Horst_In_Translation Review of The Jester

The Jester (II) (2016)

The title character is interesting, but that's it

[4/10 · 22 April 2019]

"The Jester" is an American 10-minute horror/mystery short film from 2016 directed by Colin Krawchuk and he is also part of the no less than 4 writers who worked on this relatively short movie. We have a man finished his work and he is out on the streets apparently on the night of Halloween where he runs into another man in a colorful suit wearing a clown mask. So yes, the Joker parallel is not too absurd here with the exception that the Jester apparently has supernatural powers in terms of how fast he moves, but also that there may not be a reasonable explanation behind his magic and with that I am talking about the shoelace scene and the cuffs in particular, but also about the grand finale. Anyway, overall I did not enjoy the film as much as I hoped I would. The shoelace scene was okay and same applies for the cuffs, but the mask at the end and also how he makes him disappear did not do the trick for me. Horror films are more about appearing surprisingly in terms of the bad guy for me, not in the good guy disappearing. By the way, the guy in the white shirt here is played by Krawchuk too. Would have been a better choice to cast another actor I think. He is not bad or anything and the character is really just a plot vehicle for the Jester, but still a better actor could have made this victim part more interesting. Sheffield who plays the Jester is doing fairly fine though, also from the pantomime perspective. Throughout the entire film, the makers here are playing with outr perception of the villain. Wwe know he is evil, but we also see the potential possibility that he just has an effect of a fun good guy giving a little presentation to bypassers. The final scene with the two young guys is the best example for that. They liked him and they have nothing to worry. The reason may be they are in costume celebrating Halloween and not ignoring it or just that one victim a night is enough for the Jester. We won't know. Or maybe we will because there is a sequel out because this first short film was big enough a success apparently. Sadly, the quality of this one here was not good enough for me to watch the second film. At least not immediately afterward. I give The Jester (1) a thumbs-down. Not recommended.