Runtime: 96 minutes
Release Date: September 20, 1978
Rating: NR
Director: Walter Grauman
Are You in the House Alone opens
with a teenage girl laying on the floor in her living room. After
being rushed to the hospital, she bursts into tears and claims that
she was raped. The doctors and her mother ask her who did that to
her, but she cries again and says that no one will ever believe her.
We then go back in time to when
Gail was still a fairly new girl in town. Her best friend Alison
introduces her to a guy named Steve, and the two go on a double date
with Alison and her boyfriend Phil (played by the ever hunky Dennis
Quaid). Not long after that double date, Gail and Steve decide to go
steady, but she then receives a series of notes warning her that
someone is watching her. Though her mother and best friend think
she's overreacting, Gail can't help but think that someone is
stalking her.
Oh my god, this movie was bad even
for a television movie from the 1970s. Every scene that involves her
"stalker" comes from someone following behind her with a
camera. We also get a number of shots of someone sneaking through the
halls and staring at her every time she moves. Despite the fact that
she knows someone is following her, she doesn't seem to notice
someone standing just over her shoulder.
The said thing is that my roommate
watched half the movie, went upstairs to take a shower, and made a
phone call. When he came back downstairs, he couldn't believe that
the movie was still on. While Netflix classifies Are You in the House
Alone? as a horror movie, don't believe the hype. If you want to skip
the film and still know how it ends, check out my TV movie blog recaphere.
Runtime: 100 minutes
Release Date: February 28, 2013
Rating: R
Director: Renny Harlin
Holly and Jensen are two college
students looking for their next project decide to tackle the Dyatlov
Pass incident.
As one of the
Internet's most favorite unsolved mysteries, thousands of people over
the years attempted to discover what happened to a group of hikers
who died under mysterious circumstances. The two convince three
others to join them on a hike through the same area to film a
documentary.
From the moment they arrive in
Russia, they face opposition from all sides. The only person attached
to the original group is in a mental hospital and unable to talk to
them, and everyone else seems suspicious or downright angry about
them being there. Some people act hostile towards them, while others
outright tell them to leave. Once they finally begin their trek up
the mountain, they learn that they might await the same fate as those
on the original expedition.
I first heard about the true story
on Cracked, and thanks to Reddit, I now know more about the story
than I ever planned. As soon as I heard there was a horror movie
based on the story, I knew that I had to see it. After learning that
director Renny Harlin also had an interest in the story and did some
research of his own, I knew that I really wanted to see it.
The problem with creating a film on
such a popular story is that it's impossible to please everyone.
Harlin decided to create a story that would offer a possible
explanation on what happened to those involved in the original case,
but it actually doesn't answer any questions. Instead of focusing on
the true story, he decides to add some elements, including two people
who were mysteriously never mentioned in any transcripts and make a
story based on those people. While it does add some interesting
moments, it really takes away from the real story.
How could you take a story about
people found in various states of undress, with cuts all over their
bodies, and with possible traces of radiation and turn it into a
(spoiler alert) time traveling story gone wrong? I wish Harlin had
just stuck with the real facts and based a horror movie around that.
Runtime: 90 minutes
Release Date: February 19, 2013
Rating: R
Director: Glenn Withrow
The Mooring opens on a family
camping in the woods. A man suddenly emerges from the forest, grabs
the teenage daughter of the family, and drags her away without anyone
noticing. He then tosses her in a cabinet on his boat and seemingly
takes off.
Ten years later, a woman named
Nancy leads a retreat for teenage girls addicted to technology. One
of the girls ran up a $2,000+ cell phone bill because of her texting,
while another girl caused a six car accident because she was talking
on her phone. Nancy wants them to learn that they can lead healthy
lives without involving technology. After the girls sneak into her
office and use the computer, she decides to take them on a retreat
into the woods.
While giving them activities to do
on the boat, she notices that there's something wrong with the engine
but she keeps it a secret from the girls. Once they arrive on a
secluded island, they spend some more time talking and having fun
together before another boat arrives. They hear a couple talking, and
when one of the girls yells at him, he calls her a bitch and flashes
his spotlight at them. Nancy diffuses the situation and puts the
girls to bed.
The next day, she decides to take
the boat back herself for repairs and come back for them later.
Smart, right? Before she can do anything, Mickey, the female half of
the couple comes over for a talk. She apologizes for the night
before, asks if they have coffee, and then abruptly leaves when her
boyfriend calls for her.
Nancy finally sets off in the boat,
but only after she makes sure that Mickey and the other boat left.
