An essay in horror
Those who love horror films will recognize this formula, a group of H.S. kids camp out in a haunted . . . fill in the blank here.
To begin with there were too many kids. Six would have been enough. The first hour runs the familiar course A) Background of said location, B) Intro of the kids and their dynamics c) Realization that something is not right and finally d) first deaths. All fine and good.
The bad: Never saw a window, never saw the kids attempt to escape after the first deaths. They spend too much time wandering halls looking for the rooms. It took too long to put a face to the green light, and expound on the reason for the haunting. In fact, the movie moved too slowly for my liking. The inner jealousy between Jesse, Dylan and Ashley was unnecessary. With the exception of Jesse, no one really had a personality unless Slut girl, Jealous boy, Stud boy, Nerd boy and Magic girl is enough for you. This last character (the girl whose brother was killed twenty years prior) should have shared her information long before entering the haunted locale. For gosh sakes, there is no good reason why she wouldn't. Furthermore as the story progressed she reveals even more (when the time is right) Why? And finally, the last half hour was populated by too many characters and their POV of what happened a 100 years ago. The ending was too rushed to explain a rather complicated plot. I don't even know how they vanquished the villain or how it related to the story.
Never answered: Why did the villain do what he did in the first place?? What did they villain want anyway. Presumably to come 'back to life'.
The good: Very haunting. The time flashes or separation of the cast via magic was cool. Loved that Jesse was a reincarnation of a person who was murdered in the original investigation. The discovery of the hands. The concept of the straight arrow hotel detective dabbling in magic to dispatch the villain. (Heck how he did it would have made a better movie) The curse aspect. The hotel itself was very frightening.
How it should have went down: Removing the two nerd boys and getting to the curse sooner would have helped. Introducing the villain sooner and diving into Jesse's past midway through the film would have lend credence to the proceedings. The fact that Jesse reveals at the end that he knew all along who he had been in a past life p*ssed me off!! So why didn't you share that info with your buddies, would have saved some lives, dude! Editing would have helped.
I have written all of this because I didn't hate the film, I only wanted it to be better. So I say, IT'S WORTH A LOOK for die hard adult horror fans.
The acting was fine, the direction, inspiring at times and the story idea was good.
Those who love horror films will recognize this formula, a group of H.S. kids camp out in a haunted . . . fill in the blank here.
To begin with there were too many kids. Six would have been enough. The first hour runs the familiar course A) Background of said location, B) Intro of the kids and their dynamics c) Realization that something is not right and finally d) first deaths. All fine and good.
The bad: Never saw a window, never saw the kids attempt to escape after the first deaths. They spend too much time wandering halls looking for the rooms. It took too long to put a face to the green light, and expound on the reason for the haunting. In fact, the movie moved too slowly for my liking. The inner jealousy between Jesse, Dylan and Ashley was unnecessary. With the exception of Jesse, no one really had a personality unless Slut girl, Jealous boy, Stud boy, Nerd boy and Magic girl is enough for you. This last character (the girl whose brother was killed twenty years prior) should have shared her information long before entering the haunted locale. For gosh sakes, there is no good reason why she wouldn't. Furthermore as the story progressed she reveals even more (when the time is right) Why? And finally, the last half hour was populated by too many characters and their POV of what happened a 100 years ago. The ending was too rushed to explain a rather complicated plot. I don't even know how they vanquished the villain or how it related to the story.
Never answered: Why did the villain do what he did in the first place?? What did they villain want anyway. Presumably to come 'back to life'.
The good: Very haunting. The time flashes or separation of the cast via magic was cool. Loved that Jesse was a reincarnation of a person who was murdered in the original investigation. The discovery of the hands. The concept of the straight arrow hotel detective dabbling in magic to dispatch the villain. (Heck how he did it would have made a better movie) The curse aspect. The hotel itself was very frightening.
How it should have went down: Removing the two nerd boys and getting to the curse sooner would have helped. Introducing the villain sooner and diving into Jesse's past midway through the film would have lend credence to the proceedings. The fact that Jesse reveals at the end that he knew all along who he had been in a past life p*ssed me off!! So why didn't you share that info with your buddies, would have saved some lives, dude! Editing would have helped.
I have written all of this because I didn't hate the film, I only wanted it to be better. So I say, IT'S WORTH A LOOK for die hard adult horror fans.
The acting was fine, the direction, inspiring at times and the story idea was good.