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Exists (2014)

A found-footage entry from director Eduardo Sanchez, the guy who first cashed in on the genre with The Blair Witch Project. I thoroughly understand the financial motivation for using GoPro cameras as the primary source of footage; it’s a helluva lot cheaper than film. And let’s face it, handheld and body mounted cameras give the action a heightened sense of urgency, particularly during the inevitable flight through the forest sequence.

Unfortunately, it’s also distracting and all but challenges the viewer to account for every shot. Sorry, but there are instances in Exists when it becomes nearly impossible to convince yourself that Brian the stoner (Chris Osborn) somehow has access to more cameras than NBC. There. I said it.

The plot is pure boilerplate, as five young adults (one of whom is Dora Madison Burge from Friday Night Lights and Chicago Fire) decide to party at Brian and Matt’s (Samuel Davis) family hunting cabin in the untamed wilds of Texas. That would be the same cabin that their uncle used to live in, until something frightened him away. So yes, by all means, let’s go see if we can figure out exactly what that might be.

The answer is Bigfoot/Sasquatch, who’s enjoying a bit of a resurgence as a movie monster, apparently fully recovered from family friendly piffle like Harry and the Hendersons, that reduced him to kiddy comic relief. In Exists, he’s a vengeful critter, looking to put a hurt on the punks that ran over Little Squatch.

Sanchez opts for a more traditional (and confrontational) approach than is used by Bobcat Goldthwaite in his meditative Willow Creek, another recent Bigfoot-gone-bad film. That means there’s an actual body count here, and that we are treated to several good looks at the beast, whose makeup is well above average.

As we watch another clutch of adolescent interlopers hide and flee, there are sufficient scenes that generate an actual fright response, so I’m giving Exists a modest recommendation that should not be mistaken for overwhelming enthusiasm.

Afterthought: Does Bigfoot eat people? I think he probably should. It’s scarier that way. Who’s gonna run away from a furry herbivore?

The Houses October Built (2014)

Call me a cockeyed optimist, but I’m the kind of meatball what thinks that life (aka, all the loud shit going on during the waking hours) is an endless learning opportunity.

Simply by not having our heads snagged in our own b-holes, we can hopefully evolve into something that isn’t eaten by bobcats or swindled by kids selling magazine subscriptions.

I sincerely believe if you’re a reasonably intelligent ordinary citizen, you should be able to keep up with your personal narrative to the extent that you can see when your own shitty decision-making is making things unbearable. That is my belief.

Why is this such a struggle for the cast of horror movies and The Houses October Built specifically? Because it’s written that way. It’s our cross to bear so that we can see the trap springing merrily shut.

Armed with digital cameras, four dudes and a woman named Brandy hit the open road in a recreational vehicle looking to document America’s scariest Halloween haunts. They head south, following hideously costumed hillbillies from one trauma-inducing spook house to the next, until they end up in New Orleans.

Strange and disturbing occurrences are routine along the way, including confrontations with hostile carny folk and vehicular infiltration by creeping intruders. Anyone with the common sense of a deer smelling a fire in the wind would have hightailed it to the nearest blue state, but the four dudes and Brandy push onward. Sad, really. I wonder who found the footage?

The cast is also billed as the crew. Not quite sure what’s up with that, but I would like to congratulate director Bobby Roe, because The Houses October Built is one scary-ass movie.

Way more effective than The Blair Witch Project. Witches aren’t scary. People are scary. Especially in those parts of the world where it gets dark super fast and the scarecrows come to life.

Animal (2014)

No, it’s not the Rob Schneider movie. That would be too depraved even for me.

Welcome to another episode of We’re A Bunch of Dipshits Who Went Camping. Two couples and their gay friend go for a hike, get lost in the woods, and are pursued through the pines by some kind of super-powerful apex predator. The creature itself is the best part of Animal, and frankly, it deserves a better movie than this tedious time waster.

