The Unborn

By Clint Morris

As a director, screenwriter David Goyer is a bit like a funky fashion-conscious model – she know how she likes her hair, but really needs to someone to apply the tips and tease it. In Goyer’s case, he needs someone to direct what he writes – he shouldn’t try doing it all himself. He knows what he wants – and he needs to tell someone capable of applying that to celluloid to make it so.

Goyer is a fantastic writer – you only have to check out “Batman Begins” or “The Dark Knight”, two of the finest superhero movies (or in the latter’s case, finest movies) for proof of that. He knows how to shape an arc, he can write build-up, inject tension, humanity, and intrigue. He knows what works and what doesn’t. His head is undoubtedly full of ingenious ideas, and he reaches his creative peak whenever his fingers caress a keyboard. As a director though, Goyer fumbles.

Clearly unprepared for each job at hand and seemingly desperate to just ‘get it done’, Goyer, who also wrote the “Blade” movies and “Dark City”, merely points and shoots – showing none of the flair he does in his writing. He also struggles to adapt his stories for the screen – losing much of the character development; story-arcs; and tensions you assume are present in the scripts he’s working from. “The Invisible” and “Blade Trinity”, two of Goyer’s forays into directing, are textbook examples of mediocre movies that perhaps didn’t have to be. The ideas, and story, behind both were quite good (especially “The Invisible”, which, though a riff on “The Sixth Sense”, has a rather splendid premise) and could easily have turned out reasonably good in a more gifted filmmakers hands.

And so could’ve “The Unborn”. Though a contemporary twist of ‘’The Exorcist” and “Stigmata” – and anything else that involves the devil, his devilish spawn, and monsters that suddenly appear behind you in the mirror – it actually carries a reasonably fresh and decent sort of storyline: A young woman Casey Beldon (hottie Odette Yustman, Beth from “Cloverfield”) is plagued by merciless dreams, visions of strange looking dogs, and an evil child with bright blue eyes. After being hit with a mirror by her neighbour’s son, Casey’s eyes begin to change colour and she learns she had a twin brother who died in the womb. Casey begins to suspect that the spirit haunting her is the soul of her dead twin. With the help of a Rabbi (Gary Oldman, reuniting with the ‘’Batman Begins’’ scribe), who can maybe, sorta, help her exercise the dead bro from her inners, Casey begins on her quest to eradicate the scary sibling and those bad-ass dreams for good.

The problem, again, lies with Goyer. He has no idea how to translate his intriguing story to the big screen. What results is a laughable, hokey and rather slow (it’s such a short movie – yet it feels so long!) spookfest. Sure, the story is a little redundant, but with some more gusto behind the camera, and the capacity to ignite some fire into his actors, this could’ve been much, much better.

You could also blame the studio for sticking to a PG-13 rating – but since it is still possible to make a good film – not to mention good horror film – within the confines and restrictions of a lower-classification – just look at Spielberg and Hooper’s “Poltergeist”! – That’s a void excuse. And maybe the finger could also be pointed at producer Michael Bay (who is no doubt the one that insisted the film’s leading lady get about in skimpy pants and tight T-Shirts for most of the movie) for forcing style over substance (and I’m sure he did to a degree) but mostly the film suffers because of its directors powerlessness to be patient, his inability to let events unfold organically, and his idiotic fortitude to film his creative screenplay as it reads to an accountant – not as he sees it, or saw it. Trying to please too many people? or simply keen to film as fast as he can before the battery on the camera goes flat? Only Goyer knows.