tonal inconsistency and a failure to commit to its conceit hamper the effort, however, leaving a film that is sometimes interesting, infrequently fun, and altogether scattered.  

Villains opens with young lovers Jules (Maika Monroe) and Mickey (Bill Skarsgård) robbing a gas station, only to then run out of gas a mere mile or so down the road. Such an obvious oversight in planning would be enough to inform the audience of the level of sophistication of this would-be Bonnie and Clyde, but the script doesn’t risk any mistake in this regard, showing Jules and Mickey to be more taken with the idea of being criminals than the crimes themselves. Stranded without any gas, and desperate to get on the move again, the pair break into a secluded house hoping to find a new car, and instead find a little girl chained up in the basement.

It’s right around this point that the homeowners return: an overly domesticated June and Ward Cleaver type whose plastic smiles and welcoming demeanor take Jules and Mickey even more aback. And this is where things get interesting in Villains, for these homeowners, George (Jeffrey Donovan) and Gloria (Kyra Sedgwick), seem trapped in some kind of psychosexual time warp, with their attitudes and even their furniture seemingly stuck in the past. What follows is a battle of wits and wills, with each side taking turns getting the upper hand on the other: the stakes of which couldn’t be higher considering the parties involved.

As the movie settles into its second act, George and Gloria reveal themselves to be depraved ghouls whose encounter with Jules and Mickey is akin to a spider getting robbed by a fly. The chained-up kid in the basement along with a quickly discarded video camera featuring torture porn hint at a level of depravity the young gas station thieves can’t compete with, yet a plucky score and an overreliance on goofy comedy routines keeps the tension at bay and the audience at ease. Although Villains feels like Bottle Rocket meets House of 1000 Corpses, it leans far more into the former camp than the latter, removing any real tension from the proceedings.

Even so, there’s subtext to admire, here, along with a knowing wink at the history of the film’s genre. Harkening back to flicks like The Texas Chainsaw Massacre or Last House on the Left, Villains tickles the audience’s expectations vis a vis the wandering-stranger-gone-home trope, yet manages to carve its own path in the process. Indeed, unlike those films, which commented on the decay of the working class or the persecution of the traditional family unit, Berk and Olsen lampoon the “good ol’ days” of the family values crowd, using the frozen-in-time setting of George and Gloria’s home as an indictment of such halcyon memories.

Yet it never quite comes together, and despite these intriguing maneuvers, the themes don’t mesh with the narrative in any meaningful way. The cast does a fine job with the script, with Donovan and Sedgwick both sinking their teeth deep into their dialogue with a palpable relish, yet in some ways their roles are the easy ones. They have to play smooth-talking psychopaths, sure, yet there’s little variance in what they need to do (be crazy), and as a result they can hit cruise control with their parts and really go for broke. Monroe and Skarsgård have more difficult jobs playing up the humor of the set pieces while still trying to maintain that underlying fear/desperation, and try as they might, they can’t quite pull it off.

And this isn’t their fault, really. Villains wants to be scary yet quirky, tense but funny: yet in trying to do it all, it stumbles. Had Berk and Olsen committed to either side of this spectrum they might have gotten somewhere, yet as it stands, the film feels off balance, tilting as it frequently does between two stylistic realms. Some interesting kernels pop from time to time, like George’s speech about his salesman days, or Jules’ backstory, yet too little of this develops to bear fruit enough to nourish the narrative.    

Stuck in limbo between two genres, Villains flirts with some interesting ideas and does enough good character work to keep it engaging throughout its brisk 88-minute runtime. Yet the struggle to find its footing on two different sides of the tonal fence ultimately hamstrings this one beyond salvageability, leaving the audience with more questions than answers, and more problems than plaudits. Strong performances by Donovan and Sedgwick save the film from outright failure, yet they also act as a tease for what might have been with a tighter script and more focused direction. This doesn’t make Berk and Olsen villains by any means, but it does feel like they’ve engaged in something without much of a plan: much like a pair of robbers who knock over a filling station only to then, shortly thereafter, run out of gas.

It’s getting mighty crowded this week as the Scene-Stealers Podcast ransacks Darren Aronofsky‘s provacative new headtrip mother! and sifts through the rubble. The more the merrier!

With Trey Hock, Trevan McGee, Abby Olcese, and Johnny Szlauderbach.

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The Scene-Stealers Podcast returns with 100% more women and a bonus dude!

It’s a circus this week as Trevan McGee, Trey Hock, Abby Olcese, and Johnny Szlauderbach tackle the new adaptation of Stephen King’s IT and talk Reagan-era nostalgia. (Trevan just might be stuck in Pennywise’s lair.) Stay tuned also for a peek at this fall’s most exciting releases.

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Trey and Trevan welcome new Scene-Stealers contributor Will Findley before unpacking Richard Linklater’s magnum opus Boyhood. After the discussion, the trio move on to James Gunn’s Guardians of the Galaxy. It’s a great week for film for two very different reasons.

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Trevan and Trey return to go over two new movies: Third Person from that writer/director/guy Paul Haggis, who gave us Crash.

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Trevan and Trey discuss the surprisingly touching The Fault In Our Stars before moving on to the latest Tom Cruise vehicle Edge Of Tomorrow. Then, they move on to time travel in general as a narrative mechanic in film and highlight some examples of movies that use it well.

