Delivered (Into the Dark) is One of 2020's BEST
I have no idea how much I pay for Hulu but between providing my wife access to all her favorite network shows like Chicago Fire, Chicago PD, Chicago ER, Chicago YMCA and Chicago AARP and providing me access to the stellar Blumhouse monthly series Into the Dark, it’s well worth the price, whatever that is. Now I’m not going to lie, the Into the Dark Series is really very hit or miss, but when the films hit, they knock it completely out of the park and May 2020’s entry into the series Delivered is one of those hits.
Now like most of these I just went in completely blind, they come out the first weekend of the month and they are themed towards that month’s holiday and that’s all I really need to know. With a title like Delivered and opening with a very pregnant woman going to “Mamaste” Yoga class, I knew this month's theme was mother’s day. Starring Natalie Paul as the very pregnant Val who is accompanied to Mamaste Yoga by her husband Tom played by Michael Cassidy. While checking into the yoga class they start to form a friendship with another pregnant mother Jenny played by Tina Majorino who you might recognize as Deb from Napoleon Dynamite. The young couple leave the yoga studio and head to a coffee bar for sometime where they coincidentally run into Jenny again who invites the couple over for dinner at her ranch far outside of the country. And then when shit gets weird…
You see, Jenny isn’t really pregnant, she was just wearing a bodysuit and pretending. In reality she is a crazy lady who was physically and sexually abused by her parents and was pregnant at 14. Her lunatic parents decided she couldn’t have the baby so they tied her down to the bed and crudely cut the baby out of her stomach and left her for dead but Jenny wasn’t having it so she got out of the bed and murdered her parents with an axe. Now, many years later, she stalks pregnant women, lures them and their husbands back to her house where she feeds them drugged food, murders the husband and does crude C-sections to the pregnant women because she wants a baby. It never works out for her as the women and the baby always die, but this time, with Val, it will be different.
This movie can be best explained as similar to the French film À l'intérieur (Inside) but remove all the gore and replace it with thick, brutal tension and just a dash of Misery and you have Delivered. The film seems to be self aware of its connection to the latter as there is an extremely brutal homage to the Kathy Bates classic towards the midway part of the film. It’s truly outstanding company to be in and this film deserves it! I haven’t seen many of the horror films released in 2020, it’s still early and COVID-19 is delaying releases like mad, but I can easily say this is the best horror film of 2020 so far.
A very dark and tense film, which shines a huge light on the acting chops of the two main characters. Perhaps main is the incorrect word to use as 90% of the film is just Val and Jenny interacting with each other while Jenny has Val chained up in the house. Val’s husband only lasts a few scenes before he is killed off and even Val’s sidepiece Riley only gets in a few lines before he is shoveled in the face by Jenny. The tension remains throughout and the final moments in the film’s climax end the story in a believable yet extremely gory way. Oftentimes the Into The Dark films tend to fall apart near the end, they at times attempt to convey some deep message and they leave the ending fairly bland, but this one doesn’t have any message other than the power of a mother’s love.
Overall, an outstanding film. 5 out of 5, 10 out of 10 go watch it now! This film currently sits atop of top horror films of 2020 just a smidge past The Invisible Man, sorry Leigh Whannel, I still love you buddy, and I expect it to stay there for the rest of the year. Strong acting, strong dark powerful story and excellent directing from the woman behind The Wind which this film is about as far as a polar opposite as you can get. For those with Hulu, go check it out now. And those of you in Canada, go protest, this no Hulu in Canada nonsense has got to stop.
(Note from the Canadian owner of this site - SERIOUSLY HULU AND BLUMHOUSE - GET YOUR SHIT TOGETHER - I can’t even rent Into The Dark films up North - SHAME ON YOU AND YOUR HOUSES)
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