Christopher WaldeckAfterdark Horrorfest 2009 review
June 21st 2009 20:03
Well after viewing all of these films I must say that last years was surprisingly better. Sure this year there were bigger stars in the movies and some interesting concepts, but the movies just didn't seem to work for me.
I apologize for the long delay but I'll just review all of them quick and easy.
Slaughter. This was your basic torture porn film. It seemed quite boring at first and certain parts didn't make sense. The violence got disturbing and violent towards the end like any average horror film. Except this one was boring and the object that was used to carry the first part of the film was the attractiveness of the female leads and brief sexual scenes, which if you compare this film to Hostel this is very underwhelming. Oh yeah and there's some back story about a girl running away from an abusive boyfriend which gives a couple good nightmare sequences but is complete meaningless in this film. when this story meets the real story later in the movie the directors thankfully killed off the back story which added nothing to a main story that was actually less adapted than the back story. All in all I didn't like this film.
Voices. I actually missed this one so I'll post a seperate review later.
The Broken. The people seemed to hate this film and I couldn't figure out why. maybe it was because this film wasn't as hardcore as the other films, but I found it interesting and well done. It had a solid story that felt like the twilight Zone. the acting was better than expected for a serious horror film. Lena Headley is fantastic as usual. Others may assume this film to be slow, but you have to give it a chance and wait for the ending. It's one of the few true gems at this horrorfest.
From Within. I found this to be very good. It had an excellent premise to it. A satanic revenge ghost that is haunting and killing teenagers in a bible belt town where every belief is conservative and religious. This all seems to happen the moment a family with siblings who worship the devil return. This film had some neat ghost effects, good acting especially from unknown actors who are teenagers!. Ha take that CW! This film was also a great look at how religious belief can often cause hatred towards others with different beliefs. I thought this was phenomenal. The ghost effects were pretty shocking. A figure that imitates your form and causes you to kill yourself like mirrors but the figure had smoldering eyes and actually stalks you and can grab you and force you to commit acts against yourself. There was one part in a bedroom that made me jump out of my chair. It was like the Uninvited where the terror is obvious right in front of you, but still shocking. I would definately recommend this film.
Dying Breed. Ah1 What's a good horrorfest without a tale of cannibalism, and the legendary Alexander Pearce. This film was well acted from Nathan Philips and Leigh Whannell, who is a better actor in this than he was as Adam in Saw. Two couples go to the jungles in search of a Tasmanian Tiger, who is rarely seen. well this film earned some good reviews in Australia and felt above average unlike many horror films remade in the U.S. A group of Hikers go into the woods in search of this tiger where they run into the cannibals descended of Alexander Pearce. this film had some very graphic and brutal parts like a man getting shot through the face with an arrow and still alive. A skinned corpse hanging above from a tree nude like the Midnight Meat train. A woman getting her gum skin and teeth bitten out of her mouth which is very disgusting, and of course your standard twist at the end, except with better development and a more chilling ending. The women who accompany the men are beautiful and smart like the women in the Decent which is a sign that horror films are changing when it comes to sexes being smart and dumb. It had Nathan Philips as the cocky, jackass like friend, and leigh Whannell, as the smart and responsible friend who is accompanying his girlfriend on this trip. This film has the brief sex and nude scene with one of the women who accompanies Nathan Philips, and as usual is the first to go, which reverts back to Wes Craven's Scream. All in all this an above average horror film.
The Butterfly Effect 3: Revelations. Did we really need a Butterfly Effect 3? That's just as easy to say as Do we really need Ashton Kutcher? This film was better than the second butterfly Effect and was far bloodier and graphic than the first butterfly effect. We are introduced to Sam Reide as he wakes up in an ice filled bathtub after witnessing a murder with his vitals being monitored by his sister Jenna. He takes up the guise of a psychic helping the police capture criminals. That Night Elizabeth, the sister of Sam's murdered girlfriend arrives and asks Sam for his help, he reuses and then later decides to finally help after having raunchy sex with a bartender named Vicki. After the random, yet expected sex scene the real and predictable plot begins, where all the girls that Sam visits begin to turn up dead. We have a climatic ending that is actually quite sad because it involves two of the characters that we actually care about in the whole film. The film also has some really good vicious murder scenes, that are almost like a soft version of Robert hall's Laid to Rest. Overall this is a basic straight to DVD film, except its decent and better than the other Cuba Gooding Jr. straight to DVD releases.
