They're Watching Movie Review – Bloody and Just Plain Fun

Runtime: 95 minutes

Release Date: March 25, 2016

Rating: NR?

Director: Jay Lender & Micah Write

They're Watching may seriously be my favorite horror movie of the year. I started watching it while playing a game on my phone and quickly realized that there was absolutely no way I could ignore it. It hooked me from the beginning and had me laughing my ass off for much of the film.

We meet Becky and her boyfriend, a professional soccer player, as they search for a place in Moldovia, on the popular house hunting show Home Hunters International. After finding a rundown place in the middle of nowhere, she decides to buy the house and turn it into her dream home. Months later, Greg and Alex, two of the original crew who shot the episode, return with Sarah, a new employee, to see if Becky really transformed the house. They meet up with their producer, Kate, and Vladimir, the only real estate agent in town, to check on her progress.

Alex thinks the whole thing is pretty ridiculous and can't imagine that she did anything. All he really cares about is finding some random chocolate bar, and Greg only cares about potentially hooking up with Sarah. They quickly learn about the legend of a witch who once lived in Becky's house and how people in this tiny little town are still scared of the witch. While shooting b-roll footage around town, they mistakenly wander into a funeral and shoot footage before getting run off. When Sarah shouts their word for witch in the middle of the town's restaurant, people are less than thrilled. All of this is just backstory that leads up to the whole crew getting trapped in Becky's house as bloodthirsty locals wait outside. Are they after the crew for what they did in town, or if there something more sinister happening behind the scenes?

They're Watching really is one of those films that hooks up in from the very beginning. What other movie can you name that literally starts out with a girl getting an ax through the head and then reintroduces her minutes later as a main character? While you know she's going to get it in the end, half the fun is watching the story unfold and waiting to see what happens to her and everyone else.

My favorite was Kris Lemche as Alex. You might remember him as the goth/emo kid from Final Destination 3, which I reviewed not that long ago. While he's still got the whole sarcastic jack ass thing going on, he's easily the standout of the film. One of the best moments comes when the crew is stuck in Becky's house and trying to sleep in shifts. He's stuck listening to Greg and Sarah flirt in another room and finally yells out at them if they're done before mumbling to himself about how he needs to get some sleep. It's hard to explain, but the scene actually made me snort.

And let's not forget the Home Hunters International, which even used a song and cut scenes similar to the real show. You could almost believe that this is a show that would air on HGTV up until the second half. Given that I just watched all episodes on Netflix, it was hysterical.

The last 10 minutes of They're Watching were some of the bloodiest 10 minutes I've seen on screen in a long time. Once the witch makes her appearance, the bloodshed starts and doesn't let up. In addition to a woman getting an ex to the head, we get a man turned into frogs, a guy vaporized into nothing, a guy literally ripped in half, and a guy's face get ripped in half. It was far gorier than anything I've seen in recent times. Between the humor and the gore, I just couldn't get enough. They're Watching is one I would recommend to any horror fan.

Paranormal Activity: The Marked Ones – AKA Paranormal Activity 5

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.

Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters – "We learned a couple of things while we were trapped in that house."

Runtime: 88 minutes
Release Date: January 25, 2013
Rating: R
Director: Tommy Wirkola


"We learned a couple of things while we were trapped in that house. One, never walk in to a house made of candy. And two, if you're gonna kill a witch, set her ass on fire."


Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters opens with two young children finding themselves alone in the woods after their father abandons them. After they find the home of a witch, the witch tries to fatten them up and prepare them for her next meal, but they trick and kill her. Where the fairy tale ends, this story picks up.


The two now devote themselves to slaying witches and stopping the spread of witchcraft across the country. They head to a new town, where they see the sheriff planning to execute a witch. The two immediately go through the motions of showing him that this woman isn't a witch, and after saving her life, they decide to stick around and kill a group of witches who recently kidnapped several children from around town. This leads to the two to partner with a young local boy, meet a troll, and discover that they have a connection to witchcraft they never knew of before.


Confession time: I actually saw this movie back in May at the drive-in, watched it, and rolled my eyes. When it came out on DVD, I gave it another try and realized that I really liked the movie. I even bought a copy when the video rental place near me clearanced it out for $5. The movie has the perfect combination of cheeziness, horror, and action to keep me entertained.


