Spoonful of Sugar
Shudder
The Stats
Video: 1080p High Definition
Audio: Dolby Digital (DTS-MA 5.1)
Subtitles: English SDH (French subs available in menu)
Buy it HERE from Vinegar Syndrome or HERE from Diabolik
by "Doc" Hunter Bush, MovieJawn Staff Writer and Podcast Director
The Movie: Good
Spoonful of Sugar, the debut feature from director Mercedes Bryce Morgan, is a bit scattered overall, but features more good than bad ultimately. Ostensibly a riff on the character of Mary Poppins considering the title and the nanny lead, the film does very little with those things, instead crafting a psychosexual thriller that tries its best to keep viewers on their toes.
Millicent (Morgan Saylor) is the new nanny for Johnny (Danilo Crovetti) a boy with behavioral issues and a laundry list of allergens as long as your arm: sugar, gluten, seeds of any kind, strawberries, smoke, and artificial fabrics "...so please, only organic stuffed animals" leading to him only leaving the house wearing a makeshift astronaut outfit. Johnny's parents are Rebecca (Kat Foster) a self-help author of child behavior books, and stay-at-home carpenter Jacob (Myko Olivier), who swap sympathy in the viewers' eyes as the film progresses. One will seem to be more benevolent and concerned about Johnny than the other before further details and behaviors reverse these positions, and on and on, with the occasional larger shocking development thrown in for good measure. We also fairly quickly learn that Milli has been prescribed lysergic acid diethylamide, a.k.a. LSD, to help treat her own issues.
Milli is an interesting POV character. An unreliable narrator even to herself, she's prone to emotional outbursts when placed in situations where she is made uncomfortable, but her constant psychedelic state means not everything is exactly as she (and we) see it. Milli's hallucinations never go full Pink Elephants on Parade, instead sticking in a more subtle area, like not being sure if you've just seen a mouse out of the corner of your eye. Plenty of visual effects, like different film speeds and processes, wiggly distortion and smeary lighting, are all used to show Milli’s disconnect from baseline reality.
The most interesting aspect of Milli for me was trying to discern whether she was the prey or the predator. Are her actions deliberately, knowingly harmful, or does she see it as defending herself and protecting her interests? As we learn more about her, as well as Rebecca and Jacob, it gradually becomes clear: no one is exactly "right" so much as there are some who are, maybe "less wrong". The very end of the film, the credits in fact, reveal aspects of the story that you didn't know you were missing which is a very fun, creative development.
The Packaging: Good
The standard cover features an image of Milli dripping LSD into her mouth via an eyedropper with Johnny's spacesuit helmet in the background. The inside cover features a still from the film of Milli and Johnny spending the afternoon in the yard, specifically they're examining a Nativity scene set up. Oh, did I not mention that Spoonful of Sugar is a Christmas movie? Well as someone who loves a good non-standard film to add to my holiday watchlists, I was as pleasantly surprised as (I hope) you are right now.
There is a special limited edition slipcover available, designed by Corinne Halbert, with depictions of some key imagery from the film set against a lilac background on the front cover, and a moment from the film of Milli surreptitiously bleeding on the back cover.
The Video: Good
The transfer looks great. The film is largely given a cool or overcast quality but Mercedes Bryce Morgan and cinematographer Nick Matthews (who would go on to be director of photography for Saw X, if that does anything for you) manage to wring every ounce of color out of their exterior shots and craft interior scenes with deep shadows and warm honeyed tones. There are moments of extremely high contrast shadows that are clearly meant to be pure black, which makes the depth and texture of the other shadows feel all the more rich. Everything looks sharp, with diffuse and ambient lighting creating a surprising sense of intimacy at times.
The Audio: Good
The Dolby DTS-HD 5.1 worked perfectly well on my three-channel soundbar. The rooms felt like they had depth and dimension, the occasional tones underlining Milli's hallucinations sometimes felt like they were coming from my periphery. I never had any issues with unclear dialogue or muddy sound quality.
The Special Features: Good
I will be honest with you, a lot of these features didn't do much for me. The two featurettes, "The Story" and "The Horror", are extremely slim interview clips, and when combined with the teaser and trailer included, four of the six bonus features are promo for a disc that, if you're watching them, you've already bought. But. Then we have the commentary and the BTS features, both of which are very informative about the making of the film. A brief heads up: the BTS footage is nearly 3½ hours of mostly dialogue-free footage of the team workshopping and filming a handful of scenes from the film. It's mostly devoid of context, but it's a great peek into the actual process of filmmaking.
- Commentary with director Mercedes Bryce Morgan and producers Matt Miller, Natalie Metzger, and Katrina Kudlick
- Behind the Scenes footage (3:20:20) (HD)
- "The Story" featurette (1:57) (HD)
- "The Horror" featurette (1:06) (HD)
- Original teaser (0:33) (HD)
- Original trailer (1:27) (HD)
- Booklet featuring an essay from BJ Colangelo
In Summary: Recommended
Spoonful of Sugar is well and stylishly-made, but feels overstuffed with concepts, developments, turns, and angles from which to approach its themes. It's not a bad problem to have, all things considered, but it might not be satisfying for all viewers. On the other hand, the fact that it avoids direct depictions of onscreen bloodshed for the most part, until the climax which is decidedly violent and bloody, means it could be a strong recommendation for horror / thriller viewers who don't dig on gore.
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