Tag: 2010

Directed by Samuel Bayer [Other horror films: N/A]

Unlike some out there, I don’t hate this remake. I don’t think it’s a good movie, but I don’t hate it. What I feel is far more akin to disappointment, because while this rendition of A Nightmare on Elm Street wasn’t good, I will say that it really had potential.

To fully delve into this, I need to get into some spoilers. That’s something I try to avoid, because I like my reviews to be approachable even if the reader hasn’t seen the movie, but in this case, I have got to talk in detail about portions of this film, and so there will be spoilers in this review, starting with this next paragraph.

This film deals with teenagers who discover they have repressed memories about a preschool and a man named Freddy. Their parents refuse to tell them about it – when pressed, Nancy’s mother tells her that the kids said Freddy had abused them, and Freddy left town. During a dream sequence of Quentin’s, we see instead that the parents find Freddy on the outskirts of town, and angry that he may have abused their children, they burn his hiding place to the ground with him in it.

After Quentin sees this, it leads to what I find the most promising part of the film, in which Quentin and Nancy confront Quentin’s father about Freddy’s death. Nancy and Quentin wisely say that they were five at the time, and could have said anything – that there was no evidence Freddy was guilty, as the “secret cave” the kids mentioned was never even located, and that Freddy is seeking revenge on the kids who falsely accused him, which hurts all the more because Freddy loved the kids while he was a handyman at the preschool.

And you know what? If the film had continued to go this route, that would have been fantastic. Throughout the whole Freddy Kruger mythos, I don’t believe we’ve seen an innocent Freddy, and in this remake, they could have indeed made Freddy an innocent man who was killed due to false accusations of child abuse. The repressed memories of Quentin, Nancy, and company could have been Nancy, at five years old, deciding to play a joke and get her friends to accuse Freddy of things he didn’t do, and the finale could be her confronting her guilt, and an emotional scene of her apologizing to the innocent Freddy of her complicity in the events.

As you can probably tell, what with my hypotheticals, that didn’t happen. Upon exploring the old preschool, Nancy and Quentin come upon the aforementioned “secret cave,” and find photographic evidence that, indeed, Freddy Kruger was guilty. And everything that follows is just generic Nightmare on Elm Street stuff that you could get with a more classic feeling from almost any other film in the original series.

I think they blew a large opportunity to change the whole idea of Freddy, but instead of taking that leap, which might have been controversial, but would have been ballsy, they just keep with the “Oh, he’s just naturally evil, brahs,” stuff. I think this was a mistake, and instead of being an interesting movie, the finale of this remake is just generic and of about zero interest. Oh, and to make things better, they throw in a final scene that’s fucking awful. Even the ending of the original movie is better, and it’s not even close.

Perhaps it’s just me, but this pisses me off, because I really thought this film could have been something different. When I first saw this, I was really engaged in the story – was Freddy actually innocent? I thought it could have been so cool if they flipped the script. But they didn’t. And what was an okay movie (not great, but okay) just fell apart completely in the last twenty minutes, and I found it quite insulting, and again, a lost opportunity.

Rooney Mara (The Social Network) did pretty decent as Nancy, and Kyle Gallner (The Haunting in Connecticut) was good in the stoner-esque role. I thought the two worked well together as they were trying to figure out what their memories meant. Neither of the other teens, be it Katie Cassidy (Black Christmas, Wolves at the Door, and When a Stranger Calls) or Thomas Dekker, did much for me. Clancy Brown (The Shawshank Redemption and Pet Sematary II) was nice to see, but aside from one strong scene, he didn’t really add much.

When it comes to Freddy Kruger, I don’t think Jackie Earle Haley did terribly. I mean, let’s be honest – anyone who wasn’t Robert Englund would have a very difficult time getting praise. I don’t personally care for Freddy’s look here, but I also understand it’s more realistic as far as burn victims go, so that’s fine. More troublesome for me, though, is Freddy’s voice, which just grates. I could do without the one-liners (“I haven’t even cut you yet”), but what really takes me away is the voice. Honestly, maybe it would have been cooler if he didn’t talk, and was just a threatening figure slowly leading these kids to realize what a mistake they made in accusing him of a false crime.

