Daniel Radcliffe gets horny
Photo by Katherine Rountree
Written by Alexander Cheves
“Horns,” the 2014 film based on the novel by Joe Hill, is many things: murder mystery, relationship autopsy, mock horror, snake porn. With some heartfelt, serious moments interlaid with absolutely horrible makeup effects, “Horns” is a spoof on all the movies that rely heavily on religious imagery without relying at all on religious scholarship à la “Constantine” (2005) and “Devil” (2010). The only problem is that we’re not certain it was trying to be one.
The film’s star, Daniel Radcliffe, has quite a record. At 11, he was pegged for The Boy Who Lived. At 18, he was nude onstage with horses in Equus. With the addition of two ram’s horns protruding from his forehead, “Horns” seems an appropriate next step for him.
Radcliffe’s character, Ignatius, wakes up one morning to the familiar sight of protesters in his front yard with signs reading “Burn in hell.” We learn the whole town is accusing him of violently murdering his longtime girlfriend, Merrin (Juno Temple) and the investigation is ongoing. We meet his lawyer buddy, Lee (Max Minghella, who always plays villains), and his big brother Terry (Joe Anderson), who we welcome from his hiatus following “Across the Universe” (2007), and who always seems to appear in the same kind of movies.
The next morning, after a drunken sexual escapade with the local lady bartender, Ig wakes up with the horns. These members grow in size over the course of the film. He soon discovers the horns make people confess their darkest desires to him. It’s an interesting take on the classic Devil idea, the “tempter” who doesn’t make people evil, just pushes them to act on their darker impulses (homosexuality, clearly, is one such urge).
What’s irritating is how long it takes for him to actually figure it out and get in the game. Around this point, the film starts jumping back and forth between flashbacks of Ig and Merrin’s relationship, which started in childhood, and horned Ig scouring the town searching for his girlfriend’s true killer in a series of bizarre, comedic encounters. And while the film is certainly meant to be a funny, over-the-top dark comedy, it doesn’t push the envelope of ridiculousness for us to remain absolutely certain that is what we are watching. And there are enough moments in the film that make us fear, dear god, that these filmmakers are actually taking themselves seriously.
The gay cops thing is an easy joke the first time, but the second time around, when Ig encourages the two bumbling police officers to “just suck each other off right now,” it’s just a little too cheap to be tolerated. The joke works because so many people do actually think homosexuality is urged on by the Devil, and like the old “laughing darkie” trope of African Americans (Uncle Remus), it’s offensive because it allows people to laugh at the gays and think it’s okay because, hey, it’s a comedy. When the two cops start tearing off each other’s clothes, the theater roared with laughter.
In the end, “Horns” is a mash-up of elements that don’t work together cohesively, and maybe that’s the point. If you’re looking for a B-level comic horror, it’s a good time, and Radcliffe, all joking aside, is actually a great actor who manages to pull of an American accent far more successfully than his former Hogwarts costar, Miss Emma Watson, attempted to in “The Perks of Being a Wallflower.” After a lineup of heavy movies and hard-hitting documentaries, “Horns” was a chance to breathe. Even if you didn’t get the jokes.
