It might be wrong to include this in what’s basically a Paul Naschy festival, but it’s important because it’s the last time - maybe ever - he was used in a movie. In this case his voice, an old theater recording - in combination with a quite primitive animatronic doll of him! Weird? Yeah, and the whole movie is pretty weird in many ways, not necessary good ones either. Anyway, Wax is directed by Victor Matellano, famous for his documentary about Spanish horror - Zarpazos! Un Viaje Por El Spanish Horror (2013) - and the upcoming remake of José Ramón Larraz’ Vampyres, using the same title. Wax is an oddity, a mix of found footage and normal movie, claims to be horror, but never feels like it.
Jimmy Shaw is young hotshot journalist Mike, who gets one mission from his boss, played by Geraldine Chaplin: stay in the mysterious wax museum for the whole night and document everything that happens. That’s nothing for a young cocky stud, and he gladly accepts the challenge. The whole museum is rigged with cameras, which seems more to be there for security than for shooting the segment. Slowly the place starts affecting Mike, and at the same time someone starts stalking him in the darkness. His boss calls and tells him that one of the person being portrayed as a wax figure is doctor Knox (Jack Taylor), a sadistic serial killer and cannibal - and he escaped from prison this morning!!!! Guess if Mike shits his pants!
I would say Wax is a missed opportunity. You have a great location - a real wax museum it seems - and a cast of legends! Hell, even Antonio Mayans makes a cameo. Why come up with such a weak story? Well, the story is well-used in horror movie history - the reality show. Always easy to poke fun at without really so much about it, and you can do a lot found footage style. I don’t mind it, it can be fun. And filmmakers aren’t on the wrong track either, it could have been good - and it looks great. But everything just fizzles out, only to live up a bit during the last half hour. But before that it’s just an idiot walking around talking to his camera and looking at creepy wax figures.
Instead it’s Jack Taylor who carries the burden here, and that burden is to make the movie worth to wax. Taylor is a fabulous actor and what I understand this movie was more or less written directly for him. Maybe I’m extreme here, but for me Taylor has always been that suave gentleman with a white cotton suit getting laid at least time per movie directed by Jess Franco. A super-pro character actor, who also makes an excellent performance in the criminally underrated The Ninth Gate. He have never been Uncle Horror for me. But he’s still great a part more suitable for Howard Vernon and lends some class to the torture parts.
I’m afraid to say the gore isn’t as excessive as I hope it to be. It’s pretty lame, at least until one scene at the end. Or maybe it’s me who have seen so many genre movies now I really don’t get affected by any cinematic violence anymore? It wasn’t enough hardcore horror for, instead everything ended up in a weak media satire - done a million times before and a million times better.
So...I hate this movie now? No, I’m not. I kinda enjoyed. Wasn’t terribly bored, but ultimately disappointed. See it for Jack Taylor, or the voice of Naschy, or Geraldine Chaplin. Which reminds me, she have one of the best scenes in the film, at the end. She’s walking down a hallway and stops for a microsecond, glancing at a wax figure of her father. It’s a subtle and expected wink, but no less a good one. Two different kinds of cinema meets for a moment - and in the middle is the ever-provoking reality television.
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