Jeremy Renner is the perfect Hansel, while Gemma Arterton is the perfect Gretel. The two actually look similar and do a good job of playing brother and sister. Famke Janssen does an equally good job as the beautiful yet sometimes scary witch Muriel. Horror fans will also get a kick out of seeing Peter Stormare as the sheriff who cares more about the money he makes killing "witches" than he does learning if those people are truly innocent.


The major misstep in the film is the character of Mina. While she does have a connection to the plot, it sometimes feels like she was shoehorned into the movie. After sharing a naked moment with Hansel, he learns that she's a good witch and that not all witches are bad. She goes from being a small background character to one of the major characters in the movie, and I sometimes wished they would focus a little more on the witches than on her.


Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters also does a smart job of adding to the story. These two weren't dropped in the woods because of the same reasons found in the story. These two found themselves stuck in the woods because their father realized it was the only way to save them after the townspeople learned that their mother was a good witch. It even adds some humor to the film in the form of Ben, a young boy who adores Hansel and Gretel from afar and wishes that he could do the same work they do.


Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters came out awhile ago, but if you haven't watched it yet, give it a try before its proposed sequel lands in theaters.

The Scar Crow Movie Review – 300 Years of Evil Collide

Runtime: 84 minutes

Release Date: November 6, 2009

Rating: N/A

Director: Pete Benson, Andy Thompson

*Gasp* could it be? Could I actually watch two horror films in a row and enjoy them both? The answer is, yes, absolutely. "The Scar Crow" is one of those films that I once again stumbled across accidentally. My Family Video runs a special deal where you can pay $9.99 and get half-price rentals for one month, which I do every few months. I wind up pulling random films off the nearly new wall and from the classics section to review horror films I never heard about, and "The Scar Crow" was one of those films.

The film starts off with three sisters living in the eighteenth century with their father, who takes the idea of family love a little too far. Since he has no wife, he needs to get his loving somehow, right? While the girls put up with it for awhile, they finally decide to take a step back. The film then jumps to the present day, or at least 2009.

A group of friends accidentally stumble upon a farm where three sisters live, who just so happen look exactly like the sisters from before. They offer the boys a place to stay, food, and other "amenities." The only problem is that they have no alcohol, so they send the boys into town to get some. After having a few drinks at the bar, they mention the farm and the locals seem confused. They point out that the farm was abandoned years ago and that no one lives there. While most of us might think twice about going back, the guys decide that they must have described the place badly and that the locals must be talking about another farm. Naturally, things start going wrong as soon as they get back, and the sisters make it clear that if they have their way, the boys won't walk away unscathed.

"The Scar Crow" is another of those horror films produced on a very low budget that is more entertaining than most Hollywood big-budget horror flicks. There are a few moments when the lack of funding becomes abundantly clear, but the directors manage to shrug off those scenes. One of the moments that stick out in my mind is a scene that involves one of the strapping young men on a bed with blood and guts coming out from all sides. Look at that scene, and tell me that you saw something better in a major motion picture.

Granted, this isn't the best horror film that I've seen, but it did capture my attention and keep it off my new book sitting next to me, which is more than I can say for some of the more recent horror films.

Movie Review: “Hansel & Gretel”

Runtime: 90 minutes

Rating: NR

Release Date: January 8, 2013

Director: Anthony Ferrante

Gretel is a typical teenage girl, working in a bakery run by Lilith (Dee Wallace, “The Howling”). After meeting her brother, father, and his girlfriend for dinner, her father decides to tell the teens that they can no longer live with them. Once he and his girlfriend tie the knot, the two need to find new places to live. Though Gretel understands his position, Hansel immediately storms off in a fit of rage.

Gretel manages to chase her brother down in the middle of the woods, where their mother took them as kids. When Hansel trips over a tree root and sprains his ankle, she helps him through the woods, and they stumble across a small bungalow in the middle of nowhere. Luckily, the home is owned by Lilith, who inherited the house from her family. Lilith welcomes them into her home, fixes them a selection of dishes, and worries that Gretel won't get enough to eat.

