 | MOVIE DETAILS • Name: The Institute • Year: 2022 • Country: USA • Director: Hamza Zaman • Main cast: Ignacyo Matynia, Victorya Brandart, Mark Lobene, Joy Donze, Claire McClain • Runtime: 89 minutes • Production company: Conducive Productions, Headless Films • TRAILER
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The horror subgenre of a mad doctor experimenting with their patients in order to become some kind of deranged man-god or to fight with weird physical, psychological, or sexual deviations is a subgenre that has always brought big enjoyment to the most avid horror fans. Titles like Tom Six’s The Human Centipede (First Sequence) (2009), Stuart Gordon’s Re-Animator (1985), and many of the early David Cronenberg works like Shivers (1975), Rabid (1977), The Brood (1979), or Dead Ringers (1988), are delicious audiovisual pearls of how far the patients will sacrifice everything to get in the hands of a so-called revolutionary scientist that promises a result that is beyond the known science. And, always, with undesired terrifying results, of course.
The Institute (2022) is a movie that aims for a small spot in the previously mentioned list of films. It takes a lot from them, tries to replicate some of the behaviors of the characters, some of the actions that shocked us all before, but it never reaches the desired expectations. This time, a young couple is unable to conceive their own children. They tried everything, natural medicine, surgery… And the results only brought pain and deception. Until they hear about this new mysterious reclusive experimental clinic ruled by the excentric Dr. Lands. And, without much hesitation, they stripped naked from their clothes, fears, and common sense, and embark on this new medicine trip.
Writer and director Hamza Zaman aims too high with his first feature film, but he fails in mostly all aspects. The main characters’ depiction are straightforward, the couple has no personality of their own and they spend the entire running time of the film saying She: “I want a baby”, He: “I love you”. The other patients at the fertility clinic are nothing but cliches, dull drones that bring pretty much nothing to the story. And a special mention to Mark Lobene playing the mad doctor, and his assistants, the worst actors I have seen in a professional film in a while, pretending to be creepy but anchored in mediocre at best.
The film direction is very lousy, with plenty of continuity problems, and the story is a clumsy collection of banalities. Some original ideas were on the table but the execution of the screenplay, the weak directing crafts, and some performances that would make Steve Seagal look like Marlon Brando condemn the movie to complete oblivion.
Hamza Zaman pretended to be David Cronenberg for a day. He attempted to create a creepy horror thriller, with some body-horror elements, and full of sexual energy, but the film makes a right mess of things. We tried, the filmmakers tried, we as the audience tried, but The Institute (2022) is not the kind of mad doctor flick we want to see. Not at all.
RATE: 3/10
IMDB URL: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt12985010