She doesn't get very far before the engine dies, but Mickey and her
boyfriend Richard are right behind her. Mickey offers to tow the boat
to shore, and Nancy reluctantly agrees. As the girls attempt to have
fun without her, the other boat shows up. Richard shows them that he
has Nancy and that he tied an anchor to her feet and duct taped her
hands and mouth. He then tosses her in the water before letting them
know that he's coming after them next.
The Mooring is the film that made
my roommate and I agree that if we are ever in a life or death
situation, it's perfectly okay to leave the other one behind.
Seriously, half the incidents in the movie could have been avoided
had the girls focused on saving their own skins. Oh, you finally made
it to the boat and can sail away to safety but your one friend who
hid in the woods and wouldn't come out when you called her name
suddenly needs help? Yeah, leave her ass behind. Oh, one of your
friends is unconscious and in a good hiding spot in the woods? Yeah,
you better waste time picking her up and dragging her through the
woods with a killer stalking you.
The one smart thing the film did is
explain who no one has cell phones. I'd guess that in a desolate spot
like an island in the middle of a lake wouldn't have cell phone
reception anyway, but it does explain that Nancy takes their phones
before the trip. They don't explain why Nancy, who is supposedly so
responsible, would leave the girls behind though. If I found out that
the person I paid a large amount of money too left my daughter on a
desolate island after knowing some weird dude was out there, I
wouldn't be too happy.
The Mooring perfectly pegs the mind
of a teenage girl, which is probably because a teenage girl helped
write the screenplay. The problem is that the only people who
probably care about the mind of a teenage girl is another teenage
girl or possibly a teenage boy. I can see why teens might like the
film, but as an adult, it just made me annoyed at how teens act.
Runtime: 84 minutes
Release Date: January 3, 2014
Rating: R
Director: Christopher Landon
After getting a new camera as a
graduation present, teenage Jesse decides to use the camera to
document the things that he and his friends do. Not long into the
film, we learn that his downstairs neighbor Anna tends to keep to
herself and people think she's a witch. Late one night, he and his
friends see a neighborhood man named Oscar running from Anna's
apartment, and the police later find her dead body.
Jesse and his best friend Hector
gain access to the apartment and plan to look for evidence. They find
a bunch of photographs, including one of Jesse as a child, and they
also find some videotapes that show Kristi and Katie from the
previous films. After sneaking some girls into the apartment, Jesse
rushes off to find a condom, and his date discovers a trapdoor hidden
in the floor. When she opens it, Oscar pops up and attacks her before
running away. At the same time that all this happens, Jesse discovers
that he can do things that he could never do before. In order to
uncover the reason for his new abilities, he needs to find out how
he's connected to Anna and the women from the earlier films.
Is it bad that I didn't know this
film even existed until it was already in theaters for a few weeks?
Is it bad that I completely forgot that it even came out until I saw
it at Redbox a few weeks ago? It's not that I necessarily hate the
Paranormal Activity movies. In fact, I hated the first one, but I've
come around and actually found them fairly enjoyable. It's just that
it didn't look very entertaining.
According to the producers of the
film, this isn't a reboot or a sequel to the earlier films but a
cousin to those films. That's fine and dandy except that it clearly
connects its story to the other films by bringing in the Katie and
Kristi videos, showcasing a character from the last film, and then
actually bringing back Katie herself. What is odd is that this is the
fifth film in the series but a Paranormal Activity 5 comes out later
this year.
Despite getting some favorable
reviews, I wasn't happy with the movie. It honestly felt like the
producers and directors aimed this film at a younger generation and
not necessarily the same people who made the original films such a
hit. Sure it's nice when the boy who gets picked on gains superpowers
that let him fight back against his bullies, but we've all seen
Spiderman before. The scenes that should have made my jaw drop seemed
more like something I might catch on YouTube. It just felt like it
didn't bring anything new to the franchise.
Though Paranormal Activity: The
Marked Ones wasn't my favorite, it made more than $80 million at the
box office and there are plans for several more in the series.
Runtime: 96 minutes
Release Date: March 14, 2014
Rating: PG?
Director: Mark Hartley
Kathy (Sharni Vinson, "Bait,"
"You're Next") accepts a job working as a nurse in a
psychiatric hospital. Though the nights are long, she loves having
the chance to escape from her former life. As she tells her newest
friend, she just ended a bad relationship and wants the chance to
move on without him standing in the shadows. Not long after she
begins her new job, she meets Patrick.