The beast is close to human size, really fast, agile, and powerful. It appears to be equal parts rodent, reptile, and canine, and must have been fasting recently, because this thing is first in line at the human flesh buffet, barely slowing down to nosh on one victim before another lands in his lap. Put him on a plate son, you’ll enjoy him more.

Predictably, things bog down when the campers discover a fairly majestic log cabin to hide in, one that already has a trio of trapped hikers, including former Kevin Smith co-star Joey Lauren Adams. That’s when these idiots turn on each other and reveal long-simmering secrets that have no bearing on the action whatsoever, but do fill a tidy bit of time.

Animal is not awful, but when you introduce a badass creature that piques the curiosity, we want to know a little backstory, like, what the hell is it and where’d it come from? This information is not forthcoming, but while we’re twiddling our thumbs in the cabin, we do find out that the studly Jeff (Parker Young), who has long since had his head removed, may have once had a hookup with Sean (Paul Iacano), much to the chagrin of Mandy (Elizabeth Gillies), the hot Final Girl.

Come on, people! Priorities!

Beneath (2013)

Not to be confused with Beast Beneath, this cold-sweat skin crawler from director Ben Ketai plunges us into some seriously subterranean depths for claustrophobic goosebumps not seen around these parts since Neil Marshall’s The Descent (a below-the-surface horror highwater mark).

Filmed in a very realistic coal mine (no location info available), a group of unlucky miners, along with their boss (Jeff Fahey) and his plucky daughter (Kelly Noonan), find themselves stranded 600 feet below ground after an unexpected tectonic turn.

Searching for a way out, they come across an older tunnel that leads to the abandoned outpost of a mining crew that disappeared nearly 100 years earlier.

Meanwhile, their emergency supply of oxygen canisters is dwindling faster than free drinks at a wedding reception. Wait! Did you hear something?

Since Beneath is “based on actual events,” the likelihood of mole men, ghouls, or trogs appearing out of the stonework seems remote at best, but to their credit, Ketai and writers Patrick Doody and Chris Valenziano keep a firm hand on the reins and the threat levels high.

I myself experienced the same sense of impending doom (and fear of tight spaces) that I felt while getting to know the colorful company of marines in Cameron’s Aliens.

I wish I could have contributed to the marketing of this movie, because I have a can’t-miss tagline.

“The poisonous atmosphere left them—OXYGEN DEPRAVED!” (The written content of Horrificflicks.com is my intellectual property, by the way.)

Dark Ride (2006)

If you’ve seen the Tobe Hooper flick Funhouse (1981), then there’s no particular reason to sit through this inferior facsimile.

Yes, The Sopranos Jamie-Lynn Sigler is onboard, as is Patrick Renna from The Sandlot. Neither possesses sufficient dramatic gravitas to make the slightest bit of difference on the quality scale.

On the plus side, Dark Ride is adequately paced and there’s a decent amount of bloodletting, including a memorable ax-chop that neatly cleaves a security guard in twain.

Six very old-looking college kids (including Sigler and Renna), on their way to New Orleans, stop off to visit a boardwalk amusement park where a pair of adorable moppets were hacked to smithereens a few decades earlier.

Meanwhile, the maniac who committed the killings decides there’s no time like the present to escape from the loony bin, and seek sanctuary in the bowels of the very same carnival ride that the “kids” intend to explore. What are the odds, right?

Other than some brief nudity and the aforementioned head-splitter, director/cowriter Craig Singer doesn’t bring anything compelling to the table, including an identity plot twist that I had pegged accurately the moment it appeared.

Dark Ride doesn’t suck, exactly, but if you give it a pass there’s no harm done.

Afterthought: This is exactly the sort of “meh” film that presents me with a challenging dilemma, as to whether or not I should even bother reviewing it.

But at the end of the day (I never use this phrase!), if I can save even one of you from a case of overly high expectations in the Netflix horror queue, then my life has meaning.