Though Lilith seems nice enough, it's clear that she's harboring a dark secret. Once Gretel passes out after drinking a cup of tea, two sinister men step inside from the woods and drag Hansel into the basement. There, Hansel meets several people who were unlucky enough to run into Lilith. As they remain chained to the walls, they let him know that Lilith is a witch who eats people and that Gretel might just be the next person on her list.

With all of the hype surrounding the upcoming “Hansel and Gretel: Witch Hunters,” it isn't surprising that The Asylum jumped on the bandwagon with a mockbuster film. What is surprising is that “Hansel & Gretel” actually comes across as a pretty entertaining film. The Asylum often cuts budgets and makes films on limited budgets, and even though this one only had a budget of around $150,000, that works as one of its advantages.

The screenplay takes the tale that we all know out of some unknown age and tosses it into the modern world. This Hansel and Gretel is a brother-sister team who know all about cell phones and the Internet, but it's believable that they would get lost in the woods without any modern conveniences. The film also does a good job of setting up the loving yet sometimes antagonistic relationship between the two, which plays like a real brother-sister relationship.

There are two big standouts in the film: Dee Wallace and Clark Perry. Dee Wallace can do a horror movie like no one else, and she seems perfectly cast as the witch. Wallace sometimes hams it up a little too much, like the scene where she chases after a man with a crazy look in her eyes that makes you sit back from the screen. She has some great moments onscreen, but when she goes a little crazy, you might find yourself wincing a little.

Perry takes on the role of Kevin, one of the unfortunate souls chained in Lilith's basement. He serves as the comedic relief in the film, and he has some great lines. When Hansel worries about his sister, he asks if she's a big girl because, “they like to eat the big girls first,” and when Hansel wonders why he keeps eating the donuts and sugary snacks they deliver, he lets him know that if he's going to die, he's going to go out on top. He's the type of guy who runs off, rather than go back to save his friend, making it clear that he might be the only smart person in the movie.

Some might say that “Hansel & Gretel” is just another cheap imposter film from The Asylum, but I found it to be one of the more entertaining films the company released over the last few years. It won't keep movie lovers from racing to the theaters for the big-budget version, but it might appeal to those who would rather wait for that one to land on DVD.

“Book of Shadows: Blair Witch 2” Movie Review

Runtime: 90 minutes

Rating: R

Release Date: October 27, 2000

Director: Joe Berlinger

A random group of people show up in Burketsville to create their own documentary about the Blair Witch. Tristen, who is pregnant, and her boyfriend Stephen want to write a book about the witch, while Kim is a psychic and goth girl and Erica (Erica Leerhsen, “Wrong Turn 2: Dead End”) kind of seems to just go along for kicks. They're lead by Jeff (Jeffrey Donovan, “Hindsight”) who claims that he had thousands of satisfied customers leading tours of the areas associated with the previous film, though it turns out he just meant people who bought crap from his website.

They head out on a tour of the woods, eventually settling in the ruins of an old house for the night. After a night of partying, they wake to discover their belongings trashed. The group ventures back to Jeff's house to go over the footage they shot, and things turn even weirder.

Here is where I lose any bit of horror street cred that I have: I actually liked this film. I saw “The Blair Witch Project” in the theater with a friend who also loved horror films, and we were both pissed by the time it ended. I have never seen the movie again, and I have no interest in seeing it. I bought a used copy of this movie from a store here in Dayton, and the cashier tried to upsell me to the two-disc set for $1 more, which included a copy of the first film, and I completely shot him down.

I frequently tried to tell people that “Book of Shadows: Blair Witch 2” was a good movie and way better than the first one. I still maintain that it's far superior to the last film, but after watching it recently, I don't know why the hell I once liked it so much. Granted, Donovan is creepily hot in the movie, and it has an interesting ending but that's about it.

The problem is that there is just something a little too slick about the film. If you haven't read about the problems between the director and the studio, go read about it. It's like the studio decided that everything original about the previous film wasnt't good enough for a sequel, so they decided to make a traditional horror film. After watching it again, I think it probably would have been better to make this as a stand-alone film with no connection to the Blair Witch.