Horns (2013)

Horns is the latest movie from director Alexandre Aja (the Hills Have Eyes remake, Mirrors, Haute Tension) and without question it is his most ambitious.  Pretty much anybody who has been following new movies this year has probably had this on their radar since it seems that Harry Potter actor Daniel Radcliffe has once again decided to do a horror movie.  Well, calling this a “horror movie” may be a bit of a stretch since Horns does a balancing act with a number of genres (including horror, comedy and drama).  All in all, I think Horns is wildly successful in balancing a lot of different elements while being imaginative and entertaining all the way through.

Horns is an adaptation of a novel by Joe Hill (Stephen King’s son) and tells the story of a man named Ig whose girlfriend (played by a very rousing Juno Temple) is suddenly murdered.  He immediately is blamed for the murder by pretty much everybody and is struggling to remember exactly what happened.  Shortly thereafter, Ig wakes up and notices, much to his surprise, that large horns are growing out of his forehead and he seems to have a new “power” that causes everybody around him to say pretty much whatever they want or even live out their deepest desires on the spot.  Ultimately, these horns provide a catalyst for Ig to discover who killed his girlfriend in the present.  Also, the movie uses flashbacks so we see a long series of events that culminates in this mystery.

Sounds pretty wild, right?  It had better, because Horns is an extremely unique film and one that made a very positive impression on me despite some of the flaws it has.  Radcliffe is outstanding in the movie and is proving himself to be a great actor with every new role he takes on.  The entire supporting cast is great as well, especially (in my opinion) Juno Temple and David Morse (who plays the father of Ig’s girlfriend).  The wide variety of characters allows for some of the seemingly uneven genre elements to mesh together better.  The movie is surprisingly funny in places but gets darker and darker with each passing minute.  While the ambition of blending horror, comedy, romance and drama will definitely prove to be jarring for many, I thought it worked quite well.

Horns does have some issues, however.  The central mystery of this movie isn’t exactly anything extremely creative or impressive.  I actually had guessed who the killer was going to be before the reveal and some of the twists with character’s backgrounds weren’t laid out subtlety enough to be massively impactful.  The best parts of Horns are its comedic moments, impressive visuals and unique concept.  Unfortunately, Horns could have been great if there was just a little bit more meat to certain elements of the story.  I’m not sure that can really be blamed on the filmmakers fully (I haven’t read Hill’s novel so it may be incredibly similar) but Horns could have been great but ends up being really good instead.

Horns is an ambitious movie in a lot of ways but it’s core plot holds it back from being a truly great movie.  The acting is great (I believe this is Radcliffe’s best performance so far), the blend of laugh-out-loud comedy, violent horror, romance and drama works surprisingly well, and it shows that Alexandra Aja can be a very competent and creative director when he puts his mind to it.  While Horns is flawed in a lot of ways (and runs maybe 10 minutes too long) it manages to be an absolute blast.  This is one of the best “horror” movies of the year for me and I think it’s one that will gain a cult following in the future.

8.5/10