Producers: Robert Zemeckis, Derek Hogue, Jack Rapke and Bill Block   Director: Robert Zemeckis  Screenplay: Eric Roth and Robert Zemeckis   Cast: Tom Hanks, Robin Wright, Paul Bettany, Kelly Reilly, Michelle Dockery, Gwilym Lee, David Fynn, Ophelia Lovibond, Nicholas Pinnock, Nikki Amuka-Bird, Cache Vanderpuye, Anya Marco-Harris, Tony Way, Jemima Rooper, Joel Oulette, Dannie McCallum, Keith Bartlett, Daniel Betts, Leslie Zemeckis, Zsa Zemeckis, Lauren McQueen, Beau Gadsdon, Jonathan Aris, Albie Salter, Henry Marcus, Lily Aspell, Mohammed George, Dexter Soll Ansell, Delilah O’Riordan and Stuart Bowman     Distributor: Sony Entertainment/TriStar Pictures

Grade: C-

In 1993 Ingmar Bergman delivered one of his most celebrated films, “Scenes from a Marriage.”  Now, thirty years later, Robert Zemeckis offers one that falls at the opposite end of the quality spectrum.  One might prefer to call it “Clichés from Multiple Marriages,” but, like the 2014 graphic novel by Richard McGuire from which Zemeckis and Eric Roth adapted their screenplay, it’s titled “Here.”

That’s explained by the conceit it shares with the book, of presenting everything from a single perspective, as if cinematographer Don Burgess’s camera were permanently stuck in a single spot.  For the most part it’s a space in the living room of a house that’s shown being built in the early twentieth century across from an already standing colonial mansion which, we’re informed, once housed William Franklin, the illegitimate son of Benjamin, with whom the younger man disagreed on the war for independence from Great Britain.

But there are a few sequences depicting the place prior to that.  One depicts dinosaurs tramping about, Jurassic Park style, before disaster strikes.  There’s no marital bliss apparent there, or in the moments in which Benjamin and William Franklin (Keith Bartlett and Daniel Betts) appear more than a hundred years prior to the new house’s construction,  but there is in the few brief insertions showing a Native American couple (Joel Oulette and Dannie McCallum) living out their lives in the area.

These vignettes aren’t presented chronologically, and the same can be said of those portraying moments in the lives of the families that occupy the more recently-built house.  But the details in Ashley Lamont’s extravagant production design and Joanne Johnston’s period-emphatic costumes make what follows what obvious.  The first family are the Harkers.  John (Gwilym Lee) is an aviation enthusiast who bought (or built) the place because of its proximity to an aerodrome; his wife Pauline (Michelle Dockery) worries about his passion for flying, and is incensed when he takes their daughter (Delilah O’Riordan) up for a spin. 

Following a death in the family, ownership passes to the Beekmans.  Leo (David Fynn) is a garrulous inventor who spends his days tinkering over perfecting a recliner, while his wife Stella (Ophelia Lovibond), a model, frolics with him endlessly over the improvements he comes up with.  When he sells the device—christened the La-Z-Boy by the investors—they apparently use the proceeds to move to a millionaire’s mansion.

Then come the two generations of the Youngs, whose years in the house predominate.  It’s bought around 1945 by vet Al (Paul Bettany), who moves in with his wife Rose (Kelly Reilly).  The house will eventually be inherited by their oldest son Richard (Tom Hanks) and his wife Margaret (Robin Wright).  In brief, Al, who’s hearing impaired as a result of shelling and probably PTSD, constantly shouts, and as a Depression-era child he’s always obsessing about staying within their means; Ruth is subservient and tolerant.  Richard gives himself over to sketching and painting, and hopes to become an artist.  But when Margaret gets pregnant in their high school years and they marry, his hopes are dashed, and he too must go into the salesman game, always worried about money.  Margaret, meanwhile, resents living with his parents, and even when they take over the house wants a place that’s really their own.  Their daughter Vanessa (Zsa Zsa Zemeckis) grows up to be a lawyer.

