Movie Review: ‘The Houses October Built’

*** 1/2 out of 5
91 minutes
Not rated
Image Entertainment

Article first published as Movie Review: ‘The Houses October Built’ on Blogcritics.

Considering the amount of money brought in by haunted houses across the country come October, it’s surprising there aren’t a lot of movies surrounding them. Probably the best known would be Tobe Hooper’s The Funhouse from 1981. But loud noises and questionable special effects have started to take their toll on the spook house attraction and they’re starting to become more interactive to raise the terror level. Some are so extreme the average person would never even consider it. Such is the case with the underground attraction sought out by a group of friends in director Bobby Roe’s above average found footage entry: The Houses October Built. It’s available now in theaters, on VOD, and iTunes.

Expanding upon his 2011 documentary, we follow five friends – with the cast essentially playing themselves – on the road trip from hell. Bobby, Zack, Mikey, Jeff, and Brandy are visiting haunted houses to find the next big thrill ride. Not satisfied with the everyday attractions, they are hunting down “The Blue Skeleton,” taking them across Texas and into Louisiana. Along the way they interview cast members of the houses along the way, following a trail of clues to the big score. Little do they know that The Blue Skeleton is hot on their trails, trapping them in a game of increasing scares that the group of friends start to question whether they’re real or all part of the show.

The cast of The Houses October Built is a huge improvement over what’s typically offered in low budget found footage movies. Considering anyone with a camera in their hand can make a movie now, this is a particular area that’s been deteriorating at a rapid pace. The real haunted house footage lends an air of authenticity, but there’s way too much build up to the Blue Skeleton finale. Here is when things start to fizzle out with the happenings being to dark to see anything and falling back on typical haunted house tricks such as things appearing out of nowhere and loud noises in the dark. Roe also didn’t seem to know when to end his film. Sometimes vague endings work, this time not.

As for the handheld video work, the quality is on par with something that belongs in a V/H/S segment; the whole idea actually would have worked way better in that context. As it stands, The Houses October Built only left me wanting to watch the original documentary where Roe was more interested with the behind-the-scenes of America’s spook houses. Questioning the dark undertones and rumors that real body parts or whole corpses wind up making their way onto the show floor. The Houses October Built has a built in audience for horror hounds and haunted house aficionados and is definitely worth a look for those who seek it out.

Movie Review: ‘The Judge’

*** 1/2 out of 5
141 minutes
Rated R for language including some sexual references
Warner Bros. Pictures

Article first published as Movie Review: ‘The Judge’ on Blogcritics.

We all know dramadies are manipulative. Whether the characters wind up deserving our empathy is another matter. Surprisingly, two directors not known for making great films have now given us two of the year’s better dramedies. Last month, Shawn Levy — known for the worst family films imaginable — treated us to some Cameron Crowe-lite with This Is Where I Leave You, and now, director David Dobkin does one better. The Judge is every bit as manipulative as you’d assume, and yes, the trailer gives away most of the movie, but with Robert Downey, Jr. and Robert Duvall leading the cast, prepare to feel bad for loving this movie.

Henry “Hank” Palmer (Downey) enjoys being the lawyer innocents can’t afford. But life calls him home to Carlinville, Indiana, following the death of his mother. Leaving behind his cheating wife Lisa (Sarah Lancaster) and daughter Lauren (Emma Tremblay), he arrives to less than open arms by his father, Judge Joseph “Joe” Palmer (Duvall). His brothers Glen (Vincent D’Onofrio) and Dale (Jeremy Strong) are far more welcoming. While Hank can’t seem to get out of Carlinville fast enough, he still finds time to reignite an old flame with Samantha (Vera Farmiga) before finding Joe’s Cadillac scratched up with a broken headlight and the Sheriff finding a dead body. Now, Hank has to stick around to help defend the one client he doesn’t want to and deal with all the skeletons in the Palmer closet.

Director Dobkin may be best known for comedies — the good: Clay Pigeons, Shanghai Knights, and Wedding Crashers; the bad: The Change-Up; and the ugly: Fred Claus — but it never feels forced, easing the manipulative melodrama. Nick Schenk and Bill Dubuque’s screenplay almost feels like a testosterone version of a Lifetime movie, but the cast saves the day. The whole Palmer clan feels like an authentic family. Coming from a family of three boys myself, I can tell you, their portrayal is all too real. Screaming and fighting one minute to acting like nothing’s happened the next while everything sits on the backburner for another round — Dobkin and crew nail it.

