In a Violent Naturehas been getting a lot of attention for its concept of taking aFriday the 13th-like slasher, with a masked killer stalking people in the woods, andreinventing it by telling the story from the killer’s perspective. While that’s a great idea, this 2024 title is not the first to do it.1960’sPeeping Tomhad its killer filming his victims as he murdered them.Halloweenreally made the gimmick popular with that opening scene of a teenage girl being stalked in her own home before being stabbed to death, until the POV is reversed to show us that the killer was her six-year-old brother, Michael Myers himself.Friday the 13thused it a lot too with the first film in the franchise to play up the mystery of not knowing who the killer is. More recently,The Poughkeepsie Tapesused that angle to terrifying success, but these movies were only shown from the killer’s perspective in moments as a plot device.One film, however, forced us to live through its killer’s actual eyes for the entire film. In 2012, for a reboot of 1980’sManiac,Elijah Woodplayed a character so depraved that to put us inside his head made us just as guilty as he was.
In a gritty urban landscape, a mannequin shop owner conceals his dark secret as a relentless serial killer targeting unsuspecting women. His troubled past and psychological torment are depicted through a series of disturbing events, revealing the inner workings of his mind.
Elijah Wood Was Perfect Casting for a Reboot of ‘Maniac’
In 1980,William Lustig’sManiacwas unleashed onto the world. With its gritty, grindhouse style,Maniaclooked like a documentary or a snuff film, a similar effectWes Cravenhad accomplished withThe Last House on the Left. If the filming style wasn’t terrifying enough, its villain was, withJoe Spinnellplaying Frank Zito,a man with mommy issues who kills women and places their scalps on mannequins. Seems like a nice fellow, huh?Maniacis filled with intense violence and is an uncomfortable watch for most, but over the decade it found a cult following.
In the early 2000s, the era of horror remakes beganwith popular redos ofThe Texas Chain Saw Massacre,Halloween, andFriday the 13th.Maniacwas nowhere near as popular as those titles, so to do a straight-up remake would only invoke curiosity among the most hardcore of horror fans. In 2012, with the remake boom dying out, a stab was taken anyway, so to speak. But as the most successful of horror remakes had discovered, there had to be a different route taken to set itself apart. The 2012Maniac, which was co-written byAlexandre Aje(The Hills Have Eyes,Crawl), and directed byFranck Khalfoun(P2), found two ways to shock its audience. One was to cast Elijah Wood as its killer.Wood was best known to audiences as the heroic Frodofrom the Lord of the Rings films, but now he was going to play a murderous madman. Just a year before,he was voicing a penguin inHappy Feet Twofor Pete’s sake! HavingManiac’s killer assomeone who looks harmlessmakes it easy for him to lure in more victims, while also allowing him to be somewhat sympathetic. The second alteration was inManiac’s style. Not satisfied with simply trying to recapture the gritty look,Maniacwent bigger, by taking us into the killer’s eyes. For ninety minutes, it would force us to spend nearly every second in his head.
Many Tricks Were Used To Put Us Into the Eyes of ‘Maniac’s Killer
Elijah Wood had to be on set for the entirety ofManiac’s four-week shoot. He toldThe Scotsmanthat a lot of his time was spent standing behind the director of photography,Maxime Alexandre, whose camera becomes Frank’s eyes. He said, “I would be behind him the whole time, tapping on his shoulder to make him move faster or slower. It was a totally fascinating way to work.”
Maniacwas initially going to have a body double play Frank most of the time, but as Wood revealed toThe Guardian, that didn’t work, so for every single scene, he is right there behind the camera, and it’s usually his hands you see when the killer reaches out, with Wood simply leaning forward into frame. That couldn’t always work though, as Wood couldn’t reach both of his hands around the camera, so as Wood confessed toFront Row Reviews, a body double was used when we see both of Frank Zito’s arms. That might sound a little silly, but it’s also creepy when you think about it like the killer is two people in one. In a way, he is, though not through the body double.The killer inManiacis not only Elijah Wood as Frank but us, the viewer, too.
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The refreshing new slasher is clicing its way into theaters.
In another interview withFront Row Reviews, director Franck Khalfoun acknowledged thatother films likePeeping Tomhad done the POV of the killer, but never for the entire film like his did. He had one huge reason for wanting to do this: so we would become just as guilty as Frank. Khalfoun said:
“I wanted the audience to feel trapped in his body. The cinema plays a big part in that concept since you are stuck in your seat forced to experience the events with little control over the outcome. Much like Frank is stuck in his body. You are therefore at the same time complicit and repulsed. Therein lies the horror”
The Audience Is Just as Complicit as Frank Zito in ‘Maniac’
There is a conflict in watching a movie likeManiac. While it might be entertaining and scary,it also centers on the male gaze, with a man stalking and hurting women. That’s uncomfortable and can make the viewer feel guilty, especially if they too are a man, so what better way to make that message clear than to have us be one with the killer? If you feel guilty, well, too bad, because you’re still watching anyway, soManiacis going to force you to be the killer as well. We are Frank’s eyes, and while sometimes we can be taken out of that for a few seconds whenElijah Wood is shown in a reflection in a mirror, we are then forced back in before we have time to distance ourselves from the horror.
Maniacis not just a visual performance, as we have more than Frank’s sight, but his words and feelings as well. The beginning ofManiacstarts out just likeHalloween,with a killer watching his victim from afar and silently following her. Just like Michael does to his sister, Frank stabs a woman to death, but before he does, he speaks, telling her not to scream. You don’t get that from Michael Myers. Beyond his words, we can feel Frank’s panic as his rapid breathing increases when he gets anxious and scared before each kill, just like we do by being made to watch through him. He’s not someone who is enjoying this but feels compelled to by the mental breakdown that’s destroying him.
That kind of story is perfect for the POV format becauseFrank is a man who has a motivation behind his kills, with his psyche torn apart by the sexual acts he saw his mother doing with men when he was just a child. He’s not a quiet man in a mask, but a complex human being who is as frightened as he is frightening. Slashers likeHalloweenandIn a Violent Natureuse the killer’s point-of-view as an intriguing filmmaking device, but forManiac, going into Frank’s eyes is where the true horror lives.
