Bill Paxton’s directorial debut Frailty was very promising. The result is a very dark thriller, a strong, well-crafted horror story about a pious but insane man from Thurman, Texas, who commits murder after being “ordered by God” to destroy demons trying to control humanity. A couple of plot twists and a creepy ending.
Director Paxton plays a twisted man known as the “Hand of God” assassin. Matthew McConaughey impresses as the eldest son of the lunatic who tells the story to an FBI agent in Dallas (Powers Booth).
What is the movie Frailty about
Frailty begins with Matthew McConaughey’s character sitting in the FBI office in Dallas, waiting to speak to a specific agent. Agent Wesley Doyle (Powers Booth) defiantly doesn’t shake hands with him and keeps talking to Doyle and telling him what he knows about the Hand of God killer. Next, the character played by Matthew McConaughey begins to recount events that began in 1979 with his father (Bill Paxton), who believed he was divinely commanded to kill. His father was so obsessed with this idea that he attracted his own sons into his “work”. The father said that the Lord had called him to “destroy the demons” who were walking around in human form.
The viewer is given the opportunity to see how everything happens in the memories of the character played by Matthew McConaughey. The longer he tells this story, the more interesting it becomes how it all ends. After all, the dude kills people along with his sons, and one of them believes his father with all his heart.
The film constantly arouses viewers’ interest in memories of childhood and growing up with such a strange father, interspersed with plots about serial murders.
The film was superbly shot from start to finish, with no boring digressions. The action flows smoothly, quickly and tightly from one scene to another.
The motion picture shows how far people can go: do terrible things with their loved ones and commit atrocities in the name of the “Creator”. The tape is interesting for its twists and turns and interpretations of the concept of morality in general.
The meaning of the film
The key moment in the plot is not a maniac killer, but human faith.
The director’s style is reliable, the plot is quite direct and verified (after all, the story of the film is based on a real case with the capture in Pennsylvania of a crazy sadist, murderer and rapist Joseph Kallinger, who committed crimes with his 13-year-old son Michael). The script is masterfully written. The actors are well invested in the script, they play emotionally and convincingly. The zigzags necessary for the plot and the confusing labyrinths in the finale lead to surprises in the answers. The filmmaker makes the audience think and reflect. It turned out to be an unequivocally smart movie, since it prompted so many viewers to think about the plot properly. It is worth noting that in the demonstration of violence, Paxton is very reasonable and delicate. Violence is almost not noticeable, but at the same time the suspense is preserved, fear is pumped masterfully.
Bill Paxton became both the director and the performer of the main role in this film. He played a man who is convinced that the world is inhabited by demons masquerading as humans and who believes that God has given him a mission to kill them all. It sounds rather strange against the backdrop of excellent acting, directing, camera work. The film can be called one of the most disturbing mainstream film projects created in recent years.
When watching Frailty, the audience does not have a firm conviction that the characters really have some kind of supernatural mission from God or they are criminally insane. The focus of the plot takes place at the climax. This then robs the film of carefully constructed suspense. The rest of the movie is entertaining. The terrible plot may scare some of the audience, but because of the carefully crafted human relationships, it will make you keep watching this film.
Movie ending explanation
The final parting semantic labyrinth turned out to be strong. The director’s faith in the fair core of history shown to the audience turned out to be very bold and impressionable. However, even against this background, the approval of illegal lynching of people is categorically unacceptable. But the film is notable for the fact that it inescapably pushes one to doubt and makes one believe specifically in Faith, which in this film is elevated to a single support of the universal measure on earth. After watching the final frames of the film, thoughts are still arguing among themselves, different beginnings enter into a dialogue with each other, there is a search for finding the right path after seeing the miracle of Vera. In general, the story in this controversial film with a complex script was a success. Paxton’s hero begins to kill, because “an angel told him”, and the Lord “dictated a list”, in anticipation of the imminent “end of the world”, he alone knows exactly “who the demon is” and will pass on his business by inheritance. The actors are convincing. The audience constantly reflects on the plot without losing their sanity.
Another nuance of what is told in the film is that when watching to the final episodes and with the subsequent intention to revise it again from the beginning, the viewer not only encounters a terrifying thriller again, but also discovers a completely different facet of the drama in the familiar character of the father.
