The Clinic (2010)

Cameron: "It's perfectly normal to have strange dreams during pregnancy."

By James Rabbitts
With Tabrett Bethell, Freya Stafford and Andy Whitfield

It was after watching Adore (2012) that I discovered The Clinic through a bit of actors and actresses IMDb stalking. The movie looked interesting with a great premise so I decided to see it.

Beth and Cameron are a young couple that travels through Australia to go visit Beth's mother for Christmas. In the middle of nowhere, a car chases them and they drive off the road. Unscathed but a little shaken up, Cameron decides it is better to spend the night there and they head into a motel with a creepy manager. In the middle of the night, Cameron can't seem to sleep and he decides to go out and seek some food leaving his pregnant wife to be alone at the motel. After experiencing the oh so unfortunate lack of fuel, he comes home and discovers his wife is missing. Police doesn't seem too cooperative, while we see Beth waking up in a bath tub filled with ice... and a big scar where her pregnant belly was.

If you have read the little story line you probably realized that the movie starts with a ton of clichés already. Leaving a wife alone in a creepy motel is probably the fiance's award while the car dying of lack of fuel is oh so sad. If the movie hadn't been placed in the 70's in order to make sure there's no DNA testings available, I'm sure their mobile phones would have lacked reception. However, the movie had great ideas. What goes on in the clinic is original, while not entirely knew as it calls to mind some other movies of the genre, it is great potential and the women trapped there could form a great survival team.

Sadly it doesn't really ever deliver as the mystery is quickly revealed and the story slowly unravels. A few twists at the end can't really save it. The movie is not particularly scary except for a few stitching and unstitching wounds... Also, they manage to make cows look scary which is in itself a decent feat. The story line of the husband was absolutely disappointing. I also wish we knew more about the women present at the "clinic" since these are the characters we had to get to learn and see behave.

I liked: Some good core ideas. Nice settings, these abattoirs were pretty grim.

I disliked: Falls into clichés. Disappointing. Fails to capture the viewer's full attention.

36/100
It tries to cash on the horror of losing a child and the maternal instinct but it fails in many aspects where other movies with the same idea did a lot better.