Oh, wait. I’m sorry. I forget the movie wasn’t trying to be different, and so I momentarily forgot how cliché it was. My apologies.

The CGI was hideous most of the time. It’s funny that the scene in which Freddy is pushing himself out of the wall above the bed is done so much better in 1984, as well as the Tina-equivalent death scene. I did like the pool scene – when Quentin comes up from the pool and sees the flashback of Freddy’s origin take place – but otherwise, there’s nothing here that’s all that unique.

More than anything, I believe with all my heart that A Nightmare on Elm Street could have been a worthwhile remake if they had just changed the story up a little, and instead of making a generic horror movie, had gone with a more emotionally poignant ending about facing the consequences of your mistakes (the mistake being falsely accusing Kruger). Instead, you get a subpar movie that has it’s moments, and it has it’s potential, but is largely a waste of time.

5.5/10

Directed by John Erick Dowdle [Other horror films: The Poughkeepsie Tapes (2007), Quarantine (2008), As Above, So Below (2014)]

To be honest, I was hoping for a bit more from this one. Now, Devil is a movie I’ve seen before, but it’s been years upon years, and I was thinking that maybe, if I went in with fresh eyes, I could garner a bit more enjoyment from this one than I got the first time through (in which I found the movie passable but little more). Alas, that’s not really what happened.

Certainly the basic story of the movie is interesting, but I could have done without any of the religious talking points thrown in, and wish that the film was more based on, you know, reality. In particular, Jacob Vargas’ character Ramirez was pretty bad, especially when he said that even people who say they don’t believe in the Devil actually do, a little bit. Yeah, that’s not how it works, but this character’s mind was too warped by religion for anything otherwise to make sense to him, I suspect.

I guess a big part of my issues with Devil is that I didn’t find the mystery of who the Devil was all that interesting. So we know it’s one of the people trapped in the elevator, and we’re supposed to be kept on our toes about the Devil’s human form, despite the fact we know that M. Night Shyamalan was partially responsible for the story? Yeah, I don’t think so. The ending itself was cliché enough, what with a reveal that was somewhat obvious, but the whole movie suffers from just feeling too Hollywood.

It’s not like the movie didn’t have some potential. If the story had been less based on religious tripe as opposed to an actual mystery regarding one of those trapped being a serial killer, the movie might have been pretty good (especially considering that some of the cinematography is top-notch – look at that scene on the roof with a guy chasing a hat). The route they went, though, might work for some people, but it left me rather disinterested.

Chris Messina was okay. I mean, he was pretty generic toward the end, but hey, it’s only to be expected. More enjoyable was Bokeem Woodbine, and the fact he dealt with claustrophobia was a nice character addition. Matt Craven had a very familiar face (I’ve seen him in Disturbia, I guess, but I can’t imagine that’s how I recognize him – maybe from the Assault on Precinct 13 remake?), and I rather enjoyed his character (especially his back-and-forth with Jacob Vargas). Jenny O’Hara (Wishmaster) was also nice to see again, but I don’t think her character really had much to do.

Despite some solid performances, though, Devil still felt, at best, competent. I can personally say that I had an okay time for a good amount of the film. However, I can also say that the ending was almost pathetically anticipated, and I wish that they had gone a different direction with this one.

5.5/10

This is one of the films covered by Fight Evil’s podcast. Listen below as Chucky (@ChuckyFE) and I discuss Devil.

Directed by Tod Williams [Other horror films: Cell (2016)]

It’s no surprise that I rather abhorred the first movie, and because of that, I didn’t really go into this one with a high expectation of enjoying it. And of course, it may come as little surprise that I didn’t care for this at all.

I did appreciate how it connected to the first movie somewhat unexpectedly. It didn’t really make the film any better, but perhaps it gained a little depth due to that addition. Still, the movie is pretty much the first movie only with a family as opposed to a couple, and that change didn’t really blow me away.

