Spontaneous has notions of being this yearâs Happy Death Day, with its caustic sense of humor and anti-heroine lead, but lands somewhere closer to Me and Earl and the Dying Girl only with considerably less pathos and a payoff so rushed and anticlimactic itâs a wonder the film doesnât end with instructions to go to a website and watch the rest. Itâs not that there isnât room for indie cinema to cross over into horror comedy and make some kind of crazy mutant baby, but when both sides are so badly underrepresented, as they are here, it suggests maybe developing one side before diving into the other might be a smarter idea.
At least Katherine Langford finally changed her hair, thatâs something (if you suffered through 13 Reasons Why, youâll understand). Sheâs ostensibly the lead here, Mara, a petulant, disrespectful brat weâre supposed to empathise with because, I dunno, she gives people the finger a lot? What a rebel! Mara has loving parents (played by Piper Perabo and Rob Huebel, which must mean weâre all getting very old), a nice home, a BFF (Riverdaleâs Hayley Law), and a boy with a crush on her (Charlie Plummer, looking like a cross between Kurt Cobain, Michael-Pitt-as-Kurt-Cobain, and Domhnall Gleeson that one time he played an albino).
Related: The Swerve is Emotionally Devastating [Review]
Unfortunately, at Maraâs typically bright and colourful high school that she hates for no apparent reason (nobody is mean to her, since this is a movie set in 2019), kids have begun spontaneously combusting. Without any rhyme, reason, or warning, they justâŠexplode. The combustions, as Mara explains at one point, arenât like bombs exploding, but more like balloons popping. âIt was like a Cronenberg movie!â pipes up Plummerâs Dylan, which is a somewhat unflattering comparison considering there are no guts spewing everywhere, just boring olâ blood (odd in an R-rated movie, but presumably the rating was for Maraâs near constant stream of F bombs).
Before too long, the army has shown up and all the kids are quarantined (making this particular moment a very strange one to be releasing Spontaneous upon the world). The confused teens are reassured that everybody is doing everything they can but, even after a vaccine is created, combustions continue to happen. The tension comes from whether Mara is to blame for the âcurse,â and when either she or Dylan will fall victim to it. And, will they get to sleep together and/or go to Prom before that happens? Do we even care, considering neither of them is particularly likable and their relationship is so new it barely registers as an anchor for the story?
Spontaneous is a frustrating movie, which is actually kind of fitting considering the premise surrounds unexplainable events that, naturally, canât be wrapped up with a bow at the end. The fact the deaths are bloody but not gory saps them of all shock value while the kidsâ decision to run away every time another combustion happens isnât played for laughs nearly as much as it should be. Actually, the whole thing is pretty somber, which jars against the constant jokes. Writer-director Brian Duffield, who also scripted this yearâs rather good Kristen Stewart-starrer Underwater, adapts Aaron Starmerâs novel of the same name and thereâs a sense that many of its nuances were perhaps left on the cutting room floor to facilitate a 100-minute movie (I havenât read it, so canât say for sure).
In this form, Spontaneous feels both baggy and underdeveloped. The relationship between Mara and Dylan is rushed and not in the least bit compelling. In 2020, the desire to watch yet another couple of suburban, middle class, straight white kids fall in love is practically non-existent. In order to sell it, there would have to be two very fine actors playing these parts and, unfortunately, Langford and Plummer just donât cut it. Mara is a weird inversion for her, since the Aussie is most well known for playing a suicide victim in 13 Reasons Why. Here, sheâs desperate not to die but the hard quality Langford had in that show isnât just present, itâs front and centre. Mara spends so much of the movie acting like a dick, with no motivation for it.
Dylan, meanwhile, is a cypher, almost a manic pixie dream boy if such a thing existed. Heâs a lovable, long-haired goof who never gets mad at Mara even when sheâs acting terribly. Thereâs no reason to root for these two because they barely even know each other and what we do know of them and their relationship isnât all that interesting. If anything, the focus should be on Maraâs relationship with her side-lined BFF who doesnât seem to mind being ditched for Dylan. Or even the horny bisexual character that pops up, alongside several other divertingly funny classmates, none of whom are given space to make a proper impression, to argue with the suits for taking them away from their lives.
See Also: Monster Seafood Wars is a Delightfully Goofy Throwback [Fantasia Review]
The focus is blunt, the tone all over the place, with references to school shootings and cynical lines about âthoughts and prayersâ sitting queasily alongside the whiny-ass indie soundtrack and picturesque cinematography, which makes the town of Covington look like a pretty nice place to live, actually. Spontaneous could stand to be sharper, edgier, and have clearer intentions beyond its oddly fatalistic attitude to young people (is this how teenagers are nowadays? I thought they were busy saving the world and standing up to the NRA?). It could also have a lead we donât want to strangle, or just one compelling relationship. Spontaneous should also have decided whether it wanted to be a black horror-comedy like Happy Death Day or a sweet story about misfit teens like Me and Earl and the Dying Girl because somehow the film utterly fails at both.
Catch Spontaneous in select theaters from October 2, 2020
and on Premium VOD and Digital from October 6, 2020
WICKED RATING: 5/10
Director(s): Brian Duffield
Writer(s): Brian Duffield, Aaron Starmer (novel)
Stars: Katherine Langford, Charlie Plummer, Piper Perabo, Rob Huebel, Hayley Law
Release date: October 2, 2020 (select theaters), October 6, 2020 (VOD and Digital)
Studio/Production Company: Awesomeness Films
Language: English
Run Time: 97 minutes