Review: Grace

Grace (2009)
Genre: Horror
Format: Blu-ray
Director: Paul Solet

It's not that hard to offend people. The cheapest and easiest way to accomplish that usually involves religion or sexuality. Those come up more often than the one definite trigger that would send a lot of people nuts: Babies. You just can't talk bad about babies. Even when you see an ugly toddler, you are supposed to compliment their parents for passing down their good genes. Why? This is because babies represent a sense of purity - a clean slate if you will - a freedom from theology, sexuality, and all other forms of nurtured evil that humanity has conjured up ever since we became smart enough to form languages and methods of archiving our personal experiences. Grace, is a wonderful movie. The only problem with it is that most people will definitely avoid watching it because it dares to cross that line of what is acceptable for most people, or at least in our current society: Grace made monsters out of babies.

The movie poster above sums up the tale quite well. Grace, the name given to a baby that was not meant to survive birth, has a taste for blood. Her mother unfortunately, is just too happy to oblige for Grace is her only child and she has tried to give birth before but her past pregnancies yielded nothing but despair. The greatest triumph of this film is its deliberate and suspenseful pacing. This is not your typical body count movie as the premise may suggest. Instead, it's all about the build up of characters. There is a deep psychological underpinning to the characters' action and inaction, giving the movie a thick layer of gritty realism. The theme of a woman's maternal longing is also greatly expanded upon by using three distinct characters who are struggling with their own personal demons. The horrific bits are subtle but shockingly powerful. The way writer/director Paul Solet uses an actual baby to do most of the scenes - including the messy parts - will make you question the entire production but this is how Grace is able to translate its dark visions successfully on film.

Grace is a sick movie. It doesn't offer any form of redemption nor hope at the end - you're given a really gross final scene instead. It does a lot of things that defy cinematic expectations. There is even a "sex scene" in here that really caught me by surprise. If you have a weak stomach, you may need a barf bag for this one. If not, get your ewwws, yucks, and heck-nos ready. You are definitely going to need them.

RATING: 4 out of 5