As Above, So Below
Directed by: John Erick Dowdle
Written by: John Erick Dowdle & Drew Dowdle
Starring: Perdita Weeks, Ben Feldman, Edwin Hodge, François Civil, Marion Lambert, Ali Marhyar, Cosme Castro
Horror/Thriller - 93 min Reviewed by Charlie Juhl on 30 Aug 2014
Written by: John Erick Dowdle & Drew Dowdle
Starring: Perdita Weeks, Ben Feldman, Edwin Hodge, François Civil, Marion Lambert, Ali Marhyar, Cosme Castro
Horror/Thriller - 93 min Reviewed by Charlie Juhl on 30 Aug 2014
As Above, So Below is the first horror film I am aware of set in the Parisian catacombs. The mass grave beneath the streets of Paris is one of the most logical locations to film a horror movie; there are bones stacked up in row upon row for tourists to stroll by and gawk at. I have been on the catacombs tour and even though you are surrounded by the remnants of dead people, the whole place feels remarkably sterile and almost ordinary. There must be off limits sections though; places where the walls are not reinforced or even secret chambers. As Above, So Below uses the idea of these out of the way nooks and crannies to launch itself.
Guiding us down into the depths is Scarlett (Perdita Weeks, 2013's The Invisible Woman). She is your standard mid-twenties urban archaeologist with two Ph.Ds. and a master’s in chemistry for the cherry on top. We first meet Scarlett sneaking into Iran for a cave dive right before it is wired to implode by a couple megatons worth of explosives. She must be the long lost daughter of Indiana Jones. Discovering an artifact in a matter of two minutes her father was unable to locate during a lifetime of spelunking must make her feel either eerily lucky or reconsider her father’s aptitude.
Guiding us down into the depths is Scarlett (Perdita Weeks, 2013's The Invisible Woman). She is your standard mid-twenties urban archaeologist with two Ph.Ds. and a master’s in chemistry for the cherry on top. We first meet Scarlett sneaking into Iran for a cave dive right before it is wired to implode by a couple megatons worth of explosives. She must be the long lost daughter of Indiana Jones. Discovering an artifact in a matter of two minutes her father was unable to locate during a lifetime of spelunking must make her feel either eerily lucky or reconsider her father’s aptitude.
Scarlett seeks the mythical Philosopher’s Stone. She believes in the science of alchemy and that a French alchemist created the stone capable of granting immortal life half a millennium ago. Following Scarlett around is Benji (Edwin Hodge), a documentary filmmaker who serves two functions, he provides the audience with the found footage and shaky camera work and asks Scarlett probing questions which helpfully lets us know where we are, what we’re looking at, and a bit about her deceased father.
In Paris, Scarlett picks up a local crew of partiers / catacomb experts who will guide her to where vague clues and incomplete maps tell her she must go. She also picks up an old friend, George (Ben Feldman, AMC's Mad Men), who nonchalantly translates Aramaic for her but has no intention of going into the caves; he had a traumatic experience in a cave as a child. Hands up if you think George will end up navigating the caves with the rest of the ad hoc treasure hunters.
It takes the film at least half of its running time for the jump scares to start and for inner demons to commence plucking off the group members one by one. The deeper and more lost the group becomes, more references to the gates of hell and such keep popping up. Not so subtle memories become real and confront the beholder. George sees his long dead little brother and a piano they used to play on. Scarlett sees her father. A bit of incongruity shows up as some memories are powerful enough to kill the person and others just harass and scare.
Aiding the shrieking jump scares is the cinematography. Some group members have cameras attached to their headlamps that bounce us around with them and convenient editing always shows us the action from the best point of view. As people start dying, we lose track of whose camera is where; I am not sure how all of the camera footage was supposed to be ‘found’ to create the found footage here. Even though our catacomb divers are running and screaming, the shaky cam is not as bad as it was in The Blair Witch Project or Cloverfield, but it is no Paranormal Activity steady cam either.
I like the idea of horror hiding out in the Parisian catacombs; there really are not too many other spots on Earth with such ready-made surroundings already displaying death and dismemberment. That said, As Above, So Below does not stretch the found footage horror genre too far. One change that would have made the film so much better would be ditching the found footage nonsense and bringing back sturdy tripods. Scarlett’s knack for figuring out clues and the next step reminded me more of The Goonies than a girl who supposedly has a pound and a half of advanced degrees. There is more screaming, confusion, and shaky camera work than is good for it, but certain episodes are remarkably effective. Are you claustrophobic? If so, As Above, So Below is not your idea of a good time. I felt closed off and quite empathetic when characters get stuck and can’t move. The ideas in As Above, So Below have mountains of potential; unfortunately, the audience walks away with nothing they have not seen before, just more bones this time.
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