Isn’t that tragic?

The Abandoned (2006)

As that well-known horror movie critic Tom Petty used to say, “The waiting is the hardest part.”

If this is true, then The Abandoned, a slow-burning haunted house puzzler co-written and directed by Spain’s Nacho Cerdá, will certainly test the patience of the average viewer.

My advice is to stick with it. Cerdá, a confident visual stylist, has constructed an eerie, alluring tableau frozen in time that awaits to snatch up the twin sibling protagonists who are curious about where they came from.

American film producer Marie Jones (Anastasia Hille) returns to her homeland of Russia at the behest of a lawyer (Valentin Ganev). Once arrived, she’d informed that her long-lost birth mother has been found, the victim of a 40-year-old homicide.

Marie inherits the decrepit family farm, vacant since the time of the killing. The cursed dirt patch is in the middle of Nowherezistan, surrounded on three sides by a river, with a rickety bridge serving as the only point of access.

It’s here that she’s reunited with her long-lost twin brother Nicolai (Karel Roden), shortly before the trap springs shut.

Much of The Abandoned‘s 99-minute running time is spent establishing that there is apparently no escape from this damned farm, as Marie and her brother test every available route.

To be fair, this does get a little monotonous. But Cerdá’s meticulous metamorphosis of the farmhouse, from ruined wreck to a vengeful living thing, that never meant for the twins to leave in the first place, is masterful.

My patience was rewarded; your mileage may vary.

Rampage (1987)

By request of Friends of the Blog, Jayne and Chris, I dug up this William Friedkin oddity and took it for a spin.

Though it plays out like a Movie of the Week or an episode of a gritty police procedural/courtroom drama, Rampage is nonetheless darkly fascinating, and certainly qualifies as a Horrific Flick.

Meet smiling killer Charlie Reece (Alex McArthur, a poor man’s David Cassidy), the handsome, simmering maniac next door, who shares a dumpy house with his traumatized mom (Grace Zabriskie, from Twin Peaks and elsewhere).

Charlie’s complicated madness springs from the notion that his blood has somehow been poisoned so he needs the blood and organs of other people to ensure his survival.

That’s his story and he’s sticking to it.

After the troubled lad racks up a decent body count, it’s up to blow-dried prosecutor Anthony Fraser (Michael Biehn) to prove that Charlie was sufficiently in control of his faculties to premeditate his “rampage,” while defense attorney Albert Morse (Nicholas Campbell) angles for an insanity plea.

Obviously, someone who would kill five people (plus a few cops during an escape attempt), drink their blood, and remove their spleens, must be a lunatic, right?

Oh, and he’s a closet Nazi, to boot. Should he get life in prison, be exiled to a funny farm, or hung up from the nearest tree?

The legal and ethical debate over Charlie’s mental health threatens to capsize the action, but writer-director Friedkin (The Exorcist, To Live and Die in L.A., and Sorcerer) keeps the crazy kid in the picture, occasionally jumping us inside Charlie’s warped mind so we can revel in his ritualized bloodlust.

As it so happens, Rampage is based on a true story (surprise, surprise!) set in Stockton, California. Charlie Reece is the face of ordinary, homegrown evil; he doesn’t wear a mask or rise from the grave every 15 minutes.

He’s just that weird kid from down the street.

Gosh officer, I never thought he was capable of violence. Video games and heavy metal music must have drove him to it.

Neverlake (2013)

There’s nothing wrong with a competently executed film, and Neverlake certainly qualifies. In terms of acting, setting, pace, tension, and professional camera work, I’ve got no complaints. The story itself springs from a well-chewed gothic template, namely, young girl in remote location discovers terrible family secrets and thus becomes imperiled. But that doesn’t mean there aren’t a few nits to pick.

