Regression
A father is accused of a crime he has no memory of committing.
Cast
Ethan Hawke – Bruce Kenner
Emma Watson – Angela Gray
David Thewlis – Professor Kenneth Raines
Lothaire Bluteau – Reverend Murray
Dale Dickey – Rose Gray
Like Sunday Night
Here in England, Sunday evening television is just awful. You’re either hit by dull murder mysteries in which there’s hardly any mystery, antique auctions or sport round-up’s. The ingredients of sheer boredom which leads to the feeling that I would rather eat my own testicles than turn on the TV.
But then there’s always that classic one; a cop drama. A dull, tedious cop drama.
Picture a bland police officer (with or without an agent) sitting at a desk, interviewing a middle-aged woman about the situation that has taken place.
Some good (if slightly dull) acting on the woman’s part, but otherwise you start to glaze over..
The scene shifts to the office outside the interview room where the police officer strides through a bank of desks, discussing what the woman has just said.
Bored-looking employees sit at their desks, the odd desk fan blowing, phone ringing..
This scene progresses into the next, where the police officer emerges from a car. Hands in pockets he walks incredibly slowly around a residential area, offering only personal opinions about the case as conversation to his associate..
You sit staring at the screen, void of any human emotion and mouth-dryingly bored as your hand instinctively reaches for the remote control.
Welcome to Regression.
Regression Depression
I wanted this movie to provide tense, frightening moments and intriguing dialogue between characters. I had read the synopsis and was ready for action.
Unfortunately Regression failed spectacularly to deliver any of these things, leaving me butt-numblingly bored throughout. Even the more ‘scary’ scenes. I think the only time I flinched was when an old lady goes out into her garden to investigate strange wailing noises and a cat (or some other feline creature) jumps out at her, hissing.
Yes. A cat. This is about how scary Regression gets.
The story focuses on 17-year-old Angela; a girl who has been sexually abused (yes – the movie becomes even rosier) by her father. As her character is introduced, so is a strange cult of people who are connected to what happened to her. Cue black hoods and white face paint as the cult are seen performing rituals – one of which involves the sacrifice of a newborn baby (movie getting rosier) and sexual intercourse.
Another seen then sees the old lady who had a run-in with a hissing cat thing throw herself out of her upstairs window, landing face down in her front garden.
This movie was as dull and depressing as a movie could get; and again, fit perfectly into the ‘piss-boring Sunday evening drama’ category. Regression contained all the ingredients of a (bad) Midsomer Murders episode; an ITV drama that saw a detective get caught up in some sinister stuff. It had the young girl and older police guy, a weird old woman and her cat, tedious conversations, even the group of people performing weird rituals in black hooded onesies who seem to go massively unnoticed even though there’s a whole group of them going off to do it at the same time.
Throw these ingredients in a bowl, mix them together, and what do you get?
..a shit swamp.
I actually just looked up Regression online, and Rotten Tomatoes gave it 6 – yes SIX – percent out of one hundred.
Says it all.
I wouldn’t sit through Regression again if you paid me. Seriously, it is that tedious. Uneventful. Uninteresting. Dull. Tiresome.
I’m leaving this review here as it’s irritating to think about the movie any more.
Avoid this movie at all costs. And if you can’t avoid – good luck.
Ricky's Film Reviews 