Patrick is a patient living in a
coma with supposedly no awareness of what happens around him. The
more time that she spends working in the hospital, the more she
becomes fascinated with her patient. One night, she discovers that he
can hear her and respond to her questions. Let's skip over the part
where she begins sliding her hands down his pants, shall we? Kathy
does whatever it takes to help Patrick, even going against the orders
of the head doctor. She quickly learns that forming a relationship
with Patrick was a bad idea when he begins interacting with her and
disrupting her personal life.
Let's get this out of the way right
upfront, I didn't like Patrick. I've never seen the original and
sorry, but I didn't even know this was a remake until a few days ago.
I saw a trailer for it on another movie, thought it looked
interesting, and when I realized that Vinson, who is my new favorite
horror movie actress was in it, I mentally added it to my wish list.
Now that I've seen it, I don't get what the fuss is about.
Patrick plays like a few different
films combined into one. The dark settings, shadows bouncing off the
walls, and desolate setting makes you think that it's set in a
previous era. The nurses even wear old-fashioned uniforms that no
hospital in the world would make them wear today. It's not until you
see cell phones and computers that you realize this is set in the
modern world.
The movie then seems to jump back
and forth between an atmospheric ghost story to a mad scientist film
to a love story gone wrong. It tries to heighten the tension a few
times, but the results were so bad that I just shook my head and
laughed. At one point, Patrick somehow learns how to control
electrical devices and begins sending Kathy threatening text
messages. Really?
It doesn't help that the story
gives her two different love interests, a new man she meets and her
previous boyfriend. Of course things go badly for her new love
interest, but her old guy is there to help her pick up the pieces.
Suddenly it doesn't matter that she moved and changed jobs to get
away from him, now he's a good guy again. Ugh. I watched it once and
thankfully, I don't need to watch Patrick again.
Runtime: 80 minutes
Release Date: August 16, 2013
Rating: R
Director: Lou Simon
Hazmat opens with two young woman
trapped in an old abandoned hotel. They reach the only exit only to
find that it's locked, and a killer approaches them from behind. One
of the women struggles with the man over a gun. He stabs her before
getting shot. Just as the other one flips out, they reveal that it's
all a set up for the reality television show Scary Encounters, which
is pretty much that show from SyFy.
We then meet three new people
planning a prank on their friend Jacob. His father once worked for a
chemical plant in town and claimed that it was haunted. After his dad
died, he went a little crazy and started believing his old man's
stories. They decide to play a prank on him, bring him into the
plant, and make him think it's haunted. What could possibly go wrong?
Things go well at first. The camera
crew lock themselves in the former office and place hidden cameras
all around the building. There's David AKA Scary David the host of
the show, his girlfriend Brenda, and two camera guys. Adam, who set
up Jacob, and their friends Melanie and Carla show up with Jacob.
They convince him to sneak inside and see if it really is haunted.
David told the girls to hide and
just try to stay out of the way and helped Adam pretend that the
ghost killed him. Instead of hiding, the two girls wander around and
spend far too much time talking about their problems, including how
Carla apparently becomes a clone of the men she dates. Isn't it funny
what random crap you can remember from movies? Jacob finds an old
hazmat suit, which Adam recommends he ignore, and after slipping it
on, he goes a little crazy.
It doesn't take long for Jacob to
go from shaking and holding himself to going on a murderous rampage.
He kills the actor who typically plays the killer on the show before
attacking and killing his best friend. The camera crew watching from
behind the scenes realizes what's going on long before the other
characters do, but as they're locked in a room and aren't sure where
Jacob is, they don't know what to do.
Hazmat does something really smart
in the beginning. David tells everyone to leave their cell phones
outside to focus on the show. You know how you watch films and wonder
why no one doesn't just call the cops? At least in this one, you know
why they can't call for help. The director also makes it clear that
the reception on their walkie talkies is bad too, which explains why
they can't get in touch with workers outside the building.
Unfortunately, other moments in the
film don't make nearly as much sense. At one point, Jacob is tracking
Melanie through the building and she manages to make it to the locked
office. The other characters spend several minutes talking about
whether they should let her end while he's at the complete other end
of the building. By the time they finally do decide to let her in,
Jacob is practically behind her.
They also never take the time to
explain what made Jacob snap. The film crew thinks that he spotted
the cameras and decided to enact revenge on those who set him up. We
never learn what happened though. He puts on the suit and just goes
cray-cray. Maybe it's a possessed suit, maybe he's possessed by some
vengeful spirit. Who knows?
