KEYHOLE (2011)

Maddin's films tend to be resistant to straightforward summary, and just trying to articulate what literally happens on screen here may prove the point. Nevertheless, here's what we got: a multigenerational psychosexual scenario unfolds in the upper floors of a haunted house, while on the lower floors a bunch of gangland characters (including one played by Kevin McDonald from the Kids in the Hall) embark upon a redecorating project, which includes cobbling together a functional electric chair. Perhaps Maddin's own brief summary—it's about a house where "all sorts of sad and horny things happen"—is better. Isabella Rosselini is here, and Udo Kier (RIP) passes through. More uneven than Maddin's best work, and it loses points for being the second film I've seen this week where a spectral Chinaman glowers meaningfully but doesn't deliver dialogue (Train Dreams was the other one). But a second-tier Maddin film still has more life in it than a second-tier film from just about anybody else working today.

A ★★★½ review of Keyhole (2011)

Maddin’s films tend to be resistant to straightforward summary, and just trying to articulate what literally happens on screen here may prove the point. Nevertheless, here’s what we got: a multigenerational psychosexual scenario unfolds in the upper floors of a haunted house, while on the lower floors a bunch of gangland characters (including one played by Kevin McDonald from the Kids in the Hall) embark upon a redecorating project, which includes cobbling together a functional electric chair. Perhaps Maddin’s own brief summary—it’s about a house where “all sorts of sad and horny things happen”—is better. Isabella Rosselini is here, and

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