The Mortuary Assistant review
As a movie adaptation, The Mortuary Assistant looks like a fun video game.
New movie reviews will not contain spoilers.
The Mortuary Assistant
Directed by Jeremiah Kipp
Written by Tracee Beebe and Brian Clarke
Starring Willa Holland
The Mortuary Assistant Review
I hope Willa Holland takes on more horror projects. I like to start reviews that will inevitably skew negatively with something positive. The most positive aspect of The Mortuary Assistant is Willa Holland’s performance in the lead role. Holland is too good for the material she’s given here. She brings a three dimensional performance in a two dimensional story. She plays scared better than most…a truly impressive feat given how little there is to be scared of in The Mortuary Assistant.
For those who don’t know, The Mortuary Assistant is an adaptation of the video game of the same name. I bought the game on sale a couple of years ago…and never got around to playing it. I’m going to guess that this movie sticks fairly close to the source material. There are many moments where the movie feels like we’re following instructions to progress the story forward. It does seem like it would make for a fun video game. As a movie…not so much.
The major problem is the same one that plagued Return to Silent Hill. What’s effective in games doesn’t always translate to movies. The reason is simple. We’re in control of the character in a game. Whatever happens is happening to us. Whatever we see is being seen by our avatar. I promise that if I was playing The Mortuary Assistant and a dead body had changed position while I looked away as I am trapped alone inside the building…it would be scary. When it happens in the background while a character we aren’t controlling doesn’t see it…that doesn’t hit the same. In The Mortuary Assistant…it doesn’t hit at all.
Rebecca Owens (Holland) is spending her first night working alone in the mortuary. She embalms bodies…burns bodies…and ends up facing a deadly possession. Her shady boss Raymond (Paul Sparks) clearly knows more than he’s letting on. That’s confirmed by any number of times he tells Rebecca he will now “explain everything”. And there is a lot to explain. Over the course of a video game…lore discovery can be spaced out and feel like a series of accomplishments. In a ninety minute movie…it can feel overwhelming. Yet another reason that video game adaptations often struggle.
The Mortuary Assistant plays with reality in some fun ways…but even that comes with a caveat. The story doesn’t get itself settled in reality enough by the time it starts to mess with things. The result is an uneven first half that would have been better spent embalming more bodies. There are some great gore effects when bodies are being cut open. It’s more effective than the lore dumps and fetch quests.
Rebecca has a tragic backstory that allows the entity in the mortuary to launch personal attacks against her. Holland’s strong performance makes everything work better than it probably does on paper. It’s not really all that while tied into the narrative. It’s just that Holland can land dramatic moments even when they’re unearned. When you combine the backstory with the extensive lore of what’s happening in the mortuary…it’s a lot of things that aren’t scary taking up most of the screen time.
What’s probably the most interesting about the film adaptation of The Mortuary Assistant is that it is easy to see how scary it would be in its original format. Carrying around makeshift torches to uncover hidden symbols. Bodies rearranging themselves around you. Slowly piecing the story together and trying to survive the night alone. Unfortunately, as a movie, The Mortuary Assistant tops out at “it looks like it would make for a fun game”. Even with a standout lead performance elevating everything that it can…there simply isn’t a scary movie here.
The lack of atmosphere is a real disappointment. Rebecca is alone in a haunted mortuary surrounded by dead bodies. That seems like a ripe setup for some excellent atmosphere. The Mortuary Assistant fails to find much…and manages to sustain even less. It’s kind of incredible, actually. I bet the game has some strong, scary atmosphere. I think I’ll go play that.
Scare Value
If we treat The Mortuary Assistant as a long, expensive advertisement for the 2022 video game…it’s pretty effective. I was certainly more interested in playing it afterwards. Actually, I wish I could have been playing it while the movie was running. Willa Holland gives a great lead performance as Rebecca. She pulls off a rare feat…making everything she does work while nothing really works around her. Too much lore is crammed into a ninety-minute movie. More importantly…it just isn’t scary.
2/5
The Mortuary Assistant Link
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