Once things really start happening (about an hour and 7 minutes in, mind), it doesn’t really matter, because I had stopped caring an hour before. The family all seem like decently nice (albeit rather privileged) people, the daughter (Molly Ephraim) being the most interesting and sympathetic, especially when she’s trying to convince her father (Brian Boland) of the supernatural goings-on in the house. As decent, though, as Ephraim was, it doesn’t really make the film any more engaging.

Without fail, I usually bring up the fact that I don’t dislike found footage movies automatically. There’s been plenty I’ve enjoyed, such as Hell House LLC and As Above, So Below. I also understand, at least partially, the appeal of these types of slow-burn films. It’s just that I don’t find them creepy or scary, just tediously boring and hard to get through.

Connecting to the first movie was, again, somewhat clever, and I appreciated that bit of back-story. It doesn’t necessarily shine a brighter light on the first film, but it was still nice. At the same time, the movie is still slow and tedious. I enjoyed it a smidge more than the first movie, if only because Molly Ephraim was a much better character than either Micah or Katie from the first film (both of whom, of course, pop up here).

I also wanted to mention the ending briefly. Much like it’s predecessor, it’s somewhat depressing and gloomy, but, at least to me, it lacked the emotional punch it was probably trying to attain. This is mainly due to the utterly idiotic and tried out “This is based off a true story, we promise, even though it’s obviously not true, we say it is to make the movie more believable and frightening” bullshit that I’m so sick of.

To my knowledge, there’s been absolutely zero evidence of supernatural or paranormal activity. This isn’t based off a true story, and movies that claim they are, when they’re obviously not, really piss me off. This is probably my biggest issue with found footage – if a movie foregoes this foolish true-story framing, more power to it, but when they tack that on at the beginning or end, it’s just insulting our intelligence. Perhaps I sound like a broken record, but as long as movies keep doing this, I will keep calling them out and rating them accordingly.

Paranormal Activity 2 is just as tedious and boring as the first film, with the only real caveat being the characters are a bit better (focusing on a family, even a privileged one, is more engaging than a couple, I always thought). It’s still not a good movie, and it amazes me that this won any awards at all.

4.5/10

This is one of the films covered by Fight Evil’s podcast. If you want to hear Chucky (@ChuckyFE) and I discuss Paranormal Activity 2, than this is the perfect video for you.

Directed by Joe Johnston [Other horror films: N/A]

Perhaps the very definition of average, The Wolfman has some really cool and memorable scenes, but also peters out almost entirely come the ending with some elements I don’t at all care for.

I won’t pretend that I remember enough about the original to compare to the two, but I will say that this story is decent up until the end. I enjoyed many aspects of the asylum sequences, along with the following breakout and chase through London, but once it was werewolf vs. werewolf (not too dissimilar from the finale of 30 Days of Night, only with vampires), I ceased being impressed. And to be fair, at least I’m consistent, as I didn’t love the finale to 30 Days of Night either.

There’s some solid werewolf action in the film, to be sure. I always loved that Romani attack near the beginning, which had a decent amount of brutal claw damage, and plenty of attacks throughout the movie are worth it, and filmed well too, but that doesn’t really make up for what I see as failings with how the movie concludes.

Also, I’ll be honest and say that I didn’t love Benicio Del Toro as Talbot. I can’t exactly put my finger on it, but I just didn’t buy it. Anthony Hopkins was, as always, a pleasure to see, though again, some character aspects turn me away from him. I was lukewarm toward Emily Blunt’s character, but on the upside, I did rather like Hugo Weaving (and his demands of a pint of bitter).

The Wolfman’s a fine film, but it’s not a great film. It’s action-packed, sure, and like I said, some parts are pretty solid, but much of the time, it just feels like a glossy Hollywood period piece, and I contend The Woman in Black remake did it better, and with more atmosphere to boot.

Still, a good werewolf movie is hard to come by, and I’d say that The Wolfman certainly counts. It didn’t blow me away, and having seen it twice, it really does strike me as ultimately average, but it’s a decent movie still despite my misgivings.

