found footage

Blogtoberfest – Horror Movie Review – Unfriended

Title: Unfriended
Genre: Horror, Thriller, Drama
Director: Levan Gabriadze (as Leo Gabriadze)
IMDB link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt3713166/

Synopsis according to IMDB:
A group of online chat room friends find themselves haunted by a mysterious, supernatural force using the account of their dead friend.

I might be getting too old for this, I admit this up front. I did not enjoy this movie on any level. Though I thought the story and the premise was excellent, the thirty year olds playing high schoolers did nothing to elicit my sympathy. I couldn’t even enjoy it on the “so bad it’s good” level because there was little to no physical action. You couldn’t say “don’t go in there” or “stay out of the basement”. Nope. The entire movie took place on a laptop screen.

As I said, this was an interesting concept and on some level, it was well executed. Since I watched the movie on a laptop, it was easy watching and some intriguing things happened.

The actors themselves were annoying. The screaming, crying, cursing and yelling did nothing for the movie. I won’t spoil it here, but in the end the viewer is left unsatisfied.

I’d say see it once, just to experience it.

As always….YMMV.

Grade: D

Horror Movie Review – Hell House, LLC

Title: Hell House, LLC (2015)

Synopsis:
Five years after an unexplained malfunction causes the death of 15 tour-goers and staff on the opening night of a Halloween haunted house tour, a documentary crew travels back to the scene of the tragedy to find out what really happened. (from imdb.com)

Genre: Horror, Thriller

Opinion

Well, well, well. The found footage genre isn’t completely dead.

If you’re a friend of mine on social media, you should well know I’ve never met a found footage film I didn’t like. Well, scrap that, because I realized, yes, I’ve met a few I didn’t care for at all. However, I am fascinated by the whole genre of found footage horror films and never pass up a chance to screen them….if I can take it. Some I won’t see because the gross factor is too high. But that’s blog post for another day.

Hell House, LLC is a little gem I found hiding on Amazon Video. Sidenote- I got the prime membership just for the shipping, but the Video area is kind of like your favorite Palmer Video. I’ve been finding quite a few cool films included with my Prime membership. Back to the movie.

The premise is quite simple: A group of friends put on haunted houses each Halloween season in New York City. This season, they decide to rent an old hotel. The Abbadon hotel in Abbadon, New York. Now, I’m pretty genre savvy, so I knew that Abbadon meant something or other, but was too lazy to reach for my phone to look it up. No matter, because I simply like watching the story unfold before my eyes. Why do research when surely the filmmakers will do it for me?

As a found footage film, this is one of the better ones. There’s not a ton of shaky cam or people yelling profanity at the camera, which is good. The movie opens telling us of an incident that happened five years prior, where people were killed/injured at the opening of the haunted house. It then circles back to before the incident, where the haunted house was being set up.

I must say, this film offered me quite a few scares from places I didn’t expect and had me covering my eyes at one point. It’s fun and it holds together, pretty much, plot wise. There is very little blood/gore – it’s not a slasher film, but I tell you, it’s creepy enough that I remember some of the scenes from it a few weeks later.

Recommended – have fun!

Rating – B

Horror Movie Review – Grave Encounters (2011)

Title: Grave Encounters
Genre: Horror, Found Footage
Director: The Vicious Brothers
Writers: The Vicious Brothers

NO SPOILERS

Plot Summary: (from imdb) For their ghost hunting reality show, a production crew locks themselves inside an abandoned mental hospital that’s supposedly haunted – and it might prove to be all too true.

How do much do I love watching “found footage” horror movies? I don’t know why…it’s a strange addiction indeed. Something about the first person perspective, the shaky cam and the odd angles appeal to me.

As a huge fan of those ghost hunter shows – I’m looking at you Ghost Adventures and Ghost Brothers – I was especially eager to see this film. Cynical “ghost hunters” who will pay people to say they’ve seen a ghost? Check. “Haunted” insane asylum? Check. Found footage? Whooo, baby! We got ourselves a movie!

Do not come to this movie expecting high art, a never-before seen twist or some other movie technique that will blow you out of the water. This movie is a horror movie, designed to scare you. It’s like those live haunted house experiences. You know something is going to jump out at you, it’s just a matter of when and how gross it’s going to look.

The plot is basic. Ghost hunters lock themselves in overnight to experience all that a haunted asylum has to offer. And boy, do they so get what they think they’re looking for. The movie begins with a producer explaining the found footage and how it mysteriously appeared, blah blah. You know the whole set up….now let’s get to the haunting!!

Don’t expect much from film angles and the like. This is found footage and surveillance camera footage. Most of it is in glowy black and white and shaky cam. However, when I compare it to other found footage movies, it’s pretty good! The jump scares aren’t over-done and there’s some serious creepy stuff going on.

For a good fright, watch this with the lights off and with no distractions. Being a scaredy-cat, I had to watch it in the morning, but I was still scared.

