I needed something fun today, and horror is usually fun for me. This movie was released on Shudder last year, and I have been meaning to watch it ever since. I thought this one would help me take it easy after a rough week.
Anything for Jackson is a supernatural/satanic horror about an older couple who want to bring back their dead grandson. They kidnap a pregnant woman and do a satanic ritual, but they must have done something wrong because ghosts keep popping up in their house scaring all three of them.
This movie was okay. Not bad, but okay. I appreciated the plot taking off right away and the fact that the filmmakers are obviously horror fans as they included many different horror tropes into one movie. You have a kidnapping, a satanic ritual, demons, ghosts, blood and gore, and a crazy lunatic to tie it all together. I couldn’t help but think of other horror movies any time anything exciting was happening though. They had a weird Hereditary-esque flossing ghost, and the whole pregnant lady unwillingly involved in a satanic ritual, obviously reminiscent of Rosemary’s Baby. There was even a scene where a ghost child turned his head to reveal a bloody wound on the back just like in The Sixth Sense. The filmmakers maybe had a little too much going on, and things felt forced at times. Side note, can we please stop doing the contortionist thing in horror movies? The only time that trope really worked was in The Exorcist with the spider walk, but it should have ended there.
Anyway, the characters and performances might have been the best aspect. It was exciting for me to immediately recognize the weird janitor in Urban Legend, Julian Richings. Watching him and Sheila McCarthy (whose names I didn’t know before writing this) as Dr. and Mrs. Walsh kidnap a pregnant woman and try to perform this ritual reminds me of watching my own grandparents try to use their iPhones. At one point, the Walshes even bring in a younger, more Latin-savvy member of their Satanic church to help them figure out where they went wrong. It was disturbing and amusing. The minor characters were fun to watch as well. The aforementioned Satanic church member is your typical metal nerd who thinks HE should be leading the meetings. You get to watch him go nuts helping the Walshes finish the ritual, and it is fun.
Anything for Jackson, overall, was a fun watch. It did for me just what I needed it to do, and for that I’m grateful.
Movie For One 