Much of the marketing around Longlegs has focused on its titular character’s appearance, a secret kept to the extent that most audiences will know who is playing him (Nicholas Cage) and nothing more. In spite of this, Cage’s ‘face reveal’ comes surprisingly early in the thriller, but the ploy does speak to writer/director Oz Perkins’ vision for a space where the very act of seeing is demonic. At every turn you’ll want to look away, but between its tapestry of rich, blasphemous imagery and a camera so voyeuristic it's almost predatory, you'll have your work cut out for you trying.
From its sure-to-be iconic opening scare, Longlegs constructs a world without hope or kindness. Every scene is paced as if moments from a jumpscare, with even the dialogue between protagonist Lee Harper (Maika Monroe) and her peers/family playing so cold and pragmatic as to be isolating. Several moments even frame Harper in contrast with the much larger men around her, harkening back to an exposed Clarice Starling in Silence of the Lambs. Monroe makes an admirable attempt to play up the repressed fragilities of Jodie Foster's Starling, while tactfully playing it a note more fearful, as if even her courage can't be relied upon in times of terror.
This sense of unease is heightened when, as the film progresses and Harper becomes increasingly tied to Longlegs, her every relationship becomes corrupted and ripe with suspicion. Supporting turns from Blair Underwood as her superior and Alicia Witt as her mother are particular standouts here, offering her the illusion of support in the most loveless terms imaginable. Neither seems to fully trust or even like her, but for now she's a means to an end. It is a setting devoid of comforts or salvation, which of course leaves it open to something more Satanic.
The real secret weapon behind Longlegs isn’t Cage or Monroe, despite their career milestone performances, but rather the camera and all the ways Perkins uses it against us. Virtually every frame of the film is on a centre line or bisecting a symmetrical image, with the result being too clean to feel quite real, adding an element of the uncanny to the most ordinary household scenery. When this is then coupled with the occasional, but effective over-the-shoulder handheld motion as Harper investigates areas of suspected sightings, it creates a sense of artificiality, as if our young detective is being perceived at all times, just a fly wading through her killer's artificial web.
Longlegs is scary, let there be no doubt, but its mastery comes from the sense of brutal unease it sustains throughout. Although Cage is wisely deployed only sparingly, the shadow of his deranged villain looms large in a film that feels as if it is working actively against its protagonist. This is a nasty, sometimes cruel project in a genre that has become increasingly averse to such pure displays of carnal evil. Frankly it’s a miracle the project could come together at all. Hail Satan.
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