A freaky good “Rosemary’s Baby” ripoff, but with clocks and hallucinations.
Two years ago, I saw the made-for-Hulu horror film “False Positive,” which plays like a new version of “Rosemary’s Baby.” Even I admired Illana Glazer’s glowing performance, I felt the script had morning sickness. Two years later, Hulu has another film of its kind, but a better version called “Clock.” Only instead of demons, it regards hallucinations and an implant, both of which give the new young would-be mother consequences.
Dianna Agron (“Glee”) plays a mid-30s woman named Ella, who feels pressured by just about everyone to begin a family. Her friends want her to have kids, her father (Saul Rubinek) wants her to have kids, but she has support from her husband Aidan (Jay Ali), who wants to have kids, but when she feels pressured.
Her reasons for not having kids include her future job, how society has always been broken, and how her biological clock may be broken. That’s why she heads over to a clinic with Melora Harden as her doctor Elizabeth Simmons, who suggests an idea. Her facility has developed an implant that could give Ella additional hormones, and the device would be permanent. Although, they should have done something to make it so Aidan doesn’t piece his ding dong.
I have arachnophobia, so I’m easily scared by the spiders Ella sees, especially when she thinks she sees a tarantula on her pregnant friend’s (Grace Porter) belly. I probably would freak out if I was in Ella’s shoes. And she also sees a scary woman in a black coat. You know the kind who isn’t really supposed to be standing in the middle of the road during sunlight. They’re all part of the side effects to the procedure and treatments, which she can only see. But they’re nothing compared to what happens later in the story.
My sister just had a baby boy named George, and she didn’t want him out of pressure. She wanted him out of love. I get pretty tired of friends and parents pressuring the individual to have one of their own, but I don’t get tired of how writer/director Alexis Jacknow makes her film debut with some amazing ideas, both freaky and consistent. I may not understand this new fangled contraption, but I do like to make sure the same thing doesn’t happen to my future spouse. Because I do not want to deal with the evils she thinks she’s suffering from.
I’ve never watched the show “Glee,” but I still think Agron has naturalism and emotions as the main heroine, because of she struggles to adapt to the side effects of her procedure, and how she questions about her fertility. And I like how Hardin has the same sinister spark as Cate Blanchett’s role in the new “Nightmare Alley.” She knows how to play a doctor who convinces Ella she can overcome the side effects, and the ending really proves of her nature.
No horror pregnancy film will ever top the Roman Polanski classic, but “Clock” does top “False Positive.” It really questions on what is real and what is fake, regarding this clinical trial, and it drives us up the wall. An impressive debut for Jacknow, no less.
Streaming on Hulu This Friday
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