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dreamhomesre
Reviews
The Life Zone (2011)
Not a horror movie
I rented this movie cause the cover looked so cool. However it is just plain bad. The movie is nothing but pro-life propaganda. The sad thing is that the film would have been more effective in possibly persuading people if it told a story that moves its audience through story telling. Instead the characters literally debate the issue with the same tired arguments on both sides. And then they have "interviews" with people on the street and on TV. A perfect example would be when Tim Tebow & his mother made that commercial about how she refused to have an abortion when she was pregnant with him. It made you think without being preachy. The premise and even the twist at the end had the potential to move people to believe the message, if they're persuadable on the issue. Instead the film is unwatchable and will not convince anyone.
Found (2012)
This not horror so please take out the gory scenes and call it a drama
As a horror fan, I just don't agree with all the hoopla on this movie. The positives – 1) the main character Marty (Gavin Brown) does an incredible job. He completely carries the film on his young shoulders. 2) the special effects are really well done and gory beyond belief 3) film looks good (I don't believe the $8,000 budget for a moment). The so-so's – 1) everybody else's acting. I don't agree that the elder brother's acting was great. It was okay. I've definitely seen much worse in low budget films, but best actor? Sorry, no. Parents were hit or miss. All the other adults were just bad. The negative – the script. I think that what fails in this movie is that it is an adaptation of a novel and it feels like it. While in a novel you can have several themes happening at the same time because you'll have 400+ pages to deal with them all, in a script, you have to have one theme and stick to it. This movie dealt with several issues and as a result, it doesn't deal with any of them well. First, there is the issue of race. You hear the father saying the "n" word and you find out that the brother only kills black women, but other than that, there's no lesson to be learned on this issue. It's just a matter of fact, and it really bothered me that this was thrown in without much of a repercussion to either person who has these beliefs. In fact, even though the father and older brother hate each other, that's the one thing they seem to agree on.
Then, there's the issue of watching horror movies and whether that could turn somebody into a killer. Once again, you have 2 characters who share that in common, but while one is a serial killer, the other seems to be unaffected by it, even to the end.
Finally, there's the issue of bullying. I know this is a hot topic right now, but to call this an anti-bullying movie is completely wrong. The bullying has nothing to do with the actions that motivate the serial killer in this movie. It is just something that is happening to the main character and is the main focus of the movie, but has little to do with the serial killer brother which then becomes the back story to the movie rather than the main focus. I thought that once the older brother killed the main bully, that Marty will then start pointing out new targets for his brother but that never happened. Since Marty never goes back to school, we don't see what repercussions are to the fact that the brother killed the main bully. In fact, it's like it never happened. So really, the fact that Marty is being bullied has nothing to do with the rest of the movie.
Yet, most of the movie is about Marty being bullied. So, as a horror fan, I was bored waiting for something that could really be called horror to come up. This is a coming of age movie, with gory scenes added in just so that they can brand it as horror. In fact, the only really gory scene comes from a movie that Marty watches. Really? I need to watch a movie within a movie to see what constitutes horror? Why didn't they just have that be a video that the brother made of his own killings. Then, it would make sense why it's in there. Otherwise, it's just gratuitous and has no bearing on the story. And you can't say that it's there to show what inspired the older brother, cause we never see what he actually does to his victims. And apparently, the film has no effect whatsoever on Marty, since he doesn't turn into the monster that his brother is and begs for his parents' life.
There's also the issue of the narrator style. If this is a drama, the beginning makes sense. But if you're going to call this a horror movie, I don't want to be TOLD that the kid found a severed head. I want to SEE him finding the head and see his reaction! Once again, that feels like a book and not a horror movie. It was a wasted opportunity.
There are also huge plot holes in this movie. Marty says that he finds a new head o f a black woman in his brother's bowling bag every day. Not even the most famous serial killers have killed 365 people per year. And yet, while we hear the radio on a couple of occasions, we don't hear about a man hunt for a serial killer that seems to be targeting black women. There's an entire scene at a movie theater that does nothing to move the plot forward since the exact same conversation happens again elsewhere. So that just added 5 minutes to an already long and slow-paced movie. Detention for a kid that fights and flips off his teacher? I don't think so. That would require at least a suspension in any school. A guy who keeps the heads of his victims in his unlocked room where anyone can find it? Yeah, right! Parents who are one moment absolutely great and empathetic about their kids' plight after he's bullied, and the next moment, they're beating him up for standing up for himself. And Marty's friend seeing the head of the bully and then not telling anyone? Please! It's like nothing that happens in this movie has any effect on later events.
So this movie is neither truly horror nor truly a drama. Horror fans will be bored with the pacing, drama fans will be grossed out. For me, I'd prefer that they delete the gory scene in the middle and call this a drama with a gory ending.
The Awakened (2012)
Great story, kept me entertained.
I recently watched this film at a private screening. I thought it was really well done for the budget they had to work with. The five main actors had a great chemistry and the girls were very easy on the eyes. The story kept me very entertained and wondering what would happen next.
I've seen high budget movies with all types of special effects that you're looking at your watch. And most indie horror movies are so bad that you end up laughing. This had some very original themes, with the hurricane and the spiritual healing that I've never seen before,and I really cared about the characters and whether they lived or died.
For an independent, low-budget movie, I was very impressed and thankfully, entertained.