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Critics Consensus: Horns is a bit of a tonal jumble, but it offers enough thoughtful horror-comedy -- and strong work from Daniel Radcliffe -- to hook genre enthusiasts.
Critic Consensus: Horns is a bit of a tonal jumble, but it offers enough thoughtful horror-comedy -- and strong work from Daniel Radcliffe -- to hook genre enthusiasts.
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All Critics (121) | Top Critics (32) | Fresh (48) | Rotten (73) | DVD (1)
It seems to have been made by people who couldn't decide if their film was a horror flick, a whodunit, or a Hellboy knockoff.
Radcliffe, through his sheer presence and the piercing honesty of those big, blue eyes, makes this mixed-up material watchable.
Horns juggles a lot of balls, and admirably keeps them in the air for longer than you might expect. But it doesn't know how to bring them down gently.
There are a couple of decent movies somewhere inside "Horns." But here's the real sin - Aja has no idea in hell of what they are.
Campy-fun but pointless ...
"Horns" is a good-ideas-gone-wild movie that leaves the best of itself behind.
If the fact that the film stars Harry Potter isn't enough for you (it was enough for me), then see it because it's a good story that is not only dark and ominous but also has some hilarity mixed in.
Radcliffe is amazing, and the film is worth the price of admission just for his performance. It's just unfortunate that the film around him is guilty of a bit of sloth.
It's not scary enough to be a horror, not funny enough to be a comedy, too "adult" to be embraced by the "YA" crowd and far too infantile to be embraced by the "A" crowd.
Sadly the film's mélange of ingredients never quite come together, and whilst Aja constantly attempts to root Hill's novel in the present, Keith Bunin's screenplay is too anomalous to hold our attention.
Horns is best watched as a midnight movie, with your intoxicant of choice, and possibly as part of a marathon.
Horns simply feels like a misfire that could have been an awesome mash-up of black comedy, sleuthing, and fantastical romantic drama, all with provocative commentary on religion and the never-ending discussion of good vs evil
An insufferably disjointed and overlong film that has serious trouble defining the rules of its universe and suffers from a messy structure, expository narration, intrusive flashbacks, predictable revelations (when not ridiculously sentimental) and a heap of clichés.
Super Reviewer
Based on the book by Joe Hill, "Horns" explores the dynamic between good and evil in very theatrical terms. For one thing, Daniel Radcliffe's character Ig is a stereotypically broken, alcoholic, trashed young man, who is trying to come to grips with the death of his girlfriend, as well as an entire town thinking he was the one who killed her. Steeped in the huge mountains of Washington state, and the lore of heaven and hell, this story follows Joe's investigation into finding Merrin's (Temple) real killer. Read more at http://www.bluefairyblog.com/new-blog-1/2015/3/26/horns
Delightful, funny and quirky -- with a mystery to boot. Radcliffe does a good job showing he has range beyond Harry Potter. It's a nice, strange diversion for a slow Saturday night.
At nearly two hours in length, 'Horns' certainly overstays its welcome and the once risque confessions of people (such as Iggy's dermatologist snorting oxycontin and his mom admitting that she wishes he was no longer her son) eventually lose their pungent sting along the way. Were it not for the gorehound ending (a shotgun blast to a deputy's head is plentifully dropsical), the semi-redundant 'Horns' could be classified as a Grimms Brothers love story and it's quite a poignant one. Iggy and Merrin feel like lovelorn soul mates and it's wrenching to see them torn apart. The childhood flashbacks might provide hindsight but they also feel like padded leftovers from the mischievous high-jinx of That was Then This Is Now. Radcliffe is an absolute chameleon with his American accent and he clearly relishes the devilish aspects of manipulating his enemies to self-mutilate. One brilliant piece of broad satire is when he goads competing news station to pulverize each other for an exclusive interview with him. The Scooby Doo-esque reveal of the killer resulting to two bloodthirsty climaxes that are missing human dimension and the film suddenly grasps at a hokey religious significance with Merrin's crucifix that it never earned. Overall though, 'Horns' is a nonpareil, but ultimately tedious adaptation that might be too comprehensive with Joe Hill's source material since it malingers on for far too long.
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