Review by Eric Hillis
Directed by: Colin Krawchuk
Starring: Michael Sheffield, Kaitlyn Trentham, Jessica Ambuehl, Dingani Beza
Writer/director Colin Crawchuk's 2023 feature expansion of his viral short The Jester proved enough of a hit to spawn this sequel. Michael Sheffield returns in the title role of the villainous trickster clad in a bright orange suit and rictus grin mask, though this time the mask is removed to reveal a gruesome face that looks just the same. That early make-up reveal lets us know that Crawchuck is working with a bigger budget this time, and he uses it effectively to expand his villain's bag of tricks.
The first film established that the Jester liked to attach himself to the emotionally vulnerable. This time his target is Max (Kaitlyn Trentham), a 15-year-old budding magician who often finds herself targeted by other kids who view her as "weird." Once again the Jester appears on Halloween night, when Max is bummed out over not being invited to go trick-or-treating with her mum and sister because she's now considered too old for such things. While sulking in a diner and having her home made magician's outfit mocked by some horrible teens, Max is approached by the Jester, who impresses her with a card trick. Where most people recoil in terror at the grisly sight of the fiend, Max is friendly towards the Jester. Taken aback, the Jester storms off, reluctant to follow through and claim Max as a victim. Later, Max tracks him down and the two become intertwined in a night of bloodshed.
This sequel subsequently develops into the latest of many horror movies in which a troubled kid finds kinship with a monster. This concept dates back to Victor Erice's 1973 film Spirit of the Beehive, but it can be seen in such recent horrors as Piggy, Slapface, The Angry Black Girl and Her Monster, and even the awful Halloween Ends. Crawchuk deviates from the template early on however, as Max quickly realises her new buddy is very much a wrong 'un. In similar fashion to the recent French sci-fi thriller Meanwhile on Earth, the Jester gives Max an ultimatum: she can either become his latest victim or she can aid him in taking four other lives. As Max has plenty of people who have wronged her, she agrees to the latter and sets about lining up her enemies for the Jester's deadly tricks.
Though first-timer Trentham looks more like a college student than a 15-year-old, her performance is so convincingly vulnerable that we quickly overlook this detail. We warm to Max instantly and some of her early scenes are genuinely heartbreaking. When Max cries out that she's "tried to do everything right," it's a reminder of how so many kids are cruelly targeted by bullies for the most random of reasons. For Max it's her love of magic that marks her as a victim, and there's a great injustice in the very thing she loves the most being used against her. In a surprisingly affecting scene, Max visits a struggling magic shop where the proprietor (Dingani Beza) perks her up by telling her that in other kids' hands a wand is just a stick, but in hers it's a vessel of magic. I wasn't expecting such a lovely little moment in a movie about a monster pulling people's insides out through their mouths, but it goes a long way to making us root for Max.
It also makes us eager to see her enemies get their comeuppance at the hands of the Jester. But this isn't Terminator 2. The Jester is here to exploit Max, not become her friend, and Max realises that despite them being responsible for her misery, the bullies don't deserve the sort of fate the Jester has in store for them. As the night progresses and more innocents fall victim to the Jester's tricks, Max seeks a way to break her covenant and send him back to Hell.
As with the first film, this sequel suffers from the occasional amateurish performance from its regional supporting cast, and the writing sometimes struggles to communicate its ideas in concise fashion. But there's a level of craft here that we rarely see in indie horror, or mainstream horror for that matter. This isn't simply a sequel knocked out for cynical reasons, but rather the expansion of a fictional world in which its writer/director is clearly invested. The first movie's most striking feature was its impressive colourful cinematography, and this sequel is even more gorgeous. Its visual palette makes it look more like a comic book than any of the actual comic book adaptations we've seen in the last decade. But this sequel's greatest strength is a fleshed out final girl we can instantly get behind, played with earnest conviction by a young actress we'll surely be seeing more of. The Jester 2 delivers tricks and treats in equal measure.
The Jester 2 is in US cinemas September 15th and 16th from DREAD and Fathom Entertainment. A UK/ROI release has yet to be announced.
