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Clown (film)

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2014 horror film directed by Jon Watts

Clown
Theatrical release poster
Directed byJon Watts
Written by
Produced by
Starring
CinematographyMatthew Santo
Edited byRobert Ryang
Music byMatt Veligdan
Production
companies
Distributed byDimension Films
Release dates
  • November 13, 2014 (2014-11-13) (Italy)
  • June 17, 2016 (2016-06-17) (United States)
Running time100 minutes
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish
Budget$1.5 million
Box office$2.3 million

Clown is a 2014 American supernatural horror film directed by Jon Watts in his feature directorial debut, produced by Mac Cappuccino, Eli Roth, and Cody Ryder, and written by Watts and Christopher Ford. It stars Eli Roth, Laura Allen, Andy Powers, and Peter Stormare. Visual effects for the clown monster were done by Jagdeep Khoza, Alterian, Inc., and Tony Gardner. Principal photography began in November 2012, in Ottawa. The film was released in Italy on November 13, 2014, in the United Kingdom on March 2, 2015, and in the United States on June 17, 2016, by Dimension Films. The film received mixed reviews from critics.

Plot

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Kent McCoy, a real estate agent and his wife, Meg, host a birthday party for their young son, Jack. However, the hired clown cancels at the last minute. At the end of his shift, Kent finds an old clown costume in the basement of a house he is preparing to sell and tries it on. After the party, he falls asleep while wearing the outfit. The next day, Kent discovers he cannot take off the costume. He is forced to wear it to work and attempts to remove it again, injuring himself.

When Kent returns home, he complains about the problem to Meg. She removes the fake nose, accidentally wounding him. Meg also discovers that the wig has fused to his hair. Shadow, the family dog, eats the red clown nose. He starts exhibiting strange behavior and experiences a deep hunger, eating all the food in the house.

Kent decides to enlist the help of Herbert Karlsson, the previous owner. Karlsson begs him not to touch the costume. However, after learning that Kent is wearing the costume, Karlsson urges Kent to meet him at his old costume warehouse. At the warehouse, Kent discovers that the outfit is the hair and skin of an ancient Icelandic demon called the Clöyne. Karlsson drugs Kent, revealing that decapitation is the only way to prevent the metamorphosis and possession, but Kent fights back and subdues him. 

While Kent is driving Karlsson to the police station to report the drugging and assault, his fingers and toes start to grow excessively, causing him to crash their car. An injured Karlsson warns him to kill himself before it is too late. 

Kent flees into a forest and discovers a children's campsite. One boy discovers Kent in the woods, begging for food, but he accidentally bites off the boy's fingers. Taking Karlsson's advice, Kent tries to kill himself and goes to one of his properties. A little boy named Robbie tries to befriend Kent. but is told to go away. Kent later shoots himself in the mouth, spattering the wall with rainbow blood, but quickly regenerates and survives. Kent then attempts to decapitate himself with a pair of buzz saws. Robbie bursts in at the last second, causing the saw blades to shatter and kill Robbie instead. Kent suddenly feels the urge to eat the child after tasting his blood and does so before Meg finds him. 

Arriving home, Kent tells Meg to chain him up in the basement and not let him out as he is changing by the minute. Jack confides in his father about his school bully, Colton. After coaxing Jack into releasing him, Kent goes to Colton's house and eats him.

Meanwhile, Meg is attacked by Shadow, who has become possessed after eating the nose. Karlsson appears and saves her, decapitating the dog. He tells her Kent can remove the suit only after eating five children. She learns that Karlsson put on the costume to entertain the terminally ill children at a hospital where his brother, Martin, worked years ago. To free him from the costume, Martin smuggled five terminally ill children to feed the demon. The brothers then attempted to destroy the suit but failed.

Kent fully succumbs to the demon and sneaks inside a local Chuck E. Cheese, where he consumes one child in the ball pit and another in the slide, causing panic in the restaurant.

Meg finds Kent as Karlsson attempts to decapitate him with an axe. Before Kent can kill Karlsson, Meg tries to speak to the Clöyne to spare her husband. Instead, the demon urges her to find one more child for it to eat, telling her to bring the fifth child to "their special place". Otherwise, he will eat Jack. A lost child at the Chuck-E-Cheese recognizes Meg as a nurse, and begs Meg to take her home. Meg instead drives the child to the "special place" and locks her out of the car, but eventually panics when she thinks Kent is coming. When Kent is nowhere to be found, Meg realizes that the demon is going after Jack.

