Movie 39: June

Starring: Kennedy Brice, Casper Van Dien, Victoria Pratt, Eddie Jemison, Lance E. Nichols.

Director:L.Gustavo Cooper.

Never seen or really even heard of June.  By what little I do know, it seems this is another "Child with Dark Powers" film, which is fine.  Looks to be the vein of films like Dark Touch which was pretty okay, so if this movie is half as decent as that I should at least be mildly entertained.  So, let's dive in and see what this brand new DVD release has to offer.

The time lapse/electronica music credits sequence feels more at home on TV and not so much for a film, which worries me a little...last thing I need in my life right now is a failed pilot.

We got a baby and people in old timey robes...one is a monk.  His jaunty tune sounds like Uptown Girl.  Which is now stuck in my head, along with the Simpsons episode when Homer becomes a hippy and chooses Billy Joel's song as his "song of protest."  I hope this isn't the best thing that happens to me while watching this movie.

We have some of black mass thing going on, so either it's the Eighties or they accidentally wandered onto the set of Kill List.  Or Warlock:The Armageddon.  Guess it's neither: this appears to be mostly modern.  I hope this film doesn't maintain the voice-over narration.  But if it doesn't now, I'll be wondering why.  Considering the plot-driving nature of the film at this juncture.  

So the eponymous June (I love using the word eponymous) is a solitary, withdrawn girl who lives with incredibly trashy (perhaps too trashy and maybe a little manipulatively so) foster parents and apparently has some sort of magic powers.  She hasn't exhibited any, but a foster system guy-played by Eddie Jemison who is quite good and very compassionate-apparently knows about it.

My only complaint with these kinds of movies is how utterly unsympathetic everyone is around a clearly unhappy child.  I get that the film needs that sort of thing to move along the plot, it just always feels so forced to me.  Maybe I've lived a fairly insulated life, and I certainly do know many white trash rednecks, but I have to believe that most people are capable of compassion towards a child who has had a rough life?  Anyway, it does admittedly work well enough in that we can feel for little June...and it allows us to not feel so bad when her powers hurt people.  It's an important thing to set-up: June is not the one doing this, after all, it's the evil that was put upon her...and it's kept under control as long as people aren't dicks.  Basically, June is Bruce Banner and, like Banner, the world just seems dead set on making sure she hulks out.

Actually, when June does Hulk Out, it's kinda cool.  Big bad-ass telekinetic shockwave stuff.  Not bad.

It's another element of this kind of film I always felt was forced: even the "nice" parents have this tendency to "not get it."  Like, they have this troubled child, who they know is troubled, and still react like passive aggressive dolts when the kid does stuff that troubled kids do.  This one seems to more or less be avoiding it...so far...

I can't watch a Casper Van Dien movie without adding Starship Trooper lines.  Like when June meets her new Parents and she's told "This is your new Dad" and I couldn't help but add "until he dies or you find someone better."

I'm beginning to think that our Foster Care Professional is not what he appears to be.  I'm betting he's a Santanist dude. But then again I've seen enough horror movies (so very, very many...my god...so many...) to know that nine times out of ten the guy who says "trust us" is usually the guy you should never under any circumstances actually trust.  

There's some spinning of wheels going on at this point: they've done the "Parents see June do weird psychic shit and look worried" three times.  The movie has established a bunch of stuff again and again, so it seem somewhat strange to keep doing it.  They're not bad scenes, really...

Okay, finally, we're getting someplace.  June outright informs Casper that she's gonna make him a friendly ghost.  Sorry, couldn't resist.  Well, it wasn't June, per se, but the evil entity inside June but...didn't really go where it needed to.  Basically they wrote out Casper but,,,didn't kill him off.  Not sure where we're going with all of that, really: is Casper the hero?  I would have to assume he'll eventually come back and save the day?  

Van Dien and Victoria Pratt are giving strong performances but I'm not entirely sure they know what they're actually doing.  The script is kinda all over the place with motivations and frames of mind: despite overwhelming evidence of horror, Pratt basically refuses to listen to Casper who really isn't offering anything but relatively sound advice: June IS dangerous.  But when he calls that out loud, she kinda calls him an asshole.  There's no evidence of mind control or what have you...just people acting kind of strangely.  By the way?  Victoria Pratt is JACKED.  I mean, massive.

Kennedy Brice is really great, too, as June.  I can't say I set a particularly high bar for child actors, but I'm pretty impressed with her here.

Wait, did the bad guys just say Pratt is on it?  I sometimes feel like this movie has scenes that were literally in another movie at one point.  There was no evidence to suggest that she was part of the evil cult...hell, there was very little evidence there even WAS an evil cult...but maybe she isn't and the dialogue made it sound that way?  I really do feel like this whole thing is a little sloppier than it should be...really, this isn't the most complicated story to tell, so why is it so muddled?  

Oh, okay, so the narration is Pratt.  She was part of the cult at the beginning...so now some things come together...but, really, why the long way around?  That plot point doesn't need to be there at all.  In fact, the narrative would work better without it.  

Oh, neat, it wasn't the devil for once.  It's totally some Gaea earth-cult dealy.  Nice.  Unfortunately, that ending didn't work so well at all.  Hurried, mostly pointless, with absolutely no real emotional payoff or catharsis.  Just kinda...ends.  Meh.

Final Thoughts: Well acted but muddled, largely impotent and almost entirely pointless mess.  I've seen a lot worse, to be fair, but this didn't do much for me at all.  It had some "almost there" moments, though...just a mediocre movie with some decent acting.

Final Rating: Two and a Half Stars.