Patchwork (2015) Movie Review: The Most Fun You’ll Have Getting Revenge
By: Stephanie Welling
In 2017 I made a very surprising discovery: I found two men I unquestionably trust to make a movie about and starring women taking revenge on the men who have wronged them. Director and writer, Tyler MacIntyre, and co-writer, Chris Lee Hill’s, Patchwork checks all the right boxes with an unapologetic and viciously righteous revenge story that requires no redemption arcs, no middle ground, and no sympathetic backstory to explain away the evils of men. The majority of the men in this movie are capital B bad and all-caps exploitative, the exception being the incredibly awkward but lovably goofy James Phelps. While the premise may sound like Frank Henenlotter’s 1990 horror-comedy Frankenhooker, its contents more closely resemble the outlandishness of Stuart Gordon’s 1985 Re-Animator and the unity of women working together to defeat chauvinistic and undeservedly powerful men in Colin Higgins’ 1980 9 to 5.
Patchwork is broken up between eight non-linear chapters, three of which give backstories for our leading ladies and what they were doing the night they were killed and stitched together. Jennifer, Ellie, and Madeleine are all truly alone in their respective worlds as none of them have genuine friendships, relationships, or even family that would care if they went missing. As we explore their lives pre being Frankensteined together, we know that no one would be inconvenienced by their disappearances. They only exist as unwelcome bodies in their own worlds. Ellie’s roommate would have to find a replacement, someone would be promoted to Jennifer’s vacant position, and Madeleine’s mysterious lack of a place in the world would require nothing because she has no role in her own life.
It’s clear from the first scene that Patchwork is pulling no punches with the playful absurdity that offsets its gruesome subject matter without ever dismissing the real pain that it causes. Corey Sorenson is sublime as The Surgeon as the movie opens with him complimenting and flirting with what we later find out is Tracey Fairaway’s severed head on a surgical tray. He asks for her permission to move a strand of hair away from her face, an act of explicit consent that she is unable to give. When Danny Jolles’ character, Hank, walks in on the conversation and asks the surgeon who he is talking to, Sorenson, embarrassed by the intrusion, nervously laughs as he picks up a non-surgical staple gun and haphazardly staples absolutely nothing onto a severed arm to indicate that nothing is awry. Together they run a hilariously illegitimate plastic surgery “business” whose ads are akin to a used car dealership’s obnoxious commercials with bright text and unnecessary shouting, complete with everyone’s favorite wacky waving inflatable arm flailing tube man.
Jennifer is a self-centered and demanding mid to high-level executive at some unnamed, generic firm. Like the others, she has no real friends and her only relationship is with a walking stereotype of a married male coworker wearing a Bluetooth earpiece that never comes off. Ellie is a young, college-aged girl desperate for friends and acceptance by her peers, something she never attains and only ends up being exploited after she drunkenly accepts an invitation to a frat party. Madeleine is somehow the outsider in this group of outsiders. Her story is shown in pieces; the rest of the time we only know she is incredibly insecure and strangely disconnected from the outside world. Once the girls are sewn together and reanimated into one body sharing three minds, they overcome their initial panic by introducing themselves before focusing on escaping the underground lab.
The movie cuts between quick vignettes that provide context and the present situation they all find themselves in. The creature itself is played by the fantastic Tory Stolper but is inhabited by the thoughts of all three. MacIntyre provides ample screen time both for the separate girls as they get to know each other and Stolper playing the creature with brilliant comedic precision. The combination of these shots makes it look like the creature is arguing with itself and fighting its own limbs that are sporadically controlled by each girl. Stolper is the real star here with a commitment to physical comedy rivaling that of Bruce Campbell in Evil Dead II.
But it is perhaps the boiling undercurrent that makes Patchwork a masterpiece: MacIntyre and Hill’s respect for women’s right to bodily autonomy and unapologetic revenge on those who exploit them. It is only an extreme example of mutilation because we know it is impossible to stitch three people into one and maintain all three personalities. Reality bears perhaps slightly less drastic but just as invasive violence against women. Too often do we experience these acts of violence first hand, however small they may be. From drive-by catcalling to full-blown assault, women are constantly reminded of the same basic principle: we don’t belong to ourselves. We are alive so another can consume. In no other genre are women given the chance to pick up these blunt objects of destruction, whether physical or emotional, and have license to actually use them. Good horror gifts the vulnerable with a suit of armor and provides a space wherein they can navigate without fear, where catharsis is as real as it is bloody. Patchwork never falters from its purpose or makes itself small by way of excuses for society’s behavior. It screams its way into this world and only gets louder; the only difference is that at the end, it’s holding a bloodied baseball bat dripping with the last bits of life its enemies couldn’t hold onto.