Downey and Duvall manage to play off each other in several cases of machismo gone wild, the best part of the movie are the scenes with Downey and Farmiga, unfortunately, she is severely underused. I hope we get to see them together again because they have fantastic chemistry. Downey and Tremblay also make an adorable father-daughter. The Judge is too long for sure, but the performances make it easier to take — even if you always know what’s coming. This is definitely Dobkin’s best film so far. It’s exactly the kind of soul food movie audiences crave during the fall season, full of laughs and tissue moments.

Photos courtesy Warner Bros. Pictures

Movie Review: ‘Dracula Untold’

*** out of 5
92 minutes
Rated PG-13 for intense sequences of warfare, vampire attacks, disturbing images, and some sensuality
Universal Pictures

Article first published as Movie Review: ‘Dracula Untold’ on Blogcritics.

If there’s one place Universal could truly make some big money at the box office it’s their classic monster franchises. With horror all the rave these days, they could all use an overhaul — even if the original films are still awesome — including Frankenstein, The Mummy, The Wolfman, Creature from the Black Lagoon, and even The Invisible Man. Are audiences up for accepting modern takes on such treasured icons? If the executives at Universal have their say, the answer is whether they like it or not. Let’s just hope the rest of the films aren’t as passable as this weekend’s Dracula Untold, but at least it doesn’t, well, suck.

In this take on Bram Stoker’s classic tale, a voiceover informs us that in 1442, the Turkish army has taken control of all the young boys in Transylvania, including Vlad III Tepes. Fast forward to find a grownup Vlad (Luke Evans), now the prince, with a 10-year reign of peace about to come to an end. Sultan Mehmed II (Dominic Cooper) has ordered 1,000 boys to join his army, including Vlad’s only son Ingeras (Art Parkinson). In order to save the kingdom, Vlad heads to Broken Tooth Mountain to seek the power he needs from a demon/vampire (Charles Dance). Forced to drink the demon/vampire’s blood, Vlad now has the superhuman strength and ability to control bats and the weather to take down the approaching army. Something Vlad hopes to accomplish in the three days given him to either break the curse or feed on human blood and become the immortal mythical legend.

As much as I love my horror movies, my first sign of concern was when a TV spot finally informed me that Dracula Untold was given a PG-13 rating. Considering it looked like they were going for a dark, brooding atmosphere, I was hoping to see something along the lines of Braveheart or 300, and I still hope there’s an eventual unrated Blu-ray release. There are a couple of “ew” moments toward the end, but there’s something really lacking in the first hour. If you’re going to turn the character into an action hero, director Gary Shore and screenwriters Matt Sazama and Burksharpless should have at least given him something to do. Instead, Vlad spends most of the runtime trying to find ways to stay out of the sunlight, and finally flies into action come sundown.

The cast are better than average considering most of them look unfamiliar. Evans is usually pretty boring, but it appears he’s picked up a few tips from working with Peter Jackson in The Hobbit films. Cooper gets to camp things up and is really fun to watch in the few scenes he’s given. He also is the only one who uses the stereotypical Dracula accent; everyone else just sounds English. Things take a fun turn in the final half hour — don’t worry, it’s only 91 minutes! — when Vlad is forced to embrace his fate as the titular character. According to rumor there’s supposedly an Easter egg scene used to setup the Universal Monster Universe. If it’s the end scene right before the credits, people are going to walk away scratching their heads. If Legendary Pictures and Universal really want this new monster universe to work, they’re gonna have to step up their game, but at least you won’t walk out of Dracula Untold calling it: “Dracublah.”

Photos courtesy Universal Pictures

Movie Review: ‘Gone Girl’

***** out of 5
149 minutes
Rated R for a scene of bloody violence, some strong sexual content/nudity, and language
Twentieth Century Fox

Article first published as Movie Review: ‘Gone Girl’ on Blogcritics.

If there were anyone more qualified to adapt Gillian Flynn’s novel Gone Girl than David Fincher, I’d be scared to see their vision. Fincher is synonymous with this kind of material: bleak and sardonic. Thankfully, he always seems to keep a sense of humor running beneath the material; otherwise, Gone Girl could have wound up being one super-depressing film. Led by exactly the kind of leading man necessary to pull off “empathetic, yet despicable,” Ben Affleck shines as the man looking for his missing wife. He and game-for-anything Rosamund Pike play a couple from hell who give Oliver and Barbara Rose from War of the Roses a run for their money.

Nick Dunne (Affleck) is not having a cheery five-year anniversary as he stops at the bar he co-owns with his sister Margo (Carrie Coon), not looking forward to this year’s anniversary treasure hunt. After a phone call from a concerned neighbor, Nick goes home to find his wife Amy (Pike) missing.

