Beyond the Black Rainbow --
Aesthetics are thrown around all the time when we talk about
how a film captures our attention in a way where we stare at a screen, caught
in the grip of a visual artistry that was painstaking presented by the
filmmakers involved hoping to hold us under the spell. I know I sure as hell
have used aesthetics quite a bit because it is the go to word to describe a
film that totally won me over. “Beyond the Black Rainbow” had me positively
excited as Ti West’s “House of the Devil” did so many 80s lovin’ horror fans a
couple years ago. It is one of those 80s cult sci-fi oddities made around 2010 that
magnificently mimics its influences while also going in its own direction. It
doesn’t just want to pay homage to past influences (for me, it seemed
aesthetically closer to Robert Wise’s Andromeda Strain, Logan’s Run, or 2001
than perhaps films from the 80s; it’s cult tone, though, reminds me of
Cronenberg) but has its own story to tell.
God, I know people will hurl out “this is slow as molasses”,
or “cold, clinical, pretentious”. I can’t totally argue. There are scenes where
Doc sits in an observation room and coldly (he seems to have no feeling,
although, it’s clear he obsessively gazes at his test subject with a quiet
passion that intensifies even his face seems to lash out against expressing
anything) takes his notes, turns his knobs, fluctuates light, pecks away with
his pen, prods with questions and comments delivered deliberately, all for
calculating reaction from a teenage girl that remains docile in a cell…she has
a mental power that can do some serious damage.
There's a certain idea batted about by theorists regarding this sequence in the film where it might be considered a pivotal transition in the eventual Nyle that we are introduced to at the beginning while "studying" Elena. A drug is administered and from that moment forward we see a "transformation". Once he has been completely through this, he kills Arboria's wife. Not long after Elena is born and Nyle's "purpose" seems to document his "insight" regarding her development, which would provide key evidence of his mania to us; the aforementioned nurse, Margo, lets her curiosity perhaps condemn her. Awaiting for just the right time for Margo to get on Elena's bad side, Nyle knew just when to use his "prism" to antagonize the mental power laying dormant inside his subject.
You can go on Wikipedia or read reviews on the imdb that
exhaustively detail the entire plot of Beyond the Black Rainbow, dissecting
every scene, the weird shit, mentioning David Lynch, using “fever dream” to
describe the way director Pano Cosmatos gives off a surreality to his entire
presentation, with the musical accompaniment calling to mind John Carpenter,
Tangerine Dream, and Howard Shore (I certainly felt a lot of Scanners (1982) in
the score while watching it). I wrestled with writing much at all since there's plenty online for those who want to immerse themselves in the all-knowing expertise of the information superhighway.
I’m late to the game. I have seen this film mentioned in
passing and rented it based on that word of mouth. What I read was nothing
elaborate, so the experience was especially worthwhile. This seems like a cult
film from a different era but the story isn’t all that impactful. I thought the
film reaches its full potential once Elena (Eva Allan) is free from Arboria.
Two metal fans jawing at each other at a camp fire, with one of them taking a
piss; both fall prey to the now maniacal Barry Nyle (Michael Rogers) and this
arc-shaped blade. I have no idea what point it served other than to provide seconds-long
blood squirts.
The ending, too, is rather anti-climactic. The journey out of Arboria for Elena seems to go for about twenty minutes (although it feels longer, as if it were an epic trial by fire, but Eva’s exhilaration on her face (she doesn’t speak, as much as her thought calls for a meet with her father, never to come) speaks a novel), and Nyle’s mental collapse (when we see him, he’s already psychotic; the catalyst for total collapse was his granting mentor, Dr. Arboria a “meaningful”, “respectful”, and “dignified” exit from a decreasing physical and physiological state) leads to him murdering his aloof spouse after she questions his transformation (her concern has a muted quality that doesn't have much emotion behind it; it was, to me, as if she was worried about his behavior) and pursuing the escaped Elena. In their fateful final conversation/encounter, Nyle can barely look at and talk to Arboria; in fact, he seems quietly enraged. Once Arboria dies, Nyle removes his eye implants and the wig (exactly like what his mentor wore in ’66 when introducing the world to his “enlightenment institute”), slides into a black jacket, and seems transformed into the “real him”. A colleague of his, Nurse Margo (Rondel Reynoldson), read his “observation notebook”, discovering (to her horror/disgust) a great deal of disturbing photos and seemingly nonsensical scribbling, some sexually graphic and others incomprehensible equations and diagrams, all relating to his darling Elena.
The ending, too, is rather anti-climactic. The journey out of Arboria for Elena seems to go for about twenty minutes (although it feels longer, as if it were an epic trial by fire, but Eva’s exhilaration on her face (she doesn’t speak, as much as her thought calls for a meet with her father, never to come) speaks a novel), and Nyle’s mental collapse (when we see him, he’s already psychotic; the catalyst for total collapse was his granting mentor, Dr. Arboria a “meaningful”, “respectful”, and “dignified” exit from a decreasing physical and physiological state) leads to him murdering his aloof spouse after she questions his transformation (her concern has a muted quality that doesn't have much emotion behind it; it was, to me, as if she was worried about his behavior) and pursuing the escaped Elena. In their fateful final conversation/encounter, Nyle can barely look at and talk to Arboria; in fact, he seems quietly enraged. Once Arboria dies, Nyle removes his eye implants and the wig (exactly like what his mentor wore in ’66 when introducing the world to his “enlightenment institute”), slides into a black jacket, and seems transformed into the “real him”. A colleague of his, Nurse Margo (Rondel Reynoldson), read his “observation notebook”, discovering (to her horror/disgust) a great deal of disturbing photos and seemingly nonsensical scribbling, some sexually graphic and others incomprehensible equations and diagrams, all relating to his darling Elena.
Transcendence
There's a certain idea batted about by theorists regarding this sequence in the film where it might be considered a pivotal transition in the eventual Nyle that we are introduced to at the beginning while "studying" Elena. A drug is administered and from that moment forward we see a "transformation". Once he has been completely through this, he kills Arboria's wife. Not long after Elena is born and Nyle's "purpose" seems to document his "insight" regarding her development, which would provide key evidence of his mania to us; the aforementioned nurse, Margo, lets her curiosity perhaps condemn her. Awaiting for just the right time for Margo to get on Elena's bad side, Nyle knew just when to use his "prism" to antagonize the mental power laying dormant inside his subject.
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