Viral, the third movie in the V/H/S horror series, is far from perfect, the framing narrative that connects the separate stories being incredibly hard to fathom, and the film's collective of directors taking great liberties with their format, frequently using footage taken from impossible angles and unlikely sources that serve to undermine the sense of realism so important to the genre. Stylised editing techniques further hamper the credibility of the found footage (this being most notable in the final story).
However, despite these issues, V/H/S/Viral still manages to be quite a bit of fun as a whole, with a trio of inventive tales amidst the chaos of messy wraparound story Vicious Circles from director Marcel Sarmiento, in which a young man on a bike gives chase to the renegade ice cream truck that has abducted his girlfriend while viral videos warp the minds of people in his neighbourhood (!?!).
The first of the separate stories, Dante The Great, is directed by Gregg Bishop (Dance of the Dead) and stars Justin Welborn as famous illusionist Dante, who owes his success to a supernatural cloak rumoured to have once belonged to Harry Houdini. The only problem is that, in exchange for his magical powers, Dante must feed the cloak human victims, and the mysterious disappearance of several of his assistants doesn't escape the attention of the police for very long. Admittedly this story is extremely silly but it is hugely entertaining, with lots of impressive visual effects and a few spots of splattery gore (a person's abdomen being magically opened up to reveal bloody ribs and innards being the best moment). Oh, and there's a great jolt to be had right at the end.
Next up is Nacho Vigalondo's Parallel Monsters, my favourite segment of the whole film, which sees a scientist opening a door to a parallel dimension where he meets his doppelganger. The two excited scientists agree to swap realities for 15 minutes but soon discover some startling differences between their two worlds. An absolutely demented but not very scary story that delivers toothy wangs and giant vagina dentata, this one gives Cronenberg a run for his money in the weirdness stakes.
The third tale, Bonestorm, directed by Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead, is little more than an excuse to pit a bunch of Larry Clark-style teenage slackers against the undead, using their skateboards as weapons. The story makes very little sense, and the only jumps on offer are of the skateboard variety, but the excess of Evil Dead-style splat-stick proves entertaining enough to excuse the lack of a decent narrative or shocks. This one uses a video camera and several GoPro cameras to capture the action, but ignores all the rules of the found footage genre by utilising fancy editing gimmicks including freeze frame and DePalma style split screen.
Marcel Sarmiento wraps up proceedings by concluding Vicious Circles in a muddled fashion that will leave viewers none the wiser about his intended message (if, indeed, there was one).
6.5 out of 10, rounded up to 7 for the dog with the barbecue fork stuck in his head.
However, despite these issues, V/H/S/Viral still manages to be quite a bit of fun as a whole, with a trio of inventive tales amidst the chaos of messy wraparound story Vicious Circles from director Marcel Sarmiento, in which a young man on a bike gives chase to the renegade ice cream truck that has abducted his girlfriend while viral videos warp the minds of people in his neighbourhood (!?!).
The first of the separate stories, Dante The Great, is directed by Gregg Bishop (Dance of the Dead) and stars Justin Welborn as famous illusionist Dante, who owes his success to a supernatural cloak rumoured to have once belonged to Harry Houdini. The only problem is that, in exchange for his magical powers, Dante must feed the cloak human victims, and the mysterious disappearance of several of his assistants doesn't escape the attention of the police for very long. Admittedly this story is extremely silly but it is hugely entertaining, with lots of impressive visual effects and a few spots of splattery gore (a person's abdomen being magically opened up to reveal bloody ribs and innards being the best moment). Oh, and there's a great jolt to be had right at the end.
Next up is Nacho Vigalondo's Parallel Monsters, my favourite segment of the whole film, which sees a scientist opening a door to a parallel dimension where he meets his doppelganger. The two excited scientists agree to swap realities for 15 minutes but soon discover some startling differences between their two worlds. An absolutely demented but not very scary story that delivers toothy wangs and giant vagina dentata, this one gives Cronenberg a run for his money in the weirdness stakes.
The third tale, Bonestorm, directed by Justin Benson and Aaron Moorhead, is little more than an excuse to pit a bunch of Larry Clark-style teenage slackers against the undead, using their skateboards as weapons. The story makes very little sense, and the only jumps on offer are of the skateboard variety, but the excess of Evil Dead-style splat-stick proves entertaining enough to excuse the lack of a decent narrative or shocks. This one uses a video camera and several GoPro cameras to capture the action, but ignores all the rules of the found footage genre by utilising fancy editing gimmicks including freeze frame and DePalma style split screen.
Marcel Sarmiento wraps up proceedings by concluding Vicious Circles in a muddled fashion that will leave viewers none the wiser about his intended message (if, indeed, there was one).
6.5 out of 10, rounded up to 7 for the dog with the barbecue fork stuck in his head.