He calls in the police, with Detectives Rhonda Boney (Kim Dickens) and Jim Gilpin (Patrick Fugit) on the scene. The clues start to pile up, with Nick looking like he might have had something to do with Amy’s disappearance, while flashbacks shed some light on where the marital strains started. With the likes of TV personality Ellen Abbott pointing her finger at Nick, eventually he is forced to bring in the help of attorney Tanner Bolt (Tyler Perry) to sort through the red herrings and find Amy.

The best way to describe the tone of Fincher’s Gone Girl is to say it’s like casting a soap opera with fantastic actors and cranking the insanity up to 11. Chock full of horrible characters, the movie may make it hard to root for anyone, so the best thing to do is to sit back and bask in the audacity of it all. Flynn adapts her own novel better than anyone else could — infusing the aforementioned sense of humor. Let’s just say sometimes bat-shit-crazy characters are far more interesting on film than in a novel, and they are something Fincher is very well known for. His usual directing style comes in handy, shrouding the characters in mystery and never flinching when things start to get really twisted. And the score by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross keeps an underlying menace throughout.

Affleck and Pike bring their A game, with Affleck in particular giving one of his best performances. I also wouldn’t be surprised if an Oscar nomination is in the cards for Pike, or possibly Flynn for bettering her book. As for Affleck, he’s perfectly cast as someone whose face you wouldn’t mind punching, and there are even some fun jabs made at his expense — especially his chin.
The supporting characters shine, with Coon, Dickens, and Perry never getting lost in the shuffle. I was weary of Perry, seeing how he’s been so dreadful in literally everything he’s ever been in before this, but he gets some huge laughs.

At two and a half hours, the film could have been too long, but Gone Girl is never, ever boring and keeps the audience on their toes the entire time. Gone Girl is not just one of the year’s best thrillers, but one 2014’s best films, period – absolutely do-not-miss entertainment.

Photos courtesy Twentieth Century Fox

DVD Review: ‘The Paranormal Diaries: Clophill’

Movie: *** out of 5
Extras: *** 1/2

Article first published as DVD Review: ‘The Paranormal Diaries: Clophill’ on Blogcritics.

Believe it or not, there’s still a tiny bit of life left in the found footage genre. The key is to present them in a documentary style instead of just having a bunch of obnoxious characters run around with cameras. Directors Michael Bartlett and Kevin Gates (who also supplied the story and screenplay) set their sights on a real location known for supernatural activity.

The Paranormal Diaries: Clophill may be an awful title, but for at least the first hour, the “investigation” into the creepy shenanigans of the St. Mary’s Church in the village of Clophill, England, plays out like one of the better ghost hunting shows found on cable. Does it hold its own up to the credits? You can find out on DVD September 30 from Image Entertainment.

A documentary crew, led by documentary coordinator Craig (Craig Stovin) and interviewer Criselda (Criselda Cabitac), set off to shed some light on the spooky happenings surrounding the dilapidating church in Clophill. Along for the filming is the director Kevin (Gates), co-producer Mike (Bartlett), and cameraman Mark (Mark Jeavons).

They interview everyone they can find in Clophill: local residents, priests, incident witnesses, and former cult members. While searching the area, they come across what could be human bones, a horn, and a rotting bird carcass. It doesn’t take long before a ghost named Sofie starts trying to make contact, and of course an Ouija board comes into play before all hell tries to break loose.

For a good portion of the film, Clophill feels like a true documentary. Bartlett and Gates treat their subject with authenticity and had they trimmed the proceedings down to the standard 42-minute runtime of a TV special, the tension could have really proven itself. Unfortunately, there’s plenty of dead air, with characters standing around whispering and asking each other, “Did you hear that strange noise?” The ending even aims for a bit of Blair Witch meets The Last Exorcism action, which just means they had no idea how they wanted to end it. So it does just that, it ends abruptly.

The acting is above average for this kind of production, but dragged out to feature length, there just aren’t enough thrills to keep your interest piqued. It’s funny to mention that Clophill is too long when there’s 22 minutes worth of deleted scenes. However, the two audio commentaries are more interesting, consisting of one with cast members Stovin, Cabitac, and Gates, and the second featuring solely Gates. There is a good movie hidden within The Paranormal Diaries: Clophill, but when it comes to the month of October, we expect more from our horror movies. Keep expectations low and you might find some entertainment — especially if you watch late at night or with the lights off.

DVD Review: ‘The Calling’

Movie: *** 1/2
Extras: ***

Article first published as DVD Review: ‘The Calling’ (2014) on Blogcritics.