Don’t think too much about the how and why of the movie. Just let go and enjoy the ride!

I am not posting the trailer as I usually do, because it gives far too much of the movie away. Just watch it!

Horror Movie Review: Butterfly Kisses

Title: Butterfly Kisses

Genre: Thriller/Horror

Synopsis: (from imdb) A filmmaker discovers a box of video tapes depicting two students’ disturbing film project featuring a local horror legend, The Peeping Tom. As he sets out to prove this story is real and release it as a work of his own, he loses himself and the film crew following him into his project.

Streaming on Amazon Video.

With the introduction of so many streaming services and places to watch movies and other media online, it is difficult to find quality entertainment to watch. This is especially true in the world of the horror move lover: anyone with a good enough camera (including the iPhone 5 camera) and some willing friends/associates can create a film and upload it for viewing. This explains the huge number of simply terrible horror movies one runs into on any given service. Even the so-called “big finance” movies can be failures, no matter how good they look or how pervasive their marketing is. (I’m looking at you The Open House).

On the other hand, if you watch enough movies, as I do, you can sometime find some gems hidden in the coal-dusted rubble. I’m not saying these are diamond, but they’re a lot better than the usual fare found in the horror genre.

For this blog post, I’m going to be writing about Butterfly Kisses, an Amazon Prime offering. Amazon Prime has a LOT of horror movies, and it takes a patient soul (like me) to wade through the chaff to get to the pure grain of the good movies.

If you are a regular reader of this blog, you’ll know I have preference for found-footage horror. Some like potted meat, I like found footage horror. While I love the genre, found footage can be a serious hit or miss. Basically, some of the worse I’ve seen are like some of the ghost hunting shows on cable, complete with boring parts.

However, every once in a while, I get lucky and find a mediocre to good found footage horror film that doesn’t have a lot of heavy breathing and people asking “what’s that”?

Butterfly Kisses is a found footage horror film resting on an interesting premise: a film within a film. A filmmaker discovers a box of tapes in his home. These tapes depict the project of two film students who were investigating a local urban legend call the Peeping Tom. The bulk of the film is this filmmaker trying to prove that this legend is true while he sifts through the footage the students left behind. There’s two stories running: the filmmaker in the “present time” and the students “in the past”.

All in all, it was a pretty interesting movie. I liked the multiple layers of the film and the subplots which weaved in and out of the narrative. There was very little shaky-cam and a few good jump scares. I actually watched the movie twice to catch all the little details that came into play later.

Certainly, it’s a theme/plot device that’s been addressed before in numerous movies and shows, but the execution in this movie is pretty good. The acting is decent and there are some parts which are actually kind of touching/sad.

Not to wax overly philosophical, but the film also brings up themes of what is real/what is not, and how far one is willing to go for a vision and/or belief.
Give Butterfly Kisses a try. While it’s not a great film, I’ve seen a lot worse.
Grade: B+

Horror Movie Review – Grave Encounters 2

Title: Grave Encounters 2
Genre: Horror, Found Footage
Director: John Poliquin
Writers: The Vicious Brothers
IMDB Link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2231554/

NO SPOILERS

PLOT SYNOPSIS: (imdb.com) A film student who is obsessed with the movie Grave Encounters sets out with his friends to visit the psychiatric hospital depicted in the original film.

We’re back!

After seeing Grave Encounters, I just had to see if there were a Grave Encounters 2. And, lo and behold, it was! I quickly queued it up and sat back, prepared to be as scared as I was with the first one.

Alas, this was not the case. Now, this is not to say the movie wasn’t pretty good. It just took a bit of a time to get to the point.

Don’t go into this expect a retread of Grave Encounters. The screenwriter and director went in a bit of a different direction, which saved the movie from being a boring retread of the first movie.

A film student who is obsessed with the movie Grave Encounters sets out with his friends to visit the psychiatric hospital depicted in the original film.

I will say the characters are a little less likable in this movie than they were in the first one. They skewed younger and were less the “seasoned professionals” of the first movie and more snot-nosed college students. Being a woman of a certain age, their antics grated on me a bit, but I was eager to see what the asylum would do with them.

And the haunted asylum didn’t disappoint.

Things are not what they seem at the old homestead and the place starts acting up right away. We, the audience, know what they’re in for, having seen the first movie, we’re just waiting to see how the asylum plays with the new crew.

There’s shouting, there’s yelling, there’s running. There’s spooky stuff afoot and a surprise.

Watch it, if just to have the story continue. Grave Encounters 2 is not as good or as chill worthy as Grave Encounters, but it’s still a pretty good ride.

My advice: Push through the annoying college age antics at the beginning and stay for the scary parts. There is some lore added and maybe a door opening for Grave Encounters 3.

Blogtoberfest – Horror Movie Review – Unfriended