Another Evil

Another Evil

At one point, the queasy horror-comedy “Another Evil” is no longer about a guy going to comically extreme lengths to rid his house of ghosts, and becomes or tries to become, anyway something like a character study of a pathetically inept person who wants to be an exorcist. This shift in focus is subtle, and not entirely successful: You can’t help wondering what happened to schlubby family man Dan (Steve Zissis), who has stopped serving as the straight man to needy amateur demonologist Os’ (Mark Proksch).

Os’ is the more interesting of writer-director Carson D. Mell’s two main characters, and certainly the better-developed; he’s also more sympathetic because he’s got more problems. But that’s not saying much when Dan spends much of his screen time just staring blankly at yet another crazy thing Os’ says (“We need to use cursed boxes to catch a ghost!” “I need to stay in your house longer!” “You’re my friend please like me!”).

The hang ups and tics are believable, but they’re often expressed in such deadpan fashion that even for a movie that refreshingly opts for character driven neuroses instead of jump scares in the night of the Living Dead type madness after about 1982 or so you may start wishing that Mr. Mell were doing something else.

The early part of “Another Evil” is pretty rote. While exploring his house one night with some hallucinogens still coursing through his system, Dan finds Joey Lee (Dan Bakkedahl), a second-rate psychic. Unfortunately for Dan but fortunately for the movie’s running time, Joey turns out not only to be laissez-faire when it comes to busting ghosts (he doesn’t want them gone because they aren’t hurting anybody), but also slovenly and dopey in ways that are not amusing. So Dan gets a recommendation from a friend and calls Os’, a sad sack with minimal social skills who, when invited to crash at somebody’s house, tends to take the generous offer as a license not to leave.

The relationship between Os’ and Dan, takes over the film. Except for the middle part of “Another Evil.” Here Dan sunk to the back ground as Os’ desperation rose. When you realize that really it is about Os’, you realize that the haunting, such as it is, is just kind of happening. Sure it’s a big plot point as you can tell from counting all the different scenes told from different characters’ subjective points-of-view. But getting rid of ghosts isn’t Dan’s biggest problem: he’s got to get rid of Os’.

In this way “Another Evil” resembles black comedies like “What About Bob?” and “The King of Comedy,” only Mell’s movie is more obvious and therefore less scary. Proksch is such an open book that you can read him like an airport paperback Bald, baby faced, wearing a leather jacket over a cowboy shirt with wire-rim glasses he looks like a teenage misfit who has realized his mom isn’t watching anymore.

Proksch whines and scoffs so easily that it’s easy to overlook how much Os’ consists of nothing but facile tics: a failing marriage; competitive chip on his shoulder; desperate need to bond with another man who also thinks he’s an artist (Dan paints abstract images of dark circles surrounded by different colors).

You’re supposed to be able to read Os’ like a pop-up book. But there’s not much funny about that psychological aspect either it fails to be incisive or compelling too many times as Os’ tries time and again to cozy up with Dan only exposing himself further each time around He’s a sad lonely little man so there are some laughs in between clenched teeth

Still my mind wandered frequently throughout “Another Evil.” I’m always wondering what Richard Dreyfuss’ psychiatrist thinks while trying to warn his family about Bill Murray’s obsessive personality in “What About Bob” or what Jerry Lewis’ comedian feels as he’s being stalked by Robert De Niro in “The King of Comedy.”

But that’s because Murray and De Niro realize their respective characters’ manias so well you never wander off the ever-narrowing path those creators set you on. Things get appropriately grim at the end of “Another Evil,” as they must. But Mell gives Dan back control of his life and lets him run away with a narrative that was only briefly about him. I want to recommend “Another Evil” more strongly, but it’s just not involving enough to be worth more than guarded praise.

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