Tales from Black Manor

Despite the fact of never even having heard about the 2025 horror movie "Tales from Black Manor", of course I had to sit down and watch it, as I had the opportunity to do so. And without ever having heard about it, I virtually had no idea what I was in for. So I suppose that directors Lexie Findarle Trivundza and Nick Trivundza had every opportunity to entertain and impress me.

From the movie's title, I assumed that this was most likely an anthology.

Granted, I haven't watched the series, so I literally didn't have a clue as to what to expect here.

While the stories weren't bad, I have to say that I felt that the narratives were forced and rushed. It felt like directors Lexie Findarle Trivundza and Nick Trivundza were in too much of a hurry to get through each story and onto the next one. And that left me with a sensation of unfulfillment, as if there was so much left to be explored and brought to the screen in each story.

The narratives are slow paced, and I had to check how long was left at some point, as it felt like I had sat through two hours of the movie, at my surprise I was only halfway through. So the movie struggles with its pacing, making it quite a task to sit through.

I was not familiar with a single actor or actress on the cast list, and that is actually something I do enjoy whenever I sit down and watch a movie. So that was something that spoke in favor of the movie. The acting performances were good.

The production in "Tales from Black Manor" is good, it looks and feels atmospheric and dark. And I really liked that, because it added a lot to the overall impression of the different stories.

In overall, then "Tales from Black Manor" felt disjointed and erratic. Watchable, for sure, but hardly an outstanding or memorable viewing experience. However, after having struggled to sit through a very prolonged 91 minutes runtime, I can honestly say that this is hardly something I will return to watch a second time.

My rating of the 2025 movie "Tales from Black Manor" lands on a four out of ten stars.

This is the question I asked myself the entire run of the movie (which I didn't manage to finish).

It's an anthology of interconnected stories that look visually stunning but are honestly uninspired. After the 5th story more or less it became unbearably boring and I called it quits.

If I had to name something I liked other than the looks, I'd say it's the idea of several personified deaths, but sadly it wasn't really explored in the movie.

If you have time to watch a film I'd recommend using that time to watch something better.

Filled with plotholes, but that could be forgiven if it wasn't so goddamn boring.

Every vignette has the same formatting. Random time frame, random 'old' sounding name, anachronistic dialogue, voiceover monologue from some emo member of the house of black and what they feel about death, explanation that they obviously did what every other single character before them obviously did, all while moving at a snail's pace with footage that attempts to hide poor writing with pretty forest shots, the end. Don't believe me? Go ahead, go