Anything For Jackson
Evil doesn’t play fair.
ANYTHING FOR JACKSON is a most entertaining and disturbing film. It’s a film involving the power of grief and how evil forces can use that grief to trick you into digging your own grave.
The very nice couple, Audrey and Henry Walsh, have only one goal in life, to resurrect their beloved grandson Jackson. They will literally go to any lengths to make this happen including becoming Satanists of convenience who go to the local community center to light candles and chant Hail Satan. They don’t really strike me as the most committed Satanists, and with the advent of non-theistic Satanism, most Satanists aren’t really into the true worship of evil. Audrey wants Jackson back and her loving husband Henry will do whatever Audrey wishes to make her happy. They are so grounded as genial (and very Canadian) characters, that the tonal shift from adorable grandparents into willing tools of Satan (as they perceive it) shifts the ground beneath the viewer’s feet. Even while doing wrong, they still are so very polite (and so very Canadian) and entirely pragmatic. They don’t want to hurt anyone unless hurting someone will get them what they want. It’s kind of cute and kind of appalling. The lead actors, Sheila McCarthy and Julian Richings, performances are perfect to achieve the film’s aim. The audience’s sympathies are entirely with the Walshes no matter how depraved their actions are. This is the biggest success of the film. This could have been a very cliched version of Satanists and in one scene, it hilariously does become cliched. No mustaches are twirled and the Walshes don’t act out villainy which is a marvelous choice. In life, people who do terrible things frequently have justifications for their bad behavior and don’t think they are the bad people. In fact, they are usually just normal people who do without a conscience because their desires take over. It’s also an inversion on the trope of the loving grandparents who spoil their grandchildren rotten. Instead of buying a child toys or indulging them with food, they are going to greater and greater lengths to give themselves what they think they want: Jackson.
Konstantina Mantelos plays Becker, the pregnant woman, as a bewildered but cagey woman who never quite gives up. Josh Cruddas plays Ian, the real Satanist and a guy who really hates his mother. Even as a human, Ian is one of the scariest beings in the film. He’s scarier than some of the entities and that’s saying something. He really believes in the magic that the Walshes are trying to invoke and immediately tripped my alarm sensors. Ai Barrett as Trick or Treat is a particularly effective ghost which is an acting feat, since all the acting takes place through a sheet that denies you the nuances of the human facial structure.
Judging by the cast list and some of the prayers read out of the book, the demon that is being invoked is Vanth, an Etruscan female demon and psychopomp who is not necessarily evil. Psychopomps are the demons or spirits who lead the dead to the afterlife and who don’t render judgment on dead souls. Conjuring a psychopomp would seem to be useful to them. However, as is so often the case, human beings who choose to try and resurrect the dead are always messing with forces that they do not understand and definitely cannot control. Audrey uses the book to perform a resurrection spell that is successful and then seems to work the ritual to bring Jackson, whose spirit has already appeared to Becker, back correctly. But, then things start going very wrong.
I have seen that some are comparing this film to Hereditary and I don’t agree. It strikes me more along the the lines of Stephen King’s classic Pet Sematary. It just has a much lighter touch for most of the running time. In Hereditary, there is a genuine cult of a supernatural being that requires sacrifice and a body to inhabit. In ANYTHING FOR JACKSON, bereaved loved ones seek the return of a beloved child through a magic ritual into a new body. It is all very similar, but the key to the connection is that the parents are being manipulated, perhaps by their own grief. Somehow they discovered the ritual and became Satanists to be able to resurrect Jackson and bumble along trying to bring him back. The cult in Hereditary knows exactly what they are doing.
The most surprising thing about ANYTHING FOR JACKSON is that the director, Justin G. Dyck, has mostly directed family friendly Christmas movies and rom-coms as well as working as a cinematographer. His work in these films has obviously stood him in good stead, because it has given him that light touch and a different sense of how to direct a horror film. There’s no Sturm and Drang here. Just a gently comedic tone until he lowers the boom, which is most effective and greatly appreciated. It’s really good to see a different approach. Keith Cooper wrote the film and gets credit for the tonal difference as well. His work has also been in family friendly films as well as working in visual effects on movies like Poseidon and The Fountain. The cinematography is by Sasha Moric and the golden yellow light of the first scene gives way to snowy scenes of Ontario and the staid dark tones of the Walsh home. It’s all very appropriate to the film and pleasing to the eye.
The hubris of human beings, especially those desolate with grief, is at play in ANYTHING FOR JACKSON. It has a well chosen ensemble, particularly the great faces and chemistry of the two leads, that leads you cheerfully along a snowy path, through a room filled with yellow light, and hands you a cup of tea while you start to feel the whispers of spirits all around you and a sinister and insistent knock on the door. It’s a disquieting exercise in psychological horror with only a moderate amount of gore that doesn’t really answer the questions that it proposes. You are given clues, however, if you watch the credits.
ANYTHING FOR JACKSON leaves you to contemplate them in your dreams.