Review CLXIV - Sweet, Sweet Lonely Girl

Review 164
Sweet, Sweet Lonely Girl (2016)

Oh jeez, it's been quite a while. Here I thought I hadn't written a review since July, but in fact, it's been since June! While partial blame is definitely on the fact that I haven't been watching all that many movies in general - instead I've been splurging on some anime - I would say it's been more a case of needing to take a break from writing reviews. Some months you really feel in the mood to sit down and write out your thoughts, and other times, you just need an extended hiatus. I can't say I'm feeling cent pour cent back, but knowing it's the month of Halloween, I figured it was time to write a review for a least one thriller this month. Not to mention it's Friday the 13th. If I was really on top of my game, I would have reviewed one of the films in the Friday the 13th franchise, but in all seriousness, I actually really hated the original. Consequently, I never decided to go further into the series, but I digress. Today we're talking about A. D. Calvo's Sweet, Sweet Lonely Girl starring Erin Wilhelmi as Adele, our protagonist; Susan Kellermann as Dora, Adele's aunt; and Quinn Shephard as Beth.

Adele is a quiet girl who keeps to herself. When her mother informs her that her agoraphobic aunt is near death's door and asks that she take of her for financial gain purposes, Adele puts up little resistance. However, her aunt refuses to acknowledge her presence, leading Adele to fall into isolation in a new town where she knows no one... Until she meets Beth.

We'll start with the positive aspects of Sweet, Sweet Lonely Girl. It definitely carries an ominous air throughout the progression of the film, setting up a great atmosphere for a horror movie. As my boyfriend pointed out, the palette of the film is also very consistent - it carries a lot of dark blue, grey, black tones, with the occasional dark red. The colours are very muted, again helping set up that tone. The acting was fine overall, with no falseness from the actors and actresses... And I think that's it for positivity. Everything else was mediocre at best, just bad at worst.

Obviously the biggest complaint would be the writing of the film. It is... bad. I can't say I saw anything completely new in this film, and even though it rips on archetypes, it doesn't do a very good job. First of all, Adele's character is just badly written. She's completely naive to the point of just being not self-aware in the least, and her innocence doesn't make sense. What do I mean by this? Adele basically sees this girl at a bar one day, who we learn is named Beth. From the start, it is obvious that Adele loves this lady. I guess she's never experienced love before, but somehow she thinks it's fine to just stare at Beth for long periods of time even though it is obviously creepy. She initially has this shy look to her whenever she looks at Beth, almost not wanting to make eye contact. Guys, where did this love spawn from? I mean, Quinn Shephard is attractive, yes, but I don't know, I don't get where this infatuation comes from. Anyway, it's just typical hair-flipping action with Adele which was just crap writing. She's innocent and listens to her music and smiles to herself, talking about how much she loves Beth. I dunno, I guess it's equivalent to Myra Hindley when she first met Ian Brady and wrote in her journal about how mature he looked. But instead of just writing this in her journal, Adele portrays all her emotions up front in a conspicuous manner. That's problem number one. When she eventually gets drawn into Beth's evil ways, she has no moral compass whatsoever. She follows her around like a puppet and barely puts up a fight about anything Beth tells her to do. Spoiler - even when Beth tells her to switch her aunt's heart medication for some cheaper "natural" alternative, she doesn't put up a fight. This would make it more interesting, especially with the overall plot (which we will discuss in a minute). They could have made character development, but they didn't. Her aunt dies as a result of this shit, but she doesn't question this shit for even a second. There are easily led people, and then there's badly written characters. I can't talk shit on aunt Dora very much because she barely backs an appearance, so we'll skip her. Next is Beth. Beth is just typical bad girl too. She doesn't bring anything new to the movie, just same old shit I've seen before. I can't say she was as horribly written as Adele, but that could be because Adele gets more screen time than Beth, and I just found Beth boring to be honest.

Second is just general plot. This whole "good-girl-turns-bad" is old. I don't care if the movie had a good atmosphere, the whole time I was watching this, I felt like the script was being read to me. Nothing was subtle. Adele followed Beth because, for the sake of the plot, it had to be done. They didn't try to deviate from the eventual end, instead giving the viewer exactly what they expected from every scene. Adele turns from stupid innocence to stupid blasphemy. The plot is basically in line with The Cabin in the Woods satanist-MKUltra kind of shit. It's freakin' boring and been used before. Beth is attempting to convert Adele to the dark side because she's part of some satanist group. Adele gladly walks into it. This is boring! I want my horror movies to say something! I don't just want some satanist shit which I've seen multiple times before and I will see, I'm sure, again in the future. But no, the plot had to be weak.

From what I read for Sweet, Sweet Lonely Girl, everyone said the film moved through the underbelly slowly, only to abruptly end with the climax. People said not to question the ending, but in reality, that's because they didn't understand it. This is fine because personally, a few years back, I wouldn't have understood it either. But really, I think my satanist clue just lets you guess the ending. Spoiler - yes, her aunt supposedly comes back from the dead to make Adele take her place, but instead, maybe take it as Adele joining her aunt in the MKUltra programming. Even if I didn't understand the ending, it would still be shit. Why? Because it's so fast and horribly shot. Adele does the stupid thing of running into the basement even though she could easily run outside. And anyway, I don't care because Adele never had any morality to begin with. Good for her if she joined this cult - she doesn't care if people die.

I suppose this review is a bit all over the place, so let me sum it up: Sweet, Sweet Lonely Girl attempts at a nice atmosphere, but falls short on everything else. Characters are derivative, plot is unoriginal, and the "mysterious" ending is nothing short of lame. The movie isn't absolutely horrible - if someone put it on and I was there, I wouldn't walk out of the room - but it's not good either. Would I recommend it? No. But if you know someone who is inviting you to watch it, you won't throw up.