7/10

Directed by Colin Ferguson [Other horror films: N/A]

Look at the plot of this Syfy TV movie, and you can probably tell that it’ll be bad. Awful, even. Which is what I thought when I first saw it some years back (probably around when it first aired). Seeing it again, though, I have to admit, I find the movie somewhat, well, comforting.

The strong point here isn’t in the CGI dinosaur skeletons which are causing all the havoc, as they are just overly ridiculous and nonsensical (how can a skeleton growl without throat muscles, or sniff?). In a way, it a fun concept – a Native American spell brings the bones to life to protest development on traditionally tribal land, but come on, the skeletons look terrible.

What appealed to me about Triassic Attack were the characters, though. There’s some retroactive appreciation here, to be sure – one of the stars is Emilia Clarke, who began playing Daenerys Targaryen in the ultra-popular series Game of Thrones. Seeing the Mother of Dragons play a moderately bratty teenage girl isn’t something I got to experience the first time I saw the film, and that certainly adds a little something.

Even ignoring Clarke, though, there are some solid performances here, such as Steven Brand (who consistently reminded me of Ben McKenzie) and Raoul Max Trujillo. Christopher Villiers and Gabriel Womack made for fine comedic characters, but Kirsty Mitchell was somewhat shaky throughout.

The family dynamics between Brand, Mitchell, Clarke, and Trujillo actually got me invested, though, despite the silly story. One brother who believes in traditional Native American religions and another who is much more the modern, integrated one made for some good drama. And I don’t know why, exactly, but it worked.

If you look online, many people give this movie quite a low rating, and I can certainly see why people would give it such, especially since I used to be one of them. But I found Triassic Attack entertaining, probably more entertaining than I should have. The question is, would this be a movie I’d buy on DVD and pop in on a rainy night to watch, and the answer is yes. It’s not one of Syfy’s better offers, but I cannot deny that I enjoyed it, and ultimately, that’s all that matters.

7/10

Directed by Vincent D’Onofrio [Other horror films: N/A]

I probably like this film more than I have any right to, especially looking at what many others say about it. But after having seen it twice, Don’t Go in the Woods is still a movie I could see myself watching again down the line.

Let’s get this out of the way first, as I think it’s rather important: if you’re looking for a new horror favorite, don’t look here. Make no mistake, some of the kills are brutal in this one (the main weapon is a sledgehammer – could you imagine them being anything but?), but it takes about an hour to really start throwing out some solid horror, and in an eighty minute film, that might not do it for most, even if they’re fans of the genre. The story’s not dripping in creativity either, and if you didn’t see that plot twist from a mile away, I wouldn’t even know what to say.

The selling point of this movie is that it’s part-musical. As a fan of the occasional musical myself, I don’t think it’s a bad idea, and really, I think the fact that I like most of the songs in the film leads me to enjoy this movie more than most people seem to (the rating on IMDb, as of this writing, is 2.6/10). There are scenes of the band sitting around a campfire singing songs that last ten, fifteen minutes. No horror, just music. And I think that wouldn’t sit well with many. What can I say, other than I didn’t have a problem with it?

There were some decent kills, as I alluded to, and while there was some occasional gore, and a little splatter, I wouldn’t say that it was anything special. A sledgehammer to the head, along with a somewhat fun sleeping bag butchering, were probably my two favorite kills. That said, given the story’s not really that amazing, I don’t think it’s enough to recommend the film to hardcore horror fans.

Matt Sbeglia is really the only one in this movie who is noteworthy. Everyone else, for the most part, is either a generic cut-out or just okay. Many of them can sing pretty well (if that was indeed the actors actually singing), but as for a stand-out performance, Sbeglia gets the closest, and to be honest, he wasn’t that amazing.

Directed by well-known actor Vincent D’Onofrio, Don’t Go in the Woods, due to it’s being almost more a musical than horror, probably wouldn’t do it for many fans of the genre. How many good musical horror movies are out there anyway? Maybe 2014’s Stage Fright? So if you go in expecting a horror film, I think the long, drawn-out musical portions will disappoint. But like I said, I think most of the music is decent, so despite the bland story and terribly cliche twist, even after two viewings, I think this movie’s somewhat decent. Still below average, but decent.

6.5/10