STARRING- Felissa Rose, Jonathan Tiersten, and John Philbin
DIRECTOR- Kris Hulbert and Randy Kent
Synopsis taken from IMDb
A young couple's dream home turns into a house of horrors when the disturbing, violent acts of three generations of doomed families is reawakened for them to witness.
Coming to DVD July 22nd, The Perfect House starts with Mike (William A. Robertson) and Marisol (Andrea Vahl) being shown around a really nice and big house house by a seductive real estate agent. It's obviously too good to be true, and they're being lied to and schemed into possibly buying it. There's no mention of the house's past, but the movie is constructed with long, detailed flashbacks of the previous owners and the owners before them, who were all driven mad by the so-called "dream home".
If you follow my blog, or read often, you know that I lovehorror anthologies. In all honesty though, I don't think there's a horror fan alive who don't like anthology films. 'V/H/S/2 is the follow-up to the cult smash hit 'V/H/S', which hit last year. Being a big fan and supporter of the first film, I was more than ready to experience the next chapter in this series. Just like the first film, this one has a nice set-up of directors of all variety. Offering us new stories, and new points of view, there's something for every kind of horror fan in this sequel. I watched the film for the first time with some friends last night. I woke up this morning and gave it a 2nd viewing before my review, allowing me to let it soak in some more in my head. I was pleased with this movie, it's good stuff. But, it's not like the first film. They don't have the same feel to them. The first came off like a snuff film; very gritty and haunting.
This sequel, comes off as a lot more fun and not as serious. There's some good stuff in this movie though, a ton of creativity and heart. 'V/H/S/2' is a really good installment in what may become the best new horror series out there right now.
"Tape 49" Director- Simon Barrett Writer- Simon Barrett This is the story that was the glue holding the other stories together. It's the one the film starts with, and we go back to it in between viewing the VHS tapes. It's the current story, and it follows two private investigators who are looking for a missing college student. They break into his house to look for clues or, anything that may lead to where he is. They find blood on one of the walls, and a setup of several TVs and an unlimited amount of VHS tapes. The male investigator leaves the female investigator, Ayesha, to watch the cassettes while he roams the house looking for clues.
Much like the first film, you get angles of the viewer, in this film it's Ayesha, watching the tapes with her back turned to the rest of the house. We, the viewers, see weird things going on in the background that she doesn't notice. Adding that touch of suspense. As the other stories are told and allow this one to unfold piece by piece, it still leaves you with questions. But it's a good, well-told story that is sinister, and fun. 3.5/5
"Phase I Clinical Trials" Director- Adam Wingard Writer- Simon Barrett As a small price for getting his eyesight back, a man agrees to let his life be watched through his new government implanted eye, as part of a test trial. He's warned that there may be glitches, but what he ends up experiencing is much, much more grim. He starts seeing ghosts in his house, more specifically, a little girl, who tends to sleep under the covers of his bed. I thought it was really creepy seeing the small child outline under the comforter. I know that I for one, would have crapped my pants, and hightailed it the hell out of there. Then a girl incorporates herself into the mix, claiming she knows about what's going on and why our lead is seeing weird things. It hits you abruptly and doesn't let up. The last five minutes of this story are extremely suspenseful. It gets pretty bloody too, which is always a nice touch. Overall, I wasn't overly happy with this story, but I did like it. I just didn't do anything really new for me. 2/5
"A Ride in the Park" Director- Gregg Hale and Eduardo Sánchez Writer- Jamie Nash and Eduardo Sánchez
This film revolves around a male biker who's out for an early morning run to get his heart pumping. His camera is mounted on his helmet, so everything you see is from the top of his head. I liked that idea, it was different from just seeing through the characters eyes. His trail ride is interrupted when a woman stops him for help, and begins regurgitating projectile blood-vomit. She then bites our main character and the film progresses from his POV as he turns into a zombie.
The zombies in this movie are actually pretty decent. In a world where the zombie realm is overplayed and overused, it's nice to see some new and creative life be breathed into the rising dead. These zombies are actually intelligent, which makes them fierce! You can actually tell how and what they're feeling through the noises, grunts and groans that they make. They're fast, fierce, and brutal. It ends with a bang, and has some humor to it, very entertaining. 3/5
"Safe Haven" Director- Timo Tjahjanto Writer-Timo Tjahjanto
This is the 2nd to best one in the whole damn movie. This one hits hard, with a dark and twisted-but desirous story. A film crew goes to Indonesia to do a report on a cult going on. A man, "The Father", of the cult sleeps with children to purify them. He leads a large commune of people who believe in his ideology, that they're on their way to a higher plane of existence.