Perkins 14. This is an interesting premise. After his parents are killed. Perkins hires 14 people by brainwashing them to protect them with only one thing on their mind. "Kill for Mr. Perkins!" This film was actually voted on via on online poll on who would star in it and we have the director of Dark Ride returning to helm this film. When Perkins is finally jailed the police are eventually attacked by the Perkins 14. This film doesn't have bad acting, but it does suffer from a mediocre script. Overall its an attempt to rip off 28 Days later in some ways with the rage like sequences. I wouldn't really recommend it but its alright.
Autopsy. This was great when it came to gore and dark comedy, but bad when it came to a storyline. I attempted to recreate hostel in some scenes. Like the convict in the body part room. it starred Robert Patrick in a good role as the menacing doctor trying to harvest parts to keep his wife alive, but unfortunately suffering from mental insanity. for example the spinal fluid drinking scene is disgusting, though it does look like Pear juice. the name of the hospital is Mercy Hospital which is a good joke. This film however suffers from some weird plot holes. The women who is on one of the floor who warns the lead actress that the doctors aren't there to help you. Then she vanishes throughout the entire film. what was the point of this character. however,you'll learn who is going to live and who won't very quickly as all of the characters are standard stereotypes of horror films with almost no depth. Don't even get me started on the ending because there really is not ending. It seems as though they were going to end it in some Hollywood fashion except the film stops like the Sopranos ending. That really pissed me off when i watched this.
Overall I must say that this film was quite disappointing, but at least it didn't have Nightmare Man. This may be good if you like watching films that are more graphic than others, but there really is no difference between these films and regular bargain bin horror films. At least they're not PG-13. I'll wait till next year and hopefully they really make the films to intense for theaters. the only exception when it came to content would probably be Autopsy.
I apologize for the long delay but I'll just review all of them quick and easy.
Slaughter. This was your basic torture porn film. It seemed quite boring at first and certain parts didn't make sense. The violence got disturbing and violent towards the end like any average horror film. Except this one was boring and the object that was used to carry the first part of the film was the attractiveness of the female leads and brief sexual scenes, which if you compare this film to Hostel this is very underwhelming. Oh yeah and there's some back story about a girl running away from an abusive boyfriend which gives a couple good nightmare sequences but is complete meaningless in this film. when this story meets the real story later in the movie the directors thankfully killed off the back story which added nothing to a main story that was actually less adapted than the back story. All in all I didn't like this film.
Voices. I actually missed this one so I'll post a seperate review later.
The Broken. The people seemed to hate this film and I couldn't figure out why. maybe it was because this film wasn't as hardcore as the other films, but I found it interesting and well done. It had a solid story that felt like the twilight Zone. the acting was better than expected for a serious horror film. Lena Headley is fantastic as usual. Others may assume this film to be slow, but you have to give it a chance and wait for the ending. It's one of the few true gems at this horrorfest.
From Within. I found this to be very good. It had an excellent premise to it. A satanic revenge ghost that is haunting and killing teenagers in a bible belt town where every belief is conservative and religious. This all seems to happen the moment a family with siblings who worship the devil return. This film had some neat ghost effects, good acting especially from unknown actors who are teenagers!. Ha take that CW! This film was also a great look at how religious belief can often cause hatred towards others with different beliefs. I thought this was phenomenal. The ghost effects were pretty shocking. A figure that imitates your form and causes you to kill yourself like mirrors but the figure had smoldering eyes and actually stalks you and can grab you and force you to commit acts against yourself. There was one part in a bedroom that made me jump out of my chair. It was like the Uninvited where the terror is obvious right in front of you, but still shocking. I would definately recommend this film.