Let's not forget the so-called
"hidden" cameras. One of those cameras is actually a
rotating security camera that sits right near the entrance to the
building. Jacob literally spots it a few minutes after they get
there. The film plays it off like he thinks it's just a security
camera, but why would an abandoned building have a security camera or
an entire system?
The one thing I did enjoy about the
film was the acting of Norbert Velez and Todd Bruno. Bruno plays
Scary David and did an admirable job. When first introduced, he
seemed like just another sleazy television producer, but he later
becomes the hero of the film tasked with saving his girlfriend and
friends. Velez takes on the role of Jacob, the formerly normal man
who becomes a serial killer. Both men did a great job, and I look
forward to seeing them in other films.
Hazmat could have been a good film,
but other than some good acting, it came across like something I've
seen before.
Runtime: 91 minutes
Release Date: March 14, 2013
Rating: Peter Wellington
Director: NR?
While her boyfriend Todd (Tyler
Labine, "Tucker and Dale vs. Evil") is at work, Cammie
decides to pack his bag for their weekend trip to his family's
cabin/lake house, which leads to her finding an engagement ring.
Knowing that he plans to propose, she wants the weekend to go
perfectly. Not long after arriving, Todd's brother Salinger
unexpectedly shows up with his girlfriend Masha. Masha is a little
quirky, and Salinger is just a pain in the ass. Cammie agrees to go
for a hike in the woods as long as Todd convinces his brother to
leave.
Instead of having the peaceful
conversation he hopes for, Todd ends up throwing his brother's
expensive headphones in the lake. That leads to a fight, which ends
with Todd knocking him out and tossing him out of the house. After
packing his brother's stuff, Salinger attacks him from behind, and
Todd grabs an ax and swings it at his brother, accidentally killing
him. Todd hides his body and makes up a story when the girls come
back, but he realizes that he has to tell Cammie the truth.
Though he attempts to prose to her,
she stops him because it isn't the right time. When he reveals what
happened, she decides that they need to take care of Masha and then
they can take a trip to a nearby island in the lake and get engaged.
The two trick Masha into coming into the kitchen, Todd wusses out
before killing her with a knife, and Cammie does the job for him.
They cut the bodies into smaller pieces, place the pieces in garbage
bags, and dump them in the lake. Unfortunately for them, they arrive
home just in time to find that Salinger invited a bunch of friends to
the lake house for a party and many of them want to know what
happened to their friend...
Cottage Country popped up as a
recommendation after watching Tucker and Dale vs. Evil, and since
I've been a fan of Labine since his Dead Last days, I had to watch
it. Don't worry if you don't remember that show. I think The WB only
ran six episodes or less before canceling it. Unfortunately, the
movie wasn't nearly as funny as I hoped.
The problem is that Labine goes
against type and it just doesn't work. Instead of playing the funny
guy, he tries to play the straight guy. He's the guy who spends long
hours at work, is afraid to stand up to his boss, and basically does
whatever his girlfriend tells him. For god's sake, they even wear
matching clothes at one point! It seems really odd, and given that
this is supposed to be a horror/comedy, it's sad that the director
didn't use his talents.
Lucy Punch, who plays Masha, is the
funniest person in the movie but that isn't saying much. She tends to
slur her words to the point where you either need to listen far too
closely, turn your television up way too loud, or wait for one of the
other characters to translate for her. She does have a fairly funny
scene in the woods, where she talks about how her mother ended up in
prison and pretends to kill herself with poisonous mushrooms, but her
character is gone a few scenes later.
There's also an incredibly odd
character named Dov in the field. He's supposed to be an Orthodox
Jew, but when I first saw him, I swore he was just a hipster. He
keeps talking about his studies and being a "good man"
while drinking and smoking pot. He also constantly asks about
Salinger, to the point where you want to just smack him. The only
good part about his character was the way he left the film.
Seriously, they make it out like Salinger does crazy stuff all the
time, but Dov swears that he would never invite people over for a
party and just disappear. That actually sounds exactly like something
he would do.
Cottage Country failed on a number
of different levels, and it was quite the come down after watching a
movie I love right before it.
Runtime: 89 minutes
Release Date: January 22, 2010
Rating: R
Director: Eli Craig
A group of college kids head into
the woods for a weekend of camping and crazy hijinks. Alison (Katrina
Bowden, "The Shortcut," "Piranha 3DD") catches
the eye of a hillbilly redneck before her friends act like he's a
complete loser. Enter Tucker and his best friend Dale (Tyler Labine,
"Cottage Country"). Tucker just bought a cabin in the
woods, and the two plan to go up and work on the cabin and do a
little fishing.