Curious teen Jenny Brook (the improbably named Daisy Keeping) arrives in rural Tuscany to visit her estranged father (David Brandon), a taciturn doctor who shares a capacious (though austere) stone villa with his assistant Olga (Joy Tanner). Jenny’s mother is deceased (or—is she?). Anyway, she’s not around.

Since Dad is too busy studying Etruscan sacrificial rituals (Clue!) to show her around, Jenny takes to rambling though the woods to explore nearby Idols Lake (Clue!). Here she meets a motley assortment of disabled kids living in a dilapidated hospital who take to her instantly, except for the brooding Peter (Martin Kashirokov, who presumably has “The Russian Robert Pattinson” written on his business cards). He takes two whole scenes to warm up to their cute new friend.

Complaint Department: Dr. Brook, as played by David Brandon, can be pegged as the villain from the moment he materializes on camera. There are no other suspects. Stevie Wonder could very quickly tell you that Dr. Brook is a cold, scowling (mad) scientist who is obviously up to something nefarious—least of all, boinking his stern, Eastern Bloc assistant. The painful obviousness of this development somewhat diminishes the suspense that director Riccardo Paoletti, and writers Carlo Longo and Manuela Cacciamani were hoping to create.

Even so, Neverlake gets a lukewarm recommendation from where I’m sitting. It doesn’t take much to buy into the drama, and thankfully, despite a well-worn path, there are still some surprises lurking in these woods.

The Collector (2009)

A good franchise is hard to find. When it comes to the contemporary horror film, how does one find the next Freddy or Jason or Leatherface? Is it Jigsaw that keeps ’em coming back or is it the cunning intricacy of his traps? Now that Rob Zombie has rebooted Michael Myers, do we have a deeper empathy for him because we’ve been privy to his bleak-ass childhood? Is Victor Crowley a ghost, a monster, or a waste of space? For that matter, what about The Collector?

Nutshell: Arkin (Josh Stewart) is an ex-con forced to ripoff a hot gem from the homeowner that’s employed him as a general contractor. See, he needs the money ASAP to square his wife’s debt with some gangsters. Not important, but it does reveal that the protagonist is basically a decent guy, despite his shady profession.

Coincidentally, the very house that Arkin is busting into has also been targeted by the title character, a mysterious (deformed?) masked man in black (Juan Fernandez). Instead of jewelry, the Collector prefers building clever booby traps, playing sadistic cat-and-mouse games with his captives, and then making off with a single survivor—presumably for more finely tuned abuse in his lair.

Director and co-writer Marcus Dunstan does create sufficient interest in his diabolical mastermind, who seems to be both a cool, calculating entomologist and a deranged, howling maniac. He walks with a curious gait, suggesting an injury or disability, but he’s also dexterous and deadly quick. There are quirks and inconsistencies to be found here, and they make me want to know who the Collector is and how he got to be this way.

I plan on watching the sequel (The Collection) soon, so we’ll see if we have a viable franchise on our hands or just a pair of movies with the same quirky killer.

Don’t Blink (2014)

If I ever needed a lesson in cinematic contrast, a whiplash-inducing transition from sublime to sucky, it could be had in seeing this Nothing Burger after my epiphany experience with The Babadook. “Nothing” is our word for the day, as in, “There is NOTHING happening in Don’t Blink and it has NOTHING to recommend it.”

Stop me if you’ve heard this one before. Ten reasonably attractive friends arrive for a Rocky Mountain winter holiday at a tacky, pressed board condo that looks like it was built from a kit an hour before filming started. There is no one around to meet them. The loser lodge is a veritable Marie Celeste, with meals left half-eaten on the table. And they can’t leave because all three cars are almost out of gas.

One by one, the vacationers start to vanish. Once that happens, you can choose your own adventure, and it will undoubtedly be a big improvement to the dramatic course charted by writer/director Travis Oates.

Don’t Blink stinks. It stars Brian Austin Green and Mena Suvari and is easily one of the most half-baked, pointless exercises I’ve seen this century.