Creepy crawly spiders, daddy long legs, are usually a nightmarish icon in your typical horror movie. Except this version of “longlegs” is way worse. Nicholas Cage brings a psychotic, satanic, mastermind murderer to life in the movie Longlegs and it is ten times scarier than any creepy crawly daddy long leg spider.
Following Lee Harker, an FBI agent and her mission to catch a killer, the movie Longlegs is split into 3 parts: “His Letters” “All of Your Things” and “Birthday Girls.” These three parts helped tell the story, but according to movie buff and Letterboxd addict, Barbie Vallejo, a second year student at Elon University, the first two acts were more engaging than the third. “When it came to the third act, it lost me a bit, and I mean only a bit.” Vallejo admits. Harper O’Neill, a first year student at Ithaca College agrees.“I thought the ending honestly felt a little sloppy and rushed. I wish the plot twist was able to speak for itself without the narration in the last 10 minutes. It could’ve been so good if there was a better build-up.” Harper said.
The plot twist at the end of the movie revealed how closely involved our protagonist, Lee Harker, really was to her case. A plot twist that was, according to Vallejo, “the perfect amount of predictable and shocking. It was a twist that made sense.” However, if it was built up more and the ending really took time to unpack the plot twist, it could have had more of an impact.
Long Legs follows the similar theme of the classic horror film Silence of The Lambs. But Silence of the Lambs is over 30 years old! Why retell such a similar story? Maybe it’s because this concept of a young woman investigator is so horrifying and needs to be retold with more of a twist. In Silence of The Lambs, Clarice Starling, the FBI agent, does not have a direct tie to Hannibal Lecter, the psycho murderer. But in LongLegs… Lee Harker does! Now that’s a plot twist. There’s also almost a sense of nostalgia with this repeating theme, serving as a reminder of the classic horror movies that came before. A reminiscent feeling, and ironically enough, a comforting feeling, according to Vallejo. “It was refreshing to see a new horror movie with original ideas but having a sense of familiarity,” Vallejo says. O’Niell also agreed and explained, “I liked how the movie tied in aspects from multiple older and more famous horror movies. I thought that was a cool concept.”
Eli Foodman, a first year student at Ithaca College, was expecting more of a jumpscare movie and was disappointed at the prolonged suspense that Longlegs put him through. “They got the suspense part down, but when I’m watching a horror movie the suspense should lead to the scare, but the scares just never showed up,” Foodman admits. It’s a crucial point to consider. What really makes a horror movie… a horror movie? The jumpscares? The music? The lack of music? What’s scary to one person might be hilarious to someone else. So in terms of categorizing Longlegs, it might be safe to say this film is for sure more of a psychological horror movie than anything else. Instead of a super scary jumpscare hiding behind every closed door and lurking in every dark closet, Longlegs keeps you on the edge of your seat the whole time. Waiting for something to happen, but it takes a while before it really does.
The iconic jumpscare in the first scene gives the audience the false impression that this movie really is a “jumpscare” horror movie, and instead messes with our brains for the rest of the film: at the very beginning, we get our first glimpse at the face of Longlegs, but it is for only half a second, until a bright red title card appears. “To me, this is one of the best movie openings I have ever seen. It establishes the mood of the movie, shows how longlegs approaches his victims, and gives us just a glimpse of our antagonist while making the audience jump.”
“It’s not necessarily scary, it’s just unsettling.” Foodman says. Which makes sense. The unsettling factor definitely could come from the creepy music, the confusing characters, and the spooky psychic power that our protagonist has. But whatever it is, it’s still able to instill that shock factor, making this movie all the more horrifying.
Whether you’re new to the horror world or a Letterboxd fanatic, we all urge you to see for yourself if Longlegs is worth the hype, or the hate!
9.5/10 Stars
Autumn Valdes is a sophomore Journalism student with little fear of spiders. She can be reached at [email protected].