Cut back to the college kids. Chad
(Jesse Moss, "Final Destination 3," "Ginger Snaps")
recounts the story of what happened to a previous group of college
kids. A group of hillbilly rednecks murdered the group, and only one
person survived: his mother. She told him all about the night that
the murders occurred and how his father died on that night. While
goofing around later that night and skinny dipping in the lake,
Alison catches sight of Tucker and Dale fishing. She's so startled
that she falls and hits her head, which knocks her unconscious.
Tucker and Dale pull her out of the
water, and Tucker lets the group know that they're their friend.
They, thinking that he's a murderous redneck, run away in fear.
Tucker and Dale take her back to their cabin until she wakes up.
While Dale tends to her needs the next day, Tucker spends time
working outside and getting his cabin in order. When the college kids
come back for their friend, all hell breaks loose.
I have an account on the DVD Talk
Forums, and I saw someone mention Tucker & Dale vs. Evil when it
came out on DVD. There was a whole discussion about how it was a
terrible movie and not worth a single watch. Last year, I was
scrolling through Netflix and gave it a short because I love Tyler
Labine. It quickly became one of my favorite films of all time. This
is one of those movies that you constantly quote to your friends.
The first time I watched it, my
roommate and my then boyfriend were in the kitchen cooking together,
and they came in to see what made me burst out laughing so many
times. When I mentioned wanting to watch it again (for the fourth
time), my roommate rolled his eyes. After quoting the college kids
line, he gave it and gladly sat down for another view.
Tucker and Dale vs. Evil is
absolutely hands down one of the funniest movies I've ever seen.
Tucker and Dale are just two normal guys hoping to have a weekend of
fishing when everything goes wrong all at once. As Tucker tells the
officer coming to investigate the college kids' claims, "There
we were minding our own business, just doing chores around the house,
when kids started killing themselves all over my property."
All of the death scenes occur in
fun and funny ways. There's the kid who accidentally impales himself
on a tree branch after he sees Tucker whipping a chainsaw around and
running from a wasp/bee nest, and the kid who throws himself into a
wood chipper while trying to attack Tucker from behind. Nearly every
death gets better from there.
The one downside is that the film
lags towards the end. Once one of the college kids goes a little
crazy and Dale needs to venture off on his own to save Alison, the
movie isn't as strong. We really need to see the two characters
together and not working separately. Luckily, Dale only gets 15
minutes or so by himself before we get back to our hapless duo. I'm
sure most people have seen it by now, but if you haven't, go watch
Tucker and Dale vs. Evil now!
Runtime: 70-ish minutes, felt like
hours
Release Date: May 17, 2013
Rating: NR
Director: Joseph Ciminera
I usually give a brief or not so
brief plot outline before talking about what I thought about a movie,
but I'll skip all that this time. I'd love to explain the plot in
depth, but to be honest, I have no idea what was going on in this
movie. My roommate and I were so bored and so confused that we kept
checking to see how much time was left. At one point, my DVD player
said there was 7 minutes left, but I swear that it took an hour to
get through that last 7 minutes.
When 6 Minutes of Death opens, we
see a woman covered in marks and bleeding on the ground. A man
standing over her whines about her sins and actions before
threatening her with some weird metal whip thing. After yelling at
her some poor, he hits her one last time and she presumably dies,
though we don't see her face or reaction to that last hit.
The movie then jumps to a small
town that reminded me a lot of Amish country. All the women wear long
dresses and/or bonnets, and the men wear simple white shirts and
black pants. The only thing that makes me wonder when this movie is
set is when it shows a fairly modern looking woman leading their
religious services. A boy in town comes down with some type of virus,
which spreads to other people.
We then meet a little girl who
catches the same disease from him. As it spread throughout their
town, she gets sicker and sicker until she eventually dies. This
leads to her winding up in some random other world where she meets a
slightly older man. He tells her that she now has a second chance at
life and asks her what she would like to do if she could do anything.
She tells him that she wants to be a teacher in China, and he tells
her that he can make that happen.
The man then goes off to find her a
book on China, which after she reads will let her transition into a
new life. While he's gone, she hears someone who sounds like her mom
calling her name, so she gets up with a different book to look for
her. A random doorway opens, and she walks through it with the book.
This sets off some weird thing where the people with the books, who
work in the library, must find her and bring her back before those
working for the side of evil can find her and steal her book, which
would bring horrible things to the library and the side of good. I
can't even...I'm just really glad that it ended.
