Movie Review: Midnight Mass
This show was highly enjoyable, start to finish. It's more or less a seven-hour movie; more like a UK-style "season," resolving a plot slowly over the full timeline rather than focusing on beats within each episode. That means, of course, that there are slow moments. It takes a little time to get rolling, but I, at least, don't consider that to be a flaw. I love how contemplative the show it, how it takes the time to establish place as well as character.
The show's real strength is the actors; there is a lot of close-up work and subtle facial expressions, and everything is conveyed with clear intent, almost artifice. The show works a lot with camera angles and framing, as well, to add nuance to simple conversations. It is the first show or movie I've seen focused on a charismatic preacher that managed to have the preacher actually feel charismatic and charming.
The plot is a good old-fashioned one. If you're a horror aficionado in the slightest degree, there will be no surprises for you, but it's executed extremely well. Most writings I've seen have cited its strong Stephen King influence, and boy howdy that is not wrong. Everything feels extremely vintage King, both for good and for ill. Bev Keane, in particular, seems like she missed the bus to The Stand or The Mist. (I love Bev. She's been waiting her whole life for a monster to serve, and she's *so happy* to finally find one.) Characters are also prone to lengthy monologues on the topics at hand, reminiscent of King's long asides in narration. It all fits together, however; as I said, the spirit of the theatrical and the staged infuses the show, and as long as you're willing to roll with that, you'll enjoy your time on Crockett Island.
On a broader note, one thing that I personally appreciated a great deal is the show's full-throated endorsement of agnostic (if not outright atheistic) secular humanist values. So often a show that deals in death, sacrifice, and religious themes ends up wishy-washy at best, going for a "oh gosh we must believe in something, mustn't we?" vibe. Here, the atheistic view of life and death, as elucidated by Riley Flynn, is taken as a firm positive stand rather than a negative or null result, and Father Paul is at his most convincing and sympathetic when he engages with the existential problems (and is at his most flawed and frail when he lapses into his blind faith).
