The nostalgia factor often finds fertile ground in horror and sci-fi, especially when it comes to extrasensory abilities and the paranormal. There’s a reason “The X-Files” and “Twin Peaks” have been reanimated, and the smash success of “Stranger Things” has proven that there’s still room for original stories lacquered with a retro sheen. Even though there have been more modern films involving psychokinesis—2012’s found-footage Chronicle comes to mind—the plot device seems vintage, culled from a time when Stephen King’s work reveled in mind powers. It’s little wonder that filmmakers return to the era of De Palma’s Carrie and Cronenberg’s Scanners when the supernatural was depicted with an emphasis on elaborate practical effects that made gore all the more cringe-worthy.
Joe Begos’ sophomore effort The Mind’s Eye taps into this rich vein of psychokinetic nostalgia, while ramping up the Carpenter-esque synthwave music to “Stranger Things” levels. Unfortunately, the filmmaker brings absolutely nothing new to the table. What’s worse is that stilted writing, dreadful acting and drab editing shred this horror cheapie’s already paper-thin story almost immediately.
Our one-dimensional protagonists are Zack Connors (Graham Skipper) and Rachel Meadows (Lauren Ashley Carter, of Jug Face and Darling fame), two psychokinetics who are kept institutionalized by an absurdly intense doctor with the vaguely menacing name Slovak (John Speredakos). He gets his jollies dulling their powers with sedatives and extracting goo from their spines. Nothing like a good spinal tap to provide him with the ingredients for a serum he obsessively injects himself with in order to gain their powers for unspecified megalomaniacal aims. Incarceration aside, Zack’s biggest beef is that Slovak prevents him from seeing Rachel, and he’s determined to break them both out. That’s the extent of the plot, and yet these cardboard-cutout characters spend the majority of the film muttering lines of exposition, when they’re not offering groaners like “I’ve got a bad feeling about this” and “I’m developing a tolerance to this shit they’re putting in us” and “nervous we’re getting our powers back?”.
Whereas “Stranger Things” used a deft hand in demonstrating Eleven’s psychokinetic abilities—a single trickle of blood from the nose usually did the trick—when The Mind’s Eye’s heroes use their powers, everybody screams their heads off until they explode their enemies’ skulls. (Between her role here as Rachel and her unblinking murderess in “Darling,“ Carter has really carved out a niche for herself as a go-to low-budget actress for protracted stare-downs.) And Slovak is so cartoonish in his supervillainy that his repeated injections eventual lead to black veins snaking across his face while his voice begins to sound more and more like a demon-possessed Optimus Prime. While Matthew Modine’s villainous scientist in “Stranger Things” was mostly troubling due to a calm demeanor coupled with the fact that he’s only one piece of a vast conspiracy, the frothing Slovak simply snarls about power while operating seemingly unchecked by any outside bureaucratic force.
The gore ramps up in the second half of the film as heads get obliterated, eyes bleed and bodies are ripped in half as everyone screams “fuck you!” and stares really intensely at each other. But even the technically sound practical effects are done so joylessly that there’s little red meat here for the most dedicated gore-hounds. Wooden dialogue is inserted only to move from one poorly edited action sequence to the next. Slovak’s henchmen (one of whom actually wears an eye patch) say things like “This is the end of the line!” and “We aren’t leaving until we get what we came for.” While this flick most blatantly apes Scanners (especially in the climactic final staring contest), it doesn’t do so as either homage or halfway effective imitation. Stupefying in both concept and execution, The Mind’s Eye is simply brainless.
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