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After a week off, Trevan and Trey are back to talk about Seth MacFarlane‘s new movie A Million Ways To Die In The West and then Trevan lets off some steam about X-Men: Days of Future Past. There’s a lot of time travel in this week’s podcast, so Huey Lewis seemed like an obvious choice for segue music. Enjoy!

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This week, Trevan and Trey talk Godzilla, the giant lizard’s return to form. Their reviews cover the first half of the podcast before moving on to welcome Molly Garrett, Joseph Tuzzolino, Erin Kennedy and Cody Hunt, four students from the Kansas City Art Institute featured in tonight’s film exhibition at the Alamo Drafthouse.

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We’re back this week with guest host Aaron Weber from DadsBigPlan.com. Trevan reviews Neighbors and Trey hits Only Lovers Left Alive. Then all three go into a discussion about comic book movies, the future of summer film, the inherent terribleness of Zach Snyder and much, much more. It’s a loose, chatty podcast. We hope you like it.

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This week, Trey dives into his love of Kaiju movies with the recent Godzilla re-releases on Blu-ray. Then, Ryan Davis from the Alamo Drafthouse Mainstreet and Adam Roberts from the Screenland Armour stop by to talk about special programming for the month of May.

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This week’s podcast features a pair of reviews from Trey before he and Trevan talk to Justin Gardner, Social Media Manager at AMC Theaters, member of the Kansas City Film Society and member of the Kansas City Film Commission. He’s a busy guy in the Kansas City film world and we were happy to talk to him about his work at AMC, his goals for the film commission and the film society, and the hidden history of film in Kansas City.

If you have a second and would like to support a local filmmaker who needs it, friend of the podcast, Joe Carey has a short film headed to Cannes. Admittedly, it’s acceptance came as some of a surprise, so now he’s trying to scrape together money to attend. If you want to pitch in, his fundrazr is here.

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Trevan and Trey talk to Nathan Reusch, CEO of The Record Machine and one of the founders/organizers of Middle Of The Map, and Peter Frend stops by to talk about some of the unsung film festivals in Kansas City. This podcast was plagued with technical difficulties (thanks, OSX Mavericks), so here’s what you need to know:

• Middle of the Map Film Fest starts today, April 16 at the Alamo Drafthouse.
• The full schedule features more than 40 films including local, national and international fare.
• Tickets are $30 for the pass, or $10 for individual screenings. You can buy them online here or at the Drafthouse throughout the festival.

If you have a second and would like to support a local filmmaker who needs it, friend of the podcast, Joe Carey has a short film headed to Cannes. Admittedly, it’s acceptance came as some of a surprise, so now he’s trying to scrape together money to attend. If you want to pitch in, his fundrazr is here.

If you don’t already, please Like us on Facebook. It’s the quickest way to get news, reviews and podcasts from us and the rest of the Web. And please subscribe to the Scene Stealers Podcast on iTunes or our RSS.

Trevan and Trey return to the Alamo Drafthouse to talk about the Kansas City Film Festival, underway right now. Comedian Chris Cubas swings by to talk about The Movie Interruption and everything else going on at The Alamo this month, and then writer/director/producer Anthony Ladesich stops by to talk about The Icarus 1 and The Secret Story of Toys, two of his projects that you can see tonight (Thursday, April 10) at the festival. You can find the full schedule here.

You can find additional reviews and write-ups of the festival right here on scene-stealers.com. And you can check back with us next week when we’ll have interviews and pieces dedicated to the Middle of the Map Film Fest. If you have a second and would like to support a local filmmaker who needs it, friend of the podcast, Joe Carey has a short film headed to Cannes. Admittedly, it’s acceptance came as some of a surprise, so now he’s trying to scrape together money to attend. If you want to pitch in, his fundrazr is here.

If you don’t already, please Like us on Facebook. It’s the quickest way to get news, reviews and podcasts from us and the rest of the Web. And please subscribe to the Scene Stealers Podcast on iTunes or our RSS.

Trevan and Trey go over a pair of movies this week: Robocop and Gloria, which couldn’t be more different. Does José Padiha‘s version of the Detroit crime fighter manage to live up to the original? Is Gloria an accessible romantic comedy or so specific that it alienates its audience? Will Trey and Trevan finally consummate their relationship live on the podcast? Find out in this week’s podcast.

If you don’t already follow us on Facebook, you should. Our Facebook page is where we post fun stuff from around the Web as well as our own reviews, 10 lists and more. It’s also a great place to go to find out more about our events like KCAI Screening Room. So what are you waiting for?

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This week, Eric takes the week off for a spa visit, so Trevan and Trey enlist the help of Film School co-curator Erin Kennedy to talk about Her, August: Osage County and Lone Survivor. We’ve already talked about Her on last week’s best-of podcasts, but you’ll want to stick around for the Oscar fodder that is August: Osage County and to hear Trey discuss Peter Berg‘s take on the real-life events of Lone Survivor.

If you don’t already follow us on Facebook, you should. Our Facebook page is where we post fun stuff from around the Web as well as our own reviews, 10 lists and more. It’s also a great place to go to find out more about our events like KCAI Screening Room. So what are you waiting for?

Subscribe to The Scene-Stealers Podcast on iTunes or our RSS.