Ho-hum scenes, devices take horror, panic out of ‘Vacancy’

In theaters

VACANCY, directed by Nimrod Antal, written by Mark L. Smith, 80 minutes, rated R.

The new Nimrod Antal movie “Vacancy” is first and foremost an homage to other thrillers and, as such, it offers nothing particularly new.

The film is a compendium of familiar scenes and devices – the car that won’t start when it absolutely must; the creepy motel clerk and out-of-the-way motel that recall Hitchcock’s “Psycho”; the killer in the expressionless mask who evokes Michael Myers in “Halloween”; the bickering couple who reconnect just when death seems imminent.

The list of references is endless, though as with any homage that has studied and learned from its genre cliches, “Vacancy” initially employs them to fine effect. By its midpoint, the movie becomes disappointingly riddled with too many plot holes, but not before launching a tense, moody start, much of which is heightened thanks to the shadowy hum of Andrzej Sekula’s excellent cinematography.

The film stars Luke Wilson and Kate Beckinsale as David and Amy, an attractive married couple steamrolling toward divorce who seem to exist to promote each other’s miserable state of being, emotionally slaughter each other with barbed insults.

This proves especially true when Amy – who takes anti-depressants that tend to make her drowsy – awakens on a trip home from seeing her parents to find that David has taken a detour from the highway. Apparently, there was a car accident he wanted to avoid, but now, with their own car on the fritz, they have no choice but to motor into the Pinewood Motel, a fleabag trimmed in a haze of neon on a road literally less traveled.

The short of it goes like this: With their car out of commission, they reluctantly decide to take a room at the motel, with the questionable motel clerk, Mason (Frank Whaley), offering them the honeymoon suite at no extra charge.

“It has some perks,” he notes, which go beyond the cockroaches, the dirty sheets and the muddy water bleeding from the pipes. Indeed, this room is hot-wired with hidden video equipment, which is there to capture their murders when Mason and his henchmen come after them.

Initially, the film’s suspense is mounted with finesse. Bored with Amy and their squabbling, David decides to watch one of the videotapes stacked atop the television. Hoping for a little porn, what he finds instead are snuff films, with people being murdered in a room that looks exactly like the room he and Amy are in now. In fact, the couple realizes it is this room, which drives them into action. The rest of the movie is focused on their survival as they try to outwit their potential slayers.

It’s here that the movie weakens into an average thriller, with Nimrod (no jokes, please) content to stick to convention and not break any new ground, which he should have. Departing from form would have cast the movie on its side, amplifying the thrills by tossing fresh chills into the paths of his protagonists.

While David and Amy behave as if they’ve never seen all of this before, the same likely isn’t true for most in attendance, who might watch the show in admiration for the looking glass it holds up to the past, but who would have been better served if that glass had been shattered with the unexpected.

Grade: C+

On HD DVD

ETERNAL SUNSHINE OF THE SPOTLESS MIND, directed by Michael Gondry, written by Charlie Kaufman, 108 minutes, rated R.

What’s so tempting about Michael Gondry’s “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind,” now available in high definition on HD DVD, is its provocative premise. Imagine if you could permanently erase someone from your memory – perhaps a former lover who jilted you, a trusted friend who wronged you, a childhood bully who humiliated you.

With those people no longer clouding your thoughts and causing you emotional pain, you would be free of them forever, allegedly living a happier life basking in the eternal sunshine of your newly spotless mind.

In the heat of the moment, such a possibility would undoubtedly be tempting to some. Just imagine the power of entering a crowded doctor’s office and declaring that you’d like to delete Jane or Jim forever!

Still, since who we are is all that we have experienced, is it wise to remove those negative elements from which we have learned so much? The movie considers the ramifications, with Jim Carrey and Kate Winslet as the vehicles that drive them.

In the film, Carrey and Winslet are Joel and Clementine, two polar opposites who meet by chance on a train, fall in love, and then fall out of it over the course of their relationship. When Clementine elects to erase Joel from her memory, he learns about it, visits her doctor (Tom Wilkinson), and promptly requests out of spite that she also be deleted from his memory.

But all isn’t so easy when it comes to matters of love and human relationships, and the filmmakers know this. As such, what unfolds is dense, complex and moving, particularly when it occurs to Joel during the procedure that he might be making a grave mistake. If Clementine evaporates from his memories, so does the knowledge that he once had love in his life. And isn’t that worth always knowing, even if the relationship fails?

Mark Ruffalo, Elijah Wood and Kirsten Dunst co-star, but they add only peripheral interest. This show belongs to Carrey and Winslet, who find in the trappings of Joel’s subconscious not only two strong performances, but also reasons to review the past to find what really matters – the potentially brighter end that might accompany it.

Grade: A-

Visit www.weekinrewind.com, the archive of Bangor Daily News film critic Christopher Smith’s reviews, which appear Mondays and Fridays in Lifestyle, weekends in Television as well as on bangordailynews.com. He may be reached at Christopher@weekinrewind.com.