Reviews

Whether or not you will like this film depends on how appealing the title of this review is to you.

It's a real mash up containing many, many tried and tested horror elements woven together well. Super derivative. What it does, it does very well... but there is nothing here you haven't seen before.

The cinematography is great. Super atmospheric and a lot of interesting stuff going on at the same time.

It fell a little flat for me because it was SO derivative, but a lot of people will love it. If I had never seen a horror film before, I would probably have given it 9/10. But I've seen lots of them so the lack of anything new made it a 5/10 experience for me. Still, it's free on Shudder so worth a watch.

Why did I bother? Why did they bother? Who gave them the money to make it?

The plot is meant to be original but it's kind of a derivative of loads of other movies: the purge, hunger games and all its copycats, logan's run. When I say other movies, I mean other much better movies. Even the bad hunger games copycats. The political statement they were trying to make was juvenile at best.

The acting was not good. All the actors barely bothered to dial it in.

The trailer was ten times better than the film. Kudos to whoever made the trailer!

Avoid.

Somehow I missed this when it was released, until I randomly saw it on Amazon today and gave it a watch. Which was lucky, as it's a film not to be missed.

Shades of The Sixth Sense, shades of The Machinist, a brooding atmosphere, Hitchcockian twists and turns and a star performance from Adrian Brody. Just superb.

It doesn't do anything massively original, but what it does... it does with an assured hand and it's totally engrossing. One of those slow burn films that grabs your attention and never lets go, with a pay off that delivers.

I was shouting at the screen at the end, always a good sign. Unless you're watching it on the bus, obviously.

I rewatched this after being reminded of it by a similar Brit crime-horror that just got released. It's even better than I remembered.

A down on his luck hit man with a troubled past (don't they all? Kinda goes with the job!) gets an offer he can't refuse to rub out a series of characters. The trail spirals into craziness as he realises that he is tied up in some sort of supernatural plot in which he isn't just the instrument of death, he is something much more fundamental...

The best thing about this film was the tone. It was gritty and realistic yet weirdly off balance and surreal right from the start. It was absolutely compelling.

The acting was on point. Ben Wheatley regular Michael Smiley is always great, but Neil Maskell as the brutal yet human lead character injected this bizarre pathos into things, even as he kicked people to death, which stole the show. He was a bad guy, but a bad guy with heart.

The plot was surprising and twisty. On first watch it was completely "WTF", but when I watched it again -knowing where it was going- then lots of little clues all made more sense.

Disturbing, and very hard to watch, but a GREAT horror movie.

A rookie female detective cracks under the pressure of dealing with a constant stream of misogyny from her douchey colleagues while hunting an occultist serial killer who turns his supernatural(?) powers against her. I enjoyed this.

The good

Like the other Brit film Kill List from a few years ago, there is a weird, gritty-yet-off-kilter vibe running all the way through this. Like David Lynch directed an episode of Cops, but in England. I liked.

Sarah Beck Mather is just superb as the lead. One of the best female horror leads in a while. In the first scenes she looked as bitchy as the men, but you soon see that this is a shield she puts up and she's already close to cracking.

The bad

Pacing problem. The first part was very slow and the gloriously fun last part seemed rushed. If they took 10 minutes from the start and added 10 to the end then the movie might have been outstandingly good.

The ugly

After using some really effective practical effects for most of the run time, the last minute was full of schlocky low budget horror CGI.

Overall. Not quite as good as Kill List, but still pretty good and well worth your time.

If you haven't seen this film then watch it now.

A kind of zombie virus that turns people into insane monsters who want to bite their way inside people to hide, all unfolding in real time from to point of view of an alcoholic radio DJ live on air locked in his studio and not sure whether the callers and news feeds are playing a cruel trick on him... or if he is the one going insane.

Stephen McHattie is absolutely, absolutely mesmerising. He was born to play this role.

Only 8/10 because after a barn storming first two acts, the story wobbles a bit in the third and the resolution doesn't quite reach the same heights as the set up. Not that the third act is bad. Far from it. But the first two acts were pretty much a masterpiece.

I enjoyed the original Hell House, in the crowded shaky cam world of found footage it was pretty original (although The Houses October Built got there first) and genuinely creepy. I think it worked so well, in part, because it left a lot of things open and unexplained.

After much anticipation, the sequel was just disappointing. It took pains to tie up all the loose ends and create a mythology... and in doing so ended up towards the "hokey mess" end of the found footage spectrum.

The first had decent acting and believable characters, whereas this was just annoying. Also they tried too hard to justify the "why don't you stop filming?" found footage conundrum, in a way that appeared to land initially but if you thought about it for two seconds was just plain silly.

And the mythology they created was explained as going on and on into the future... which I expect is the film makers' plan for this franchise.

Overall, if you are an avid found footage fan then this is perfectly watchable. But if you were a big fan of the original as an a-typical found footage, then this will probably disappoint.

This was a weird one. The plot made no sense, as in character motivation, other than "psychopaths gonna psychopath". And the senseless plot took a long time to unroll. And I kind of agree with most of the specific negative points made by a lot of other reviewers on this page. But... I didn't hate it. The atmosphere, acting, cinematography were all on point and it had a strange compelling quality that convinced the viewer -or this one at least- to stay with it to the end. Not Saulnier's best film, despite obviously having a relatively large budget compared to the other two. In fact, his weakest. But not quite as bad as most of the reviews.

Acting: very good, throughout Cinematography: also very good Atmosphere: great, the historical and foreign setting set it apart from the outset, and the horror and fantastic elements were layered in with a skilful hand. Tension with some genuine scares. Story: great, unique. The war allegory and the cultural oppression all worked very well for me. Demerits: actually none really, one of my favourites of the year

Overall: highly recommended 9/10