The last family are an African-American couple, Devon and Helen Harris (Nicholas Pinnock and Nikki Amuka-Bird), and their son Justin (Cache Vanderpuye).  Their time in the house is treated so perfunctorily that the only memorable segment is “the talk” that Devon has with Justin about how carefully he must act if he’s pulled over by a traffic cop—something we’ve seen many times before—though there’s also an intimation of the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic in the person of their housekeeper Raquel (Anya Marco-Harris).         

The script portrays lots of “significant moments” in all the occupants’ lives—weddings, births, deaths, funerals, Thanksgiving celebrations, parties, graduations, financial hopes and reversals, accidents and illnesses—but so briskly that they seem emotionally weightless, especially since the dialogue provided by Zemeckis and Eric Roth is so pedestrian and on-the-nose that it might have been lifted from any banal TV drama series.  You would think, for instance, that when Margaret, suffering the effects of a stroke, is brought back to the now-empty house by the aged Richard, the impact might be touching, but it’s played with all the subtlety of a mawkish tearjerker.  And the occasional attempts to link up the disparate episodes (like the arrival of an archaeologist who wants to investigate the backyard for Native American artifacts) grate with their ham-fistedness.  One can only wonder to what desperate lengths editor Jesse Goldsmith must have gone not only to figure out how to maintain coherence, but to remove the most embarrassingly overwrought footage.    

Nor are things helped by the static-camera perspective, which might at first seem inventive but shortly comes to seem a misguided stunt, rather reminiscent of the dull compositions of early sound movies rather than the cool experiment that Zemeckis, who’s always been obsessed with technical innovation, appears to think it is.  Directors like Hitchcock and Kubrick loved to test themselves too, but their penchant was for increased fluidity even within steady shots, and the technique here just feels stagebound, with characters often leaving the frame by rushing toward and past our line of vision—to heaven knows where, since we never see where they wind up.  The effect, combined with the hapless script, is deadening rather than enlightening, especially since the action is smothered in the strains of Alan Silvestri’s syrupy score, which overlooks no opportunity to swoon sentimentally.

And it’s all weighed down by VFX work supervised by Kevin Baillie that’s frankly subpar, like those galumphing dinos or the gruesomely artificial hummingbird that flutters around at the beginning and end, presumably as a Zemeckis signature.  Worst of all, though, is the de-aging process which is not only terrible on a technical level (Hanks, made to look like a plastic teenager and a poorly-dubbed one at that, is the most gruesome example) but ruins the possibility of good actors giving nuanced performances.  Virtually every member of the cast overacts, hammering home every banality in the screenplay as though it were deep drama rather than the soapoperatic piffle it is.  Bettany, usually a reliable fellow, is the gravest offender, but the rest aren’t far behind.  (Tony Way has a death scene so broad that it’s sure to elicit guffaws.)        

Given that there’s unlikely to be much enthusiasm for “Here,” a sequel seems unlikely.  But if one is envisioned, perhaps it should be set in the house across the way, which given its history might have been a more interesting site, even if the glimpses here showing Benjamin and William Franklin are among the movie’s worst.  (The nadir certainly comes when we see a Revolutionary soldier riding up to announce: “Message from George Washington!  The war’s over!  We won!”  But that’s not counting the horrendous insert where Richard and his younger brother Jimmy, played by Albie Salter, appear as dueling Benjamins at a costume party, one-upping each other by quoting the great man’s witticisms.) 

Anyway, they could call the sequel “There.”  It couldn’t be any worse than “Here,” which apparently wants to suggest that even the most humble places have witnessed profoundly human moments but instead proves that when treated with such stunning artificiality some places just might not be worth visiting.

Producers: Kayla Foster, Shannon Reilly, Melanie Donkers, Kira Carstensen and Caroline Lindy   Director: Caroline Lindy   Screenplay: Caroline Lindy   Cast: Melissa Barrera, Tommy Dewey, Meghann Fahy, Edmund Donovan, Kayla Foster and Brandon Victor Dixon   Distributor: Vertical

Grade: C-

The underlying message of Caroline Lindy’s oddball mixture of horror-comedy and rom-com (complete with musical numbers) is to “embrace your inner rage.”  But the movie is so limp and disjointed that it can’t even elicit the degree of antipathy in a viewer that its annoying mediocrity merits. 