Many movies you’ve never heard of wind up taking up space on video shelves every week. Most of these direct-to-video releases aren’t very good. Once in a while, one manages to slip through the cracks and surprise everyone. This week’s better-than-average thriller is The Calling. It even features a couple of Oscar winners: Susan Sarandon and Ellen Burstyn—not to mention a cameo from Donald Sutherland.

The most surprising aspect however comes in the form of director Jason Stone. You’d never expect the man behind the original short film Jay & Seth vs. the Apocalypse—which was then expanded into This Is the End—to deliver a brooding, slow-burning, faith-based police procedural. But Sony Pictures Home Entertainment is making sure you can catch it on DVD.

Detective Hazel Micallef (Sarandon) likes her town quiet. It makes her liking for pain pills and alcohol go down smoother. She lives with her mom (Burstyn) and doesn’t mind being behind the times to the point of not even owning a cell phone. (It’s still sitting on her desk in the box.) One morning she’s sent to check on someone’s elderly mother to find the mother in the living room, half-decapitated.

After another body is found a few days later, Hazel is convinced she has a serial killer on her hands, but the higher powers won’t listen. After a drifter blows into town and a newly transferred Toronto officer shows up (Topher Grace), Hazel must pool together her instincts to stop the killer before he strikes again, completing his 12 willing sacrifices.

Atmosphere and mood define The Calling, something highly lacking from a glutton of run-of-the-mill thrillers these days. Most simply want to focus their attention on the brutality of the kills and try to one-up each other on the gore factor. Screenwriter Scott Abramovitch adapts Inger Ash Wolfe’s novel with a new plot structure. He focused more on Hazel’s own demons than the Dr. Kevorkian aspirations of the killer—something they discuss in the DVD’s only spoiler-saturated special feature: “Divine Intention: Making The Calling” (15:51). Do not watch this before the actual film.

The cast helps give the film a professional air, lending the appropriate independent spirit. The Calling makes no bones about its killer, so don’t expect a barrage of red herrings. The Calling isn’t a great thriller, but a decent thriller is always a good thing when picking through new Redbox releases. Definitely worth at least a rental on an autumn afternoon.

Movie Review: ‘The Equalizer’

**** 1/2 out of 5
131 minutes
Rated R for strong bloody violence and language throughout, including some sexual references
Columbia Pictures

Article first published as Movie Review: ‘The Equalizer’ (2014) on Blogcritics.

It’s sad when I have to say that one of the best films I saw in August didn’t even open until this weekend. But alas, director Antoine Fuqua and Denzel Washington have reunited to deliver one of the best TV-to-film adaptations with The Equalizer. When I saw the trailer, I was not impressed. It looked like another run of the mill thriller, with a convoluted sounding plot and nothing to distinguish itself outside the names of Fuqua and Denzel. Thankfully, The Equalizer is a big ol’ blast of badass that audiences are in dire need of.

Robert McCall (Washington) lives a quiet life in Boston. His apartment is bare bones and he works at the local home improvement store where he helps encourage his co-worker Ralphie (Johnny Skourtis) to lose weight in order to get the security job at work. Robert spends his nights with insomnia, watching the hours pass by at a local diner reading books and waxing philosophical with a teenage escort named Teri (Chloe Grace Moretz). When Teri ends up in the hospital, Robert goes to make a deal with her pimp Slavi (David Meunier) and is left with no other choice but to kill everyone. Now, Robert has triggered a war against the Russian mob with their number one fixer, Teddy (Marton Csokas), trying to find out who Robert really is, find him, and kill him.

Perhaps the biggest surprise about The Equalizer is its attention to character. Fuqua’s restrained direction helps build tension as we get to know Robert and actually care for his survival. That’s something most action films rarely see these days with shoot-first-character-second attitude. Fuqua has also surrounded Washington with some great costars—Bill Pullman and Melissa Leo as friends from his former life. Leo is no stranger to the Equalizer’s world having guest starred on the original series. It’s also a reunion for Leo and Fuqua as she appeared in Olympus Has Fallen.

Screenwriter Richard Wenk never comes right out and divulges McCall’s past, but it becomes pretty clear as the film rolls on—especially during the big finale. Let’s just say, never play Home Alone with a trained killer in a Home Depot-type store. This whole sequence could also be looked at as a brilliant send-up of his early days directing Black & Decker commercials. Washington continues to get more badass with each film, showing no signs of slowing down. And while they may not be aiming for the Academy Awards again—back when Washington won for Training Day— the two of them work so well together, I welcome any sequel they have to offer. That’s something which is set up in the last scene. The Equalizer is one of the year’s best thrillers.

Photo courtesy Columbia Pictures