I've fallen away from it in the last bunch of years, but I've always had a heavy handed interest in psychology and serial killers. Maniac from 1980 is an amazing character study of sorts into the mind and actions of a repressed man with some serious mommy issues where Frank Zito ends up having sex with and scalping various women on the dirty assed streets of New York in an attempt to quell such feelings and miss-wirings of his fucked brain. Overbearing and overprotective parents can have massively negative effects on the children that they have and raise because they are just hidden from everything and it may become a release later in life to just destroy themselves. Or others. The Stylist is basically the female, hairstylist version of Maniac and I really loved pretty much everything about this flick because of that aspect alone. I already dig stronger female lead characters in general (especially in horror of course) what with my two favorites being American Mary and Excision, and I can very easily add The Stylist to that list. Claire has some very dark underlying problems that aren't entirely explained here (maybe a second viewing is warranted) but you get the idea that she may have inherited this huge house from her parents or family somehow that has a full blown wine cellar and everything else that goes along with it which lends her to having all the room in the world for her scalps, mannequins, glass head figures and anything else she hides down there to perpetuate her mental instabilities. She does tell a client at some point that her mom passed away when she was seventeen and her dad left when she was born so there's that, but the exposition never went any deeper than that.
I have to mention the score and the cinematography for The Stylist is nothing short of superb and both of them will suck you into wanting to watch this until the end. You can feel Claire's tension and anxiety when she is going to scalp or kill someone, you can feel how bizarre and disturbed she is when there is no music at all and the bright colors and giallo inspired lighting in a lot of scenes really meld a lot of different influences together to make this a fantastic psychological horror experience. The ending was pretty much what I was expecting and it kind of left things open for interpretation as to what happened to Claire beyond that, but it all builds up to her doing all of the bridesmaids hair and the bride herself, Olivia, which she becomes obsessed with because she believes her life is clean and spotless so she wants to be like her. And it gets really wrong when she breaks into her bedroom and puts one of her nighties on and proceeds to masturbate with one of her toys in her bed. Yeah-Olivia has something to look forward to after the wedding is over.
Wine while you get your hair cut? Cooper's Hawk, take notes.
Your outside trust is probably going to backfire on you. I can feel it.
Well, now we all know that Frank Zito has a sister.
Can't wait to see what insanity is down in Claire's cellar.
I guess we all really do want what we can't have.
Saving your life? Maybe scalping it.
If your fiancé is going to turn into a groomzilla, then he's already a beta.
Really? That's your hairstyle for your wedding? I've seen chicks with that as their regular one.
Why scalp Dawn at the coffee shop? Why not Olivia?
There's no going back now.
I'd rather kill my demons than cover them up.
My worst nightmare-a club with tons of random people everywhere and terrible music.
Zits and zombies, if you're a fan of serial killers, strong female leads, Maniac and criminal psychology, The Stylist is a great alternative route to take. I really loved everything that this tale presented and even though the run time came very close to the two hour mark, it almost didn't feel like it. The pace did burn very slowly at specific times (particularly when Claire broke into people's homes to almost scalp them, kill them or to just absorb personal things from their lives) but that's all part of the character building for her in this offering and it wouldn't be able to stand without it. Just watch it the next time you go to a salon to get your hair done-Claire might want to take a little to much off the top.
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