The heroine of sorts in “Your Monster” is Laura (Melissa Barrera), who’s introduced in crisis, undergoing surgery for cancer.  This is the moment that her boyfriend Jacob (Edmund Donovan) chooses to break up with her.  She’s distraught, of course, and enters a prolonged depression; moving back into her childhood house, she weeps uncontrollably and stuffs herself.  Her friend Mazie (Kayla Foster), a ditsy actress/dancer, helps, but as far as Laura’s concerned, is insufficiently devoted, always rushing off to do her own thing. 

Once ensconced back in the house, Laura gets a surprise: she’s visited by The Monster (Tommy Dewey) she fantasized about as a child, hiding in the closet or under the bed.  A scruffy, sarcastic guy looking like refugee from a bus-and-truck version of “Beauty and the Beast,” the Monster sends her into paroxysms of screaming, but she eventually calms down, only to find that he’s averse to her staying around.  They ultimately agree she can remain for two weeks.

Then Laura, with some encouragement from her old imaginary beastie, decides to audition for Jacob’s upcoming Broadway musical—a show she was instrumental in creating with him, and whose leading role she was supposed to play.  Jacob’s astonished to find her at the audition—which is a formality anyway, since the role’s already been assigned to better-known Jackie Dennon (Meghann Fahy)—but he offers her a place in the ensemble, understudying Jackie.

At this point the story divides into two parallel threads.  In one, Laura and the Monster gradually grow affectionate, more and more a romantic couple.  Simultaneously under his prodding she becomes more assertive at rehearsals, letting her anger toward Jacob come out, especially after she sees him with Jackie at a party—a development that takes a dark turn as the musical’s premiere approaches, a premiere in which Laura takes over the lead that was originally intended for her.

This is basically a story of female empowerment, but an odd one that tries to be incisive, funny, romantic and a little scary all at once, and fails pretty much at all of them.  Lindy’s intention is unquestionable—she’s explained that Laura’s situation is modeled on her own, and some years ago made a short film of which this is an expansion.  But while one can appreciate her hope of achieving a semblance of closure through art, what she’s contrived here is a muddled mixture so flaccidly executed that while it might help Lindy emotionally, its effect on us is irritation.  Presumably the Monster is a projection of Laura’s inner turmoil, her anger struggling to emerge.  But if so it’s a projection so fully realized as to exist outside of its creator.  This Monster doesn’t just debate with Laura.  He pesters her over the thermostat and the TV remote; he takes her in his arms and dances with her; he’s her date at a costume party.  And in the end, it takes over.  By then Laura seems not so much a young woman liberating herself as one suffering from serious mental disorder.  

Nor do the other script components work especially well.  Jacob’s musical, “The House of Good Women,” pretends to be enlightened, but, with songs by Daniel and Patrick Lazour that come across as low-grade contemporary Broadway stuff, it’s obviously intended to be a commentary on the guy’s phoniness in that department.  But Laura embraces it.  And when her rage explodes, it’s less cathartic than nasty.  After all Jacob’s a total jerk, but the suggestion of what he deserves could be thought a mite over-the-top.

Still, Barrera works very hard to sell the material, and as “In the Heights” showed, she’s very talented; and at least here she’s not trapped in the formulas of the “Scream” movies.  Dewey, a carryover from the short film, has a certain gruff charm, but it’s basically a one-note turn, and while Donovan makes a convincing sleazebag, his performance is hardly nuanced either.  Fahy and Foster aren’t much better than okay. 

Like most modestly-budgeted indies, the picture looks fairly threadbare.  Briewlle Hubert’s production design is adequate, no more, and Will Stone’s cinematography plain apart from the sequences in which a splendorous romantic mood is attempted, to meager effect.  The editing by Daysha Broadway and John Higgins is rather sluggish, and they and Lindy rely overmuch on montages to paper over the screenplay’s lack of wit.  Matthew Simonelli’s costumes are fairly ordinary, but those in the musical premiere at least have some distinction while Tim Williams’ background score has the benefit of not being wall-to-wall.

As is the case with smaller films, one wishes it were possible to be more positive about “Your Monster,” but as was the case with the recent “Lisa Frankenstein,” the more flamboyantly outlandish Zelda Williams’ movie with which it shares some narrative tropes, it’s more dud than firecracker.