Mark of Cain (1985)

Apparently based off a play, the film takes place in mostly one setting: an old house. In this house identical twin brothers were raised by a fanatically religious family. One brother turned out a lunatic who thinks he's pure evil; the other brother is a normal guy with a normal wife. Normal brother wants to sell the old house because he lost his job and needs money; lunatic brother breaks out of the mental hospital for trying to sell his house.

The film is shot with some film school pretension. I really don't know who Bruce Pittman is, but he has an abtract style that runs wild early in the film. I like this. I think there are some visually fascinating moments. An unintentially funny moment of this sort is the first 15 minutes in the house, where several dramatic moments occur making you think, just maybe, something horrible is going to happen. It reminds one (or me, anyway) of the Sandwich Nightmare sketch from Kids in the Hall.

The writing is actually sufficiently interesting to make one wonder what's going on with this lunatic twin. What drove him mad? Is the other twin possibly mad? What significance does that have? Well, they never explore this. In fact, just in case you were wondering, "When are they going to explore this?" they have a very dull moment where the psychiatrist character is plainly asked about the very subject, to which he, as a surrogate for the screenwriter, says "I don't know."

And that's the answer you get, because the end of the film turns into a series of typical suspense moments that you've seen many a time before. Including, of course, SCDs. What are SCDs you ask? Stupid Character Decisions.