Meg rushes home and meets with her father, Walt, who has brought Jack home. After Walt tells Meg he is going to help her, the demon sneaks into the house and kills Walt by ripping off his jaw. Meg fights the demon off, but he attempts to devour their unborn child from her womb. She yells out for Jack to run, distracting the demon. The Clöyne leaves to search for him, but Meg slits its throat. Undeterred, the Clöyne throws her into a wall before he takes off again to search for Jack. Once the demon finds Jack, he attempts to devour him, but Meg chains his neck to a water heater. When Jack tells Meg that Kent is no longer there, the demon lunges again and Meg then knocks his head off with a hammer and apologizes for everything that happened. However, due to a muscle still attached to the body, the Clöyne revives and grabs Jack's leg. Meg ultimately rips off the head, killing both the monster and Kent. While embracing Jack, she watches in horror as the demon's skin melts away, exposing Kent's severed head.

The film ends at Kent's autopsy later that evening where the costume, along with several of his belongings, is being packed away by the police as evidence and stored in a evidence locker.

Cast

  • Andy Powers as Kent McCoy, a real estate agent
  • Laura Allen as Meg McCoy, Kent's wife
  • Eli Roth as Frowny the Clown / Clöyne
  • Peter Stormare as Herbert Karlsson
  • Elizabeth Whitmere as Denise
  • Christian Distefano as Jack McCoy, Kent and Meg's son
  • Chuck Shamata as Walt
  • Robert Reynolds as Dr. Martin Karlsson
  • Lucas Kelly as Colton
  • Michael Riendeau as Robbie
  • Matthew Stefiuk as Detective
  • Miller Timlin as Camper

Production

Eli Roth was the film's producer and had a brief cameo as Frowny the Clown

In November 2010, Jon Watts and Christopher Ford uploaded a fake trailer to YouTube that announced Eli Roth would produce the film; Roth was not involved at the time. Roth spoke about the film, saying: "I loved how ballsy they were, issuing a trailer that said, 'From the Master of Horror, Eli Roth.' Some people thought I'd made the movie, or that it was another fake Grindhouse trailer... I really felt these guys deserved a shot, and that people are truly freaked out by evil clowns. It's new territory to make this a version of The Fly, where this guy can feel himself changing, blacking out only to find blood all over his clown suit. You're sympathetic toward a monster until the monster actually takes over."

Principal photography began in November 2012 in Ottawa. Roth joined as a producer, and Watts directed the film based on a screenplay co-written with Ford.

Music

Matt Veligdan composed the film's score, which also featured eight songs.

Clown
Soundtrack album by Matt Veligdan
ReleasedDecember 27, 2014
RecordedDecember 27, 2014
GenreMovie soundtrack
LabelEpic Records
ProducerMatt Veligdan
  • Benjamin Dickinson – "Frowny the Clown"
  • Brian McKenna – "Mexican Lindo"
  • Jared Gutstadt – "Taste of Mexico"
  • Gods of Fire – "The Long Walk"
  • Matt Veligdan – "Sonata La Squarzona"
  • Neil Sedaka – "King of Clowns"
  • Matt Veligdan – "Hardship"
  • Nirvana – "Everybody Loves a Clown"

Release

In September 2012, Dimension Films and FilmNation Entertainment acquired distribution rights to the film. The film was released on November 13, 2014 in Italy. The UK premiere was February 27, 2015, in Scotland at FrightFest Glasgow 2015, followed by the DVD and Blu-ray release March 2, 2015. The film was also released in the Philippines on March 25, 2015 and in Mexico on May 22, 2015. After being delayed, the film was released in the United States on June 17, 2016.

Reception

On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, Clown holds an approval rating of 46% based on 28 reviews, and an average rating of 4.8/10. The website's consensus reads, "Clown tries to bag a stylish, gory thrill, but good practical effects can't save this circus of mediocrity."

