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REVIEWS<br />
We Are What We Are<br />
A refreshingly mature genre entry about<br />
teen cannibal sisters tempers its gruesome bloodshed<br />
by wrapping it in serious-mindedness<br />
BY DAVID ROONEY<br />
In the deliciously seasoned genre<br />
treat We Are What We Are, director<br />
Jim Mickle and his screenwriting<br />
partner Nick Damici take the<br />
bones of the 2010 Mexican film of<br />
the same name, about a family of<br />
cannibals, and reassemble them<br />
into an entirely different creature.<br />
Exchanging impoverished urban<br />
anxiety for rural creepiness in<br />
upstate New York, this reimagining<br />
serves up chilling American<br />
Gothic that slowly crescendoes<br />
into an unexpected burst of gloriously<br />
pulpy Grand Guignol. You<br />
may never look at a bowl of beef<br />
stew the same way again.<br />
Picked up for U.S. release soon<br />
after its Sundance premiere by<br />
eOne Distribution, the film is that<br />
rare modern horror movie that<br />
<strong>The</strong> Parker kids<br />
contemplate dinner.<br />
doesn’t fabricate its scares with<br />
the standard bag of postproduction<br />
tricks. Instead it builds them<br />
via a command of traditional<br />
suspense tools — foreboding<br />
atmosphere, methodical plotting,<br />
finely etched characters and<br />
a luscious orchestral score that<br />
effectively plays against the ominous<br />
tone of some scenes while<br />
heightening the tension of others.<br />
One of Mickle and Damici’s<br />
smartest moves is to flip the<br />
gender of the surviving family<br />
figurehead. Instead of losing their<br />
father at the start of the movie, it’s<br />
the Parker kids’ mother (Kassie<br />
Depaiva) who dies in an accident<br />
while picking up groceries.<br />
That shifts the film’s dynamics<br />
to center on teenage sisters Iris<br />
(Ambyr Childers) and Rose (Julia<br />
Garner), who are expected to<br />
continue the woman’s role of preparing<br />
the family meal. Staging<br />
the most macabre element of the<br />
story in scenes that evoke classic<br />
American family tradition makes<br />
it all the more disturbing.<br />
Making the family a part of<br />
the community and not the usual<br />
isolated weirdos adds an interesting<br />
layer. This is particularly so<br />
with the girls, whose blond hair<br />
and alabaster skin give them an<br />
angelic appearance. Childers’ Iris<br />
shows the internal struggle of a<br />
girl who can picture a normal life,<br />
even if she somehow knows that<br />
prospect has been bred out of<br />
her nature. Garner — memorable<br />
in Martha Marcy May Marlene<br />
— has a watchful intensity that<br />
foreshadows her resourceful<br />
behavior when the situation grows<br />
more dangerous.<br />
<strong>The</strong> film was shot in locations<br />
still recovering in the wake of<br />
widespread flooding following<br />
Hurricane Irene in 2011. Cinematographer<br />
Ryan Samul casts a<br />
subtle graveyard gloom over the<br />
exteriors, bringing muted tones<br />
and a malevolent eye even to<br />
some gorgeous scenic shots.<br />
We Are What We Are sustains<br />
not only suspense, but also internal<br />
logic. Mickle and his collaborators<br />
have taken one of the more<br />
lurid horror subgenres, the predatory<br />
cannibal movie, and treated<br />
it with stylistic restraint, narrative<br />
integrity and even moments<br />
of gentle lyricism.<br />
Directors’ Fortnight<br />
Cast Bill Sage, Ambyr Childers,<br />
Julia Garner<br />
Director Jim Mickle<br />
105 minutes<br />
Off Camera D4 051813.indd 1<br />
5/10/13 5:24 PM
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