The Crazies works and it works really well. Part of the reason is the intense pressure subjected to a simple mid-western town and its residents (for a clue to the tone, check the opening song, "Hello Blue Skies" which closed Dr. Strangelove and know there's tons of violence coming). Remember that David Foster Wallace essay about the Illinois State Fair, the one that argues that farm people need simple gatherings as breaks from their isolated farming lives? Well, they gather in this movie, but they don't line up for Ferris wheels and candied apples. Military descends upon them and rounds them up, forces loved ones apart, gun-butting and executing. I think, though, on the scale of stresses the townsfolk face, getting got by soldiers isn't at the top. At the top is the outbreak of a disease turning family and friends into murderers. Take for instance the high school baseball game interrupted by the town drunk, strangely brandishing a shotgun.
Sheriff David Dutton (Timothy Olyphant) is more used to handing out traffic tickets than hard-core violence. "He throws fast," says Deputy Clank about the pitcher. "Like he drives," the sheriff replies. Judy Dutton is the town doctor which makes her and her husband the town power couple, sort of. At least, they're sort of responsible for the town and townspeople's well-being. As the first few crazies trickle through, they do an ok job of trouble shooting. When half the town's population starts turning into crazies and the military tries to take over, that's project management on a scale foreign to them. It's all self-preservation from then on.
This is a horror movie that doesn't cop out with regards to both pace and spectacle. The killing comes hard and fast. The aforementioned scene during the baseball game takes place about 5-minutes into the movie. The sheriff quick draws and puts bullet to forehead in front of stands brimmed with high school students. The film strolls for a bit, the sheriff trying to figure out the cause of the crazy epidemic, before going into full-sprint, the town shutting down giving rise to some pretty badass set pieces. My favorites include:
- A car wash sequence. Car washes are already pretty frightening, what with those soap-sudded rubber tentacles and the lack of lighting, but add a half-dozen or so crazies going at the car with cinder blocks and making nooses from green rubber hoses, and you got nightmare stuff;
- A farmer going at his wife and son. First, you're made to think that the wife's going to get it as she stands in front of a field mower, its blades going at mach 10. Nah, her husbands tricks her and her son into a closet before setting the house on fire. When the cops come to confront him, he whistles. Is there anything more psychotic than whistling?
- A hospital room where instead of getting healed you get fucked-up. Peep this: a platic-tarped, makeshift hospital room filled with crazies, drooling and giggling, strapped to gurneys. In walks another crazy armed with a pitchfork. Of course, it's drenched and bloody and he has to drag it across the floor so it makes a horrible scratching sound. Anyways, guy goes to work on said drooling and giggling crazies. Stabbing.
Of course, for this type of movie to succeed, ya needs a pretty likable and diverse group of protagonists (they don't need to be crazy deep or anything, just pretty heroic, for the most part). Olyhant does a good job giving life to his simple, upstanding sheriff. I didn't like him in Die Hard 4 mostly because I didn't buy this good ol' boy hissing threats like a Bond villain. He doesn't seem to possess the most versatile of range, but he's a tall white guy with a square jaw. Plus, his scowl looks a bit hard. So as long as he keeps taking these GI Joe type roles, he'll keep finding work. His deputy, played by some guy spectacularly-named Joe Anderson, adds some good pathos as the friend who gets infected and wants a chance to make an honourable sacrifice. Underneath that pallor and developing paranoia (is he a crazy?) is his loyalty. "Can I walk with you a little bit longer?" he asks after acknowledging that he's a soon-to-be goner.
Another good thing about this movie is that it doesn't overplay the government/fascist angle too hard. All we get are a couple computer-green shots from a satellite with instructions like "contain town", gas-masked soldiers firing on and flame-throwing ordinary people. There are few indications of the motives and plans behind the containment operations (trucks loaded with civilians headed for safety or for somewhere else?) so there's a palpable tinge of paranoia underneath all the intense scares.
As the film progresses, we watch the town's main street break down. First we get a busy Monday morning, Neil's Home Repairs doing good business. Then we get a spookily deserted afternoon, a single middle-aged woman singing while riding a little-girl bike. Finally, we get complete night of devastation, flaming cars littering the street, with bodies in between. David Foster Wallace uses the word grotesque a lot in his essay to describe the mid-west fair experience. Man, you start with grotesque and amp it up to horrible and you get a pretty good, pretty scary movie.
I didn't like Timothy Olyphant at first either, but he played Sheriff Bullock in the HBO series Deadwood and I totally turned around. He's very deadpan but I do think there's a decent actor in there somewhere