Dominic Cuthbert of Starburst rated it 7/10 stars and wrote, "Clown may be formulaic and filled up to the guts with familiar tropes, but it is tremendous fun and an effective body horror." Howard Gorman of Scream magazine rated it 5/5 stars and wrote, "With Clown the filmmakers have created an all-new monster of demonic proportions and it's a concept that certainly deserves to spawn a sequel or two as the sky really is the limit." Jeremy Aspinall of the Radio Times rated it 2/5 stars and described it as "efficiently put together if a little sedate in pace". Anton Bitel of Little White Lies wrote that the film doubles as an equally harrowing story of "a family man's losing struggle with his own paedophiliac impulses". Brad Miska of Bloody Disgusting rated it 3/5 stars and wrote, "Even though it's mostly a bore, there's still some really cool and fun stuff scattered throughout." Keri O'Shea of Brutal as Hell wrote, "Neither frightening nor funny, here's another lesson to prove that fake trailers are often fine just as they are." Joel Harley of HorrorTalk rated it 2/5 stars and wrote, "What could have been one of the few great killer clown movies winds up as yet another disappointment, being too uneven in tone and pace to be considered a success."

References

  1. "CLOWN (18)". British Board of Film Classification. January 12, 2015. Archived from the original on July 15, 2015. Retrieved January 12, 2015.
  2. "Clown (2014)". AllMovie. Archived from the original on February 2, 2017. Retrieved January 26, 2017.
  3. "Eli Roth Talks 'Clown', Piracy And The Comic Book Movie He Wants To Make". Forbes. Archived from the original on September 21, 2016. Retrieved September 7, 2016.
  4. "Clown (2015)". The-Numbers. Archived from the original on September 17, 2016. Retrieved September 7, 2016.
  5. Riggi, Erika (November 13, 2014). "Al cinema Clown, horror psicologico prodotto da Eli Roth. Clip in esclusiva". La Gazzetta dello Sport (in Italian). Archived from the original on April 12, 2016. Retrieved March 22, 2016.
  6. Alessandro, Anthony D' (March 22, 2016). "Weinstein Co./Dimension's 'Clown' Set To Haunt This June". Deadline Hollywood. Archived from the original on March 23, 2016. Retrieved March 23, 2016.
  7. "Eli Roth Producing 'Clown,' Based on Fake Eli Roth Movie Trailer - /Film". Slashfilm. November 18, 2010. Archived from the original on November 8, 2014. Retrieved November 8, 2014.
  8. Kit, Borys (November 16, 2012). "Shooting Underway for Eli Roth's Horror Movie 'Clown' (Exclusive)". The Hollywood Reporter. Archived from the original on November 13, 2019. Retrieved November 8, 2014.
  9. "Toronto: Dimension Scores Big Deal For Eli Roth Pics 'Aftershock' And 'Clown'". Deadline Hollywood. September 7, 2012. Archived from the original on November 13, 2019. Retrieved November 8, 2014.
  10. "This Poster For Eli Roth's New Movie Was Just Banned In Italy". November 5, 2014. Archived from the original on November 13, 2019. Retrieved November 8, 2014.
  11. "Eli Roth's 'Clown' Gets Massive Image Gallery!". Archived from the original on November 13, 2019. Retrieved November 8, 2014.
  12. Miska, Brad (March 22, 2016). "Eli Roth's 'Clown' Hitting Theaters This June!". BloodyDisgusting.com. Archived from the original on March 22, 2016. Retrieved March 23, 2016.
  13. "Clown". Rotten Tomatoes. Fandango Media. June 17, 2016. Archived from the original on March 8, 2023. Retrieved September 8, 2023.
  14. Cuthbert, Dominic. "Clown". Starburst. Archived from the original on August 31, 2017. Retrieved April 13, 2015.
  15. Gorman, Howard (January 22, 2015). "CLOWN: Film Review". Scream. Archived from the original on April 22, 2015. Retrieved April 13, 2015.
  16. Aspinall, Jeremy. "Clown". Radio Times. Archived from the original on March 31, 2015. Retrieved April 13, 2015.
  17. Bitel, Anton (February 3, 2015). "Glasgow FrightFest 2015: New Horror Round-up". Little White Lies. Archived from the original on April 3, 2015. Retrieved April 13, 2015.
  18. Miska, Brad (March 4, 2015). "[Review] 'Clown' Delivers All Sorts of Juicy Surprises". Bloody Disgusting. Archived from the original on April 2, 2015. Retrieved April 13, 2015.
  19. O'Shea, Keri (February 28, 2015). "DVD Review: Clown (2014)". Brutal as Hell. Archived from the original on March 24, 2015. Retrieved April 13, 2015.
  20. Harley, Joel (March 6, 2015). "Clown Movie Review". HorrorTalk. Archived from the original on May 9, 2015. Retrieved April 13, 2015.

External links

Works by Jon Watts
Films directed
Film written and produced
Television series created
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