When I was a young man, I remember seeing  Silence of the Lambs. It starred me as a film fan like no film up until that point had before. Sure, I have seen movies that affected me on a personal level before, but none like that one. Another film I saw in 1995 was Se7en, which had a massive effect on me. It had a gruesome detective story with a gritty, dirty look to it. I’ve finally seen another movie that lives up to those two in a grizzly horrific way, and it’s Linglegs from director Osgood Perkins, the Son of Anthony Perkins, and the director of The Blackcoat’s Daughter. Which is a dark, horrific period piece.

Lee Harker (Maika Monroe, It Follows) is a young FBI agent. She is put on a case to help investigate a series of grizzly brutal and bloody murders. Murders have the father killing his family with knives, axes, and shotguns. The killer leaves the calling card of a cipher for the agency to figure out. This young woman is at the top of her class in various exams and tests she takes, so she is tasked with helping on this complicated case that no one else can make a dent in until now. Once she starts working on it, more crazy things start to happen. Which opens up more doors in the investigation. The problem is, can she keep her head straight and not get too in over her head?

Maika Monroe is a good actress who has pretty much been typecast in horror films in her career. It follows, Watcher, God Is A Bullet, and Greta pretty much sums up her career to this point. Longlegs gives her a new type of role. Even though there are horrific elements in the movie, she has more to do on the character development side of things. As the movie progresses, more and more of her story unfolds. How the investigation involves her backstory is very fascinating to behold. She plays her character as a bit of a genius. She is a multilayered character, and Monroe eats this role in so many great and different ways. Hopefully, this will break her out of the horror genre and get her other terrific roles like this one.

Nicolas Cage is a legendary actor by this point in his career. He’s had iconic roles in Face/Off, Conquer Air, The Rock, and too many more to mention. He’s even won an Academy Award for Leaving Las Vegas. In the last twenty years or so, he’s been in a lot of unforgettable films with the occasional exceptionally good film here or there. Lately, though, has been doing some inspiring work in Pig, Redfield, Arcadian, and the semi-autobiographical film The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent. His role in Longlegs is another inspiring turn. He is doing something wild and crazy akin to the Joker from  DC Comics. He is off his rocker in this role, and I love him every second he’s on screen.  I want to see him take more risks like this in his career moving forward.  He still has a lot more in the tank as far as I’m concerned.

Perkins does some interesting things with the way he films this movie. He uses a 4/3 aspect ratio sporadically throughout the film and in the beginning sequence. To show that we like home movies in a way. We the viewer are in on what’s being shown on screen. It’s an ingenious way to let the audience in on the story. There is a period aspect to the film as well. It takes place in the 90s which is good because there isn’t much technology to hinder the main story elements.  Some crazy visions cause a bunch of things to flash on screen as well which makes for another odd part of the film. Add in some weird music with violins, drums, and so forth and you got a pretty impressive movie all the way around.

With some horror movies, they create an atmosphere all their own. This is one of those kinds of films. It has a vibe like nothing else I’ve seen all year thus far. The marketing campaign built it up to almost insurmountable expectations, but for me, it lived up to the expectations. The horror aspects were well with the price of admission. The suspense and mystery involving the conclusion of the movie were well done. This is the kind of film I want to see. It was well worth not getting an early screening. NEON has another winner on their hands. People are going to be shocked by what they see. Perkins is another filmmaker who should be watched going forward by film fans and horror fans as well.

4 ½ stars

Dan Skip Allen