Comments on: The Movie Frailty Explained and Discussed

By: Angela

Angela — Sat, 23 Jul 2022 01:39:57 +0000

@axi …I’m with you. “That was a review alright” certainly sums up my take as well, respectful way possible. I was wondering where I could find your review if you ever ended up making one?
I’d love to read a well thought out, more secular perspective.

By: Charlie

Charlie — Sat, 28 May 2022 20:02:56 +0000

@Chris, this is what gets me. Why did “God” not intervene when Sheriff Smalls was on their case?

I personally think the whole film implied that the Dad was nuts. He was a man who lost the plot of reality through some kind of head injury. And Paxton (RIP), played the part perfectly.

However, to me, the Twist at the very end felt kind of tacked on just for reactions. Almost like the director or writer didn’t believe fully in the twist themselves. A what if kind of ending.

By: Chris

Chris — Tue, 18 Jan 2022 20:54:58 +0000

Once father Meiks kills innocent Sheriff Smalls, his crusade can’t really be directed by a just God, can it?

You could try to argue that the murder was a “necessary evil.” But if Adam Meiks has God-given powers that allow him to erase images or people’s memories of him… then why didn’t his father have, and use, the same powers to evade capture by Sheriff Smalls, instead of killing him?

By: KrisChan

KrisChan — Sun, 12 Dec 2021 10:18:59 +0000

Dear Taylor,
Thank you for your review of Frailty. I’ve just finished watching the film 10 minutes ago.

“Dad” Meiks says Fenton his son is a demon. But when Dad touches Fenton’s bare skin, we don’t see Dad getting any revelation of any evil deeds that Fenton has done. So, in the movie, was Fenton really a demon?
If so, I guess that’s why adult Adam ends up killing Fenton (while Fenton is on his typewriter).

Another question: Did the movie say what adult Fenton was doing on the typewriter?

By: Azi

Azi — Wed, 18 Aug 2021 12:34:25 +0000

Well! That was a review alright. (And yes, your grammar is atrocious!!) I am currently doing a review of this film, one of my all-time favorites. I just had a couple of comments about the “religious” or “spiritual” aspect of this film. I am not a Christian, and the first couple of times I saw this, I immediately assumed Dad needed a time-out at the local loony bin. Paxton (I really miss that guy), WANTED the audience to side with Fenton, who thought Dad had just gone bonkers. If the audience believed that Dad really WAS seeing visions, the Adam reveal wouldn’t work. However, I realized that this was not a religious family going to church on Sundays, with crucifixes all over their walls. They were just a normal, working class bunch. Until Dad has a visit from the angel. Change-up! Dad suddenly becomes a demon vigilante, able to detect their evil with just a touch. Fenton, older, slightly wiser than younger Adam, thinks Dad has had a psychotic break…and that’s the BEST scenario in his mind. Adam believes in Dad, and claims he sees visions as well. So, although I did agree with Fenton, I realized I couldn’t just write everything off as crazy. The religocity that Dad suddenly embraces, was tough to ignore. I also had read a review that claimed James Cameron saw an early cut of the film, and each “demon” had it’s own sins and murder (destruction) separately. Cameron told him to do the flashbacks at the end or else Paxton would risk splitting the audience. Some would actually believe that Dad really was doing god’s work. The more they saw him struggling with this monumental task, the more they would feel for him, which wouldn’t make the reveal nearly as stunning. That was one thing I had trouble with. The other was (and I’m probably late to the party on this, but I finally made it) the fact that through the flashbacks we see that Adam really DID see visions like his Dad. He wasn’t just making it up. When he gives away his true identity, we see that he, too, was a demon-destroyer. Of course, the big question is, how did he know that Doyle had killed his own mother? Clearly, film-wise, it was through touch, like dear old Dad. Did Adam inherit some freak-show talent from his insane father? Or was it something more than that? Finally, the fact that no one can remember what he looks like, the static obscurring his face on the video, it was almost like he being protected. By whom? When he shakes Agent Hull’s (who saw him clearly a few times that day) hand (no gloves!), he tells him he is a “good man”. The last shot of him and his pregnant wife..why? She was completely unnecessary to the plot. Unless, she was carrying something more important than your average, run-of-the-mill baby. Now, again, I am definitely not down with it being a religious thing, end of story. It could have been aliens, and it would still be basically the same movie. I could go on and on..I have REAMS of notes, and evidently yet more research to be done. This is one of my favorites, thankfully. I wish Bill had been with us longer. This was only his first time in the director’s chair. He also gave newbie Brent Hanley his first chance at writing a screenplay, and composer Brian Tyler’s first foray into doing a musical score (and there was no stopping that guy after “Frailty”). Thanks, Bill! Spot on!

By: Robert Jennings

Robert Jennings — Fri, 16 Jul 2021 05:26:34 +0000

It was nice to stumble upon this and see that people were talking about a film rant not only love I find to be brilliantly crafted and delivered. I luckily am not someone that buys into religion in any way whatsoever. I place my focus and energy and roots in those things that are real. So for me I never really focused on the religious aspect. I instead was drawn to the smoothly executed story and how it unfolded. This is one of those rare movies that has an obvious je ne sais quoi about it the entire thing. From the story and the choices of twists and turns, to the absolute brilliant casting ….. just all of it. I was immediately taken with. I was and still remain baffled that something so great is so underrated and overlooked. Maybe the religion thing was a turn off for some or maybe it was just the timing of release. Either way it remains a masterpiece (IMO) that every movie maker, writer, producer, star etc… should watch before pulling the trigger because Frailty gets it right. More specifically Matthew gets it right. It’s not easy to make an audience endear themselves with a character and or identify with or want to protect … only to then have them nauseated from the gut punch of realizing they’d been sympathetic to the boogeyman all this time yet once the shock subsides the warm fuzzies are still there even after we know he’s not a hero in any sense.

By: Demetris Alexandrou

Demetris Alexandrou — Tue, 01 Sep 2020 12:50:16 +0000

In reply to Anderson. So these are real people writing here about their real lives based on a fictional movie. I thought some movies are based on real people and real lives made to look fantastic on the big screen. That’s the most interesting twist!!

By: Chris

Chris — Thu, 30 Jan 2020 21:49:21 +0000

My take is they live in a universe where demons are real. Dad was doing God’s work killing three demons. Fenton was a demon but Dad didn’t want to acknowledge the fact. Adam continues Dad’s work killing demons because he also had the perception gift as well. That’ why no one could remember him and the tape was fuzzy. God is protecting his next demon killer, Adam.

By: Deb

Deb — Mon, 23 Dec 2019 03:24:57 +0000

So this is the thing: at the end we see the crimes of the victims without editorializing. Now, the challenge is this, do we have an unreliable narrator in Adam? Perhaps. But the story wasn’t told that way. It was told this way: WHAT IF a man was called to exact judgement on people who were so consumed by evil they had become demons? And what if a son who literally couldn’t believe appropriated belief to bridge the gap between him and his father. And killed “real people” to get into his natural father’s good graces.
What would have made this more interesting would have been a catalog of Fenton’s killings which had no “list” and Adam’s killings which had no record-ie not any of those killings made a blip on any public records. Because they actually WERE demons. Just a thought.