Spain, 2002
Review:
JA Kerswell
A glossy - if ultimately rather unfocused - Spanish thriller that flirts with slasher movie conventions without fully embracing them. A group of young urban explorers are lured to forbidden places by a mystery presence on an IRC internet chat room. However, after one of them appears to die during an expedition, they find themselves targeted by a shadowy killer who taunts them online and in real life. Despite some Hitchcock pretensions, the film seems more interested in illicit would-be erotic encounters than building up tension or scares. But, although it features a twist Helen Keller could see coming a mile off, it does have a few surprising moments nonetheless.
Despite moving into a new apartment together, student Gonzalo (Pablo Echarri) seems a little bored with his life with girlfriend Marta (Pilar Punzano). He seeks thrills elsewhere and soon stumbles across a chat room linked to his university where someone - calling themselves Iblis - is offering clues to offbeat places to urban explore for anyone clever enough to solve the riddles. Despite her reservations, Marta joins Gonzalo as they hunt for the first location - which turns out to be a reservoir out in the countryside. Others in the group chat have also worked out the clues and they are joined by a small group: Sonia (Marián Aguilera), Sergio (Tristán Ulluoa), Alicia (Marta Ambit) and Pablo (Andrés Gertrúdix). However, the thrillseekers nearly meet an untimely demise when the water in the dam unexpectedly is turned on as they explore deep inside. Despite nearly drowning, Gonzalo is energised by this near-death experience.
Even after promising Marta he will now concentrate on his studies, Gonzalo seeks further thrills and soon enters into an illicit and erotically charged affair with Sonia. Also behind his girlfriend’s back, Gonzalo and the rest of the group are tempted by more clues from Iblis that lead them to a large office block. However, whilst dodging the lifts in the building’s central shaft, one of the group disappears and is presumed dead. The rest of the group panic and scarper. However, Iblis isn’t finished with the games and warns them that unless they continue playing they will be murdered one-by-one …
YOU SHOULDN’T BE HERE
boasts good production values and some impressive cinematography - including a crane shot that travails the front of a large building that seems inspired by a similarly bravura shot in Dario Argento’s 1982 giallo TENEBRE. However, despite pretensions to be a prestige film - it even opens with a quote from the Koran! - it fails to really hang together as a coherent and effective thriller. The premise of an everyman character being seduced by escalation thrill-seeking - which risks both his safety and his morality - is a good one. Yet none of it is especially convincing. The film boasts ridiculous moments, such as where one of the group purposefully crashes a car at speed into a wall and flies through the windscreen - only to think it was a jolly good jape and end up with only a couple of butterfly stitches on his cheek! Obviously, when it comes to slasher movies the dafter is often the better, but the thriller elements are blunted by numerous sweaty liaisons (including one inexplicably in a morgue) and, even worse, the murder scenes are handled in a largely perfunctory manner as if the makers knew what was popular at the time but only shoehorned them in because it was fashionable. Like many of its contemporaries, the film utilises - and overuses - the emerging internet and streaming technologies - with everything from primitive cybersex to voyeurism with webcams (in a nod to Hitchcock's REAR WINDOW (1954)).
Argentinian actor Pablo Echarr is a likeable lead but his character makes such bad decisions it is difficult to sympathise with his plight. Marián Aguilera, who plays his illicit love interest, had already done slasher duties on the zanier - but much more entertaining - TUNO NEGRO (2001) the year before. Director Jacobo Rispa got the gig for this after an earlier award-winning short film. He has since gone on to a successful career in North American television as a producer of straight-to-streaming thrillers.
YOU SHOULDN'T BE HERE began filming in October until December 2001 in and around Madrid on a budget in excess of 3 million Euros. Given the film’s heavy use of then cutting-edge technology, it is little surprise that it was widely promoted on the internet with its own forum and competitions to solve riddles to win prizes. However, despite this, the film was not a financial success despite its generous budget. The film opened to 200 screens in Spain in May of 2002, but failed to generate much interest with only 196,293 admissions (for comparison TUNO NEGRO had 583,344 admissions the year before). Its release brought in less than 1 million Euro domestically.
The promotional blurb at the time of its release said: “[it] … is an attractive cross between "I Know What You Did Last Summer", "Crash" and "Fight Club”.” An ambitious, if awkward, mix it doesn’t really pull off. I wonder if the few patrons who did check this out at the cinema looked at the film’s title and said to themselves: “I shouldn't be here”.
BODY COUNT 6:
Female 2 / Male 4
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