Things get out of control suddenly and fast. You're thrown into the middle of some sick, ritualistic things that start hammering you with jitters and puzzlement. It's intense and nail biting. The ending gets silly though, and loses that firm grip of fear it built up. Overall it's a damn good story, but it would have been a lot better if the ending had some solidity to it. 3.5/5
"Slumber Party Alien Abduction" Director- Jason Eisener Writer- Jason Eisener
This is by far my favorite of the bunch this time around. This is the scariest, and most suspenseful out of all of the stories shown. The camera is first hand POV for the first half, the last half has the camera mounted on the family dog. Finally, a really well done, scary alien movie. The fact this this is a short film actually helps the integrity of it. It keeps things short and sweet, causing you to sort through the mayhem of what's going on. A group of youngsters, young and older, undergo an alien invasion during a slumber party. The cherry on top was how genuine the characters came off. The children acting like imbeciles gave it that sense of realism it needed for this story to be pulled off. The extraterrestrials are eerie as hell looking! They fit the perfect description of what you expect of "Greys". Bloody well done. 4.5/5
'V/H/S/2' is that new amusement ride going on in the horror genre that everyone's going to have to try. It's a really good, well handled film. And a big compliment to it's predecessor. Great anthology movie, and I hope there's more to come. At this quality, I'd say I'd be down for at least 5 of these films. It's not a perfect horror film, but it gets a lot right.
I've always been a fan of horror anthology films so it'd be fair to say, I had a lot of excitement going into this. Anthology films are great because they're so much fun packed into one movie. I remember growing up watching 'Tales from the Darkside' and 'Creepshow' and, they still remain favorites to this day. The idea of anthology films didn't surface until early 1930's with two of it's earliest films being Edmund Goulding's 'Grand Hotel' and Paramount's 'If I Had a Million', both released in 1932. The anthology method wasn't used in horror until the 1940's. And in 1945, it's biggest one to date, was released titled 'Dead of Night' which was followed by a swarm of British horror anthologies in the 60's and early 70's. Some of the better and more mentionable anthologies include,'Screamtime' (1986), 'Creepshow 2' (1987), 'Tales from the Crypt' (1972),'Vault of Horror' (1973) and the superb, 'V/H/S' (2012). The latter finding itself in my elite favorites in the anthology chapter of the horror genre. 'The ABCs of Death' offers a fresh take on the anthology spectrum and takes it to bold levels. I'm not a hundred percent sure on the matter, but this is probably the most stories ever put into one anthology movie.
The UK's very own Lee Hardcastle won his spot as director for T with his claymation short after entering a contest for the 26th director. His story in the film is one of the most enjoyable ones and is full of dark humor. I ended up not liking the film as much as I wanted. It didn't meet the high hopes I had for it. I found there to be too many stories full of humor and that made it less enjoyable for me. The serious stories ended up being the best ones and, it isn't because I don't like horror comedy; I like all types of horror. The humor in this film was too much for me to take it seriously though. To give you an example, Noboru Iguchi's "F is for Fart" wasn't enjoyable to me. I slightly smiled but I never laughed, and I was eagerly awaiting the next story to come on. I'd have to say that my favorites of the lot were Xavier Gens' 'X is for XXL', which is a gory and witty short, only to be surpassed by Ti West's 'M is for Miscarriage'. They are the only ones that I genuinely like. Other than those, some of the concepts were just so ridiculous, I couldn't find myself being entertained. And, I found myself checking the clock on the DVD player to see how much longer of the movie was left. I did enjoy Macel Sarmiento's 'D is for Dogfight'. That was a good one!
One thing that I do need to give credit to this film for is how wide it's scope is. Even though I didn't like all of the stories I still have to admit that this movie went everywhere. Then again, it did have 26 stories, so you'd have to expect nothing less. If anything else, we got to see some of horrors up-and-comers shine and, leave us in hope for what the future of horror holds and will bestow on us. Other directors showed that either we're in for some bad films in the future, or that they just didn't properly use their skill for their short in this film. We can hope it's the latter.
Synopsis taken from IMDb A POV, found footage horror film from the perspectives of America's top genre filmmakers. A group of misfits are hired by an unknown third party to burglarize a desolate house in the countryside and acquire a rare tape. Upon searching the house, the guys are confronted with a dead body, a hub of televisions and an endless supply of cryptic footage, each video stranger than the last. That's right! If you have Comcast as your cable provider you can view this movie now. I was waiting for this day since I first saw the trailer. I'm on a mission to see everything Ti West does or takes part in. For those of you who don't have Comcast, you'll have to wait to see the movie in theaters on October 5TH. I'll start off by saying what I thought over all by the movie. I loved it. I thought it was brilliant. This movie has my vote for best horror film of the year thus far. Incredibly original. Every story is from a POV perspective.
Some people may complain about the movie do to there being some unknown dialog being said due to bad sound. However, this movie is totally authentic, they keep everything realistic. They didn't give you cliche's. It really felt like you were watching people and not actors. I thought the concept was engenius and top of the line in quality. I enjoyed every one of these stories. It's too early to say but it may be my favorite anthology movie. It definitely ranks among the elite. The endings are really open and none of the stories explain anything. They kept it authentic. It's like you really just found someones video and watched it. It's very realistic.
TAPE 56 DIRECTOR- ADAM WINGARD WRITTEN BY- SIMON BARRETT STARING- CALVIN REEDEER, LANE HUGHES AND KENTUCKER AUDLEY
This story starts with a band of punks, guys looking for nothing but trouble destroying and graffiti-ing houses and running up on girls and pulling up their shirts all while recording it. We see them break into an old mans house, which they were hired to do. Their objective is to get a V/H/S tape from the house, only the old man has tons of tapes and this makes it impossible to know which is the right one. They then find the old man and owner of the house dead in his easy chair. I liked this story and was intrigued to see where it was going and you knew that guys like this had something bad coming.
AMATEUR NIGHT DIRECTOR- DAVID BRUCKNER WRITTEN BY- DAVID BRUCKNER AND NICHOLAS TECOSKY STARRING- HANNAH FIERMAN, MIKE DOHLAN AND JOE SYKES
This story is about a group of guys who buy their friend glasses with a built in camera and go out on a guy night to score some chicks. And they do. And it's a night they'll never forget... I loved this one and it may be my favorite of the bunch. I'm going to re-watch it again before I make my final assessment. I truly didn't know where this one was going and I was creeped out.
SECOND HONEYMOON DIRECTOR- TI WEST WRITTEN BY- TI WEST STARRING- JOE SAUNDERS, SOPHIA TAXAN AND KATE LYN SHEIL
This story is about a couple on their second honeymoon being stalked by an unknown female. While in their hotel room the couple receives a knock on the door to reveal a girl asking for a ride somewhere tomorrow. Later that night while they sleep, the girl returns to stalk them and watch them as they sleep. This story had creepy written all over it. To think of someone watching you like that chills me and is disturbing. Ti West did another good job. The end has a pretty gnarly twist I didn't see coming.
TUESDAY THE 17TH DIRECTOR- GLEN MCQUAID WRITTEN BY- GLEN MCQUAID STARRING- NORMAN C. QUINONES, DREW PERLEIN AND JEANINE YOGER
This film was a new take on slasher. A group of teens go into the woods for camping only to find out they're in the woods of a maniac serial killer. I thought this film was a very clever. The deaths are brutal and gory. This one is a salute to the slasher fans. The killer is somehow unable to show up on tape as other than a blur or pixelated. THAT SICK THING THAT HAPPENED TO EMILY WHEN SHE WAS YOUNGER DIRECTOR- JOE SWANBERG WRITTEN BY- SIMON BARRETT STARRING- HELEN ROGERS, DANIEL KAUFMAN AND LIZ HARVEY
This one is about a girl named Emily who moves into what she finds out is a haunted apartment. She and watch the horror happening in her apartment through web cam. What an original idea, right? I loved this one. This one stands out as one of the best to me. The ending is pretty crazy and twisted. 10/31/98 DIRECTOR- RADIO SILENCE WRITTEN BY- RADIO SILENCE STARRING- CHAD VILLELLA, MATT BETTINELLI-CLIPIN AND TYLER GILLETT
This bit is about a group of teens going to a Halloween party only to see a murder about to be performed in the basement. They rescue the girl but their troubles are far from over. This one was solid, very chilling tale. This one gets good points for creativity.
RATED-R RUN TIME 91 MINS WRITERS-MICHAEL ARMSTRONG STARRING-VINCENT RUSSO, MICHAEL GORDON AND MARIE SCINTO
Synopsis taken from IMDb Compilation of three short horror films: "That's The Way To Do It", "Dreamhouse" and "Do You Believe In Fairies?" plus some new linking material.
The first story, "That's The Way To Do It"
I knew from the opening that this would be a fun watch. And it contained puppets so you know I was digging it. Puppets are creepy.
This story deals with a guy who's a puppeteer and no one understands him and wants him to burn his puppets. Then people start getting killed off by his main and favorite puppet. This story has some decent suspense and a couple jumps but nothing spectacular. It comes off as kind of goofy they way the puppet kills people. But it was entertaining.
The second story, "Dreamhouse"
This one was instantly better than the first. It's about a man and woman who move into a big house. Things start off kind of slow but it builds as the woman begins to see things in the house.
The ending was the most rewarding part, it wasn't an ending I expected. Lets leave it at that.
The third story, "Do You Believe In Fairies?"
This one was about 2 old women who say they live among fairies and gnomes. While two guys set out to rob them they discover the women aren't crazy and that they've made a grave mistake.
Like the first story I thought the effects were weak and laughable but it wasn't horrible or anything. Just far from great.
The movie overall was decent, I wouldn't say I necessarily liked it but I didn't hate it. I thought that if it was going to have goofy effects like that that it should have had a host in between stories to poke fun at the movie or just make you laugh in general. I think it would have left a better impression that way. I would love to see Elvira host this one, but then again I'd like to see Elvira do whatever whenever.