Dying Breed. Ah1 What's a good horrorfest without a tale of cannibalism, and the legendary Alexander Pearce. This film was well acted from Nathan Philips and Leigh Whannell, who is a better actor in this than he was as Adam in Saw. Two couples go to the jungles in search of a Tasmanian Tiger, who is rarely seen. well this film earned some good reviews in Australia and felt above average unlike many horror films remade in the U.S. A group of Hikers go into the woods in search of this tiger where they run into the cannibals descended of Alexander Pearce. this film had some very graphic and brutal parts like a man getting shot through the face with an arrow and still alive. A skinned corpse hanging above from a tree nude like the Midnight Meat train. A woman getting her gum skin and teeth bitten out of her mouth which is very disgusting, and of course your standard twist at the end, except with better development and a more chilling ending. The women who accompany the men are beautiful and smart like the women in the Decent which is a sign that horror films are changing when it comes to sexes being smart and dumb. It had Nathan Philips as the cocky, jackass like friend, and leigh Whannell, as the smart and responsible friend who is accompanying his girlfriend on this trip. This film has the brief sex and nude scene with one of the women who accompanies Nathan Philips, and as usual is the first to go, which reverts back to Wes Craven's Scream. All in all this an above average horror film.
The Butterfly Effect 3: Revelations. Did we really need a Butterfly Effect 3? That's just as easy to say as Do we really need Ashton Kutcher? This film was better than the second butterfly Effect and was far bloodier and graphic than the first butterfly effect. We are introduced to Sam Reide as he wakes up in an ice filled bathtub after witnessing a murder with his vitals being monitored by his sister Jenna. He takes up the guise of a psychic helping the police capture criminals. That Night Elizabeth, the sister of Sam's murdered girlfriend arrives and asks Sam for his help, he reuses and then later decides to finally help after having raunchy sex with a bartender named Vicki. After the random, yet expected sex scene the real and predictable plot begins, where all the girls that Sam visits begin to turn up dead. We have a climatic ending that is actually quite sad because it involves two of the characters that we actually care about in the whole film. The film also has some really good vicious murder scenes, that are almost like a soft version of Robert hall's Laid to Rest. Overall this is a basic straight to DVD film, except its decent and better than the other Cuba Gooding Jr. straight to DVD releases.
Perkins 14. This is an interesting premise. After his parents are killed. Perkins hires 14 people by brainwashing them to protect them with only one thing on their mind. "Kill for Mr. Perkins!" This film was actually voted on via on online poll on who would star in it and we have the director of Dark Ride returning to helm this film. When Perkins is finally jailed the police are eventually attacked by the Perkins 14. This film doesn't have bad acting, but it does suffer from a mediocre script. Overall its an attempt to rip off 28 Days later in some ways with the rage like sequences. I wouldn't really recommend it but its alright.
Autopsy. This was great when it came to gore and dark comedy, but bad when it came to a storyline. I attempted to recreate hostel in some scenes. Like the convict in the body part room. it starred Robert Patrick in a good role as the menacing doctor trying to harvest parts to keep his wife alive, but unfortunately suffering from mental insanity. for example the spinal fluid drinking scene is disgusting, though it does look like Pear juice. the name of the hospital is Mercy Hospital which is a good joke. This film however suffers from some weird plot holes. The women who is on one of the floor who warns the lead actress that the doctors aren't there to help you. Then she vanishes throughout the entire film. what was the point of this character. however,you'll learn who is going to live and who won't very quickly as all of the characters are standard stereotypes of horror films with almost no depth. Don't even get me started on the ending because there really is not ending. It seems as though they were going to end it in some Hollywood fashion except the film stops like the Sopranos ending. That really pissed me off when i watched this.
Overall I must say that this film was quite disappointing, but at least it didn't have Nightmare Man. This may be good if you like watching films that are more graphic than others, but there really is no difference between these films and regular bargain bin horror films. At least they're not PG-13. I'll wait till next year and hopefully they really make the films to intense for theaters. the only exception when it came to content would probably be Autopsy.
| 30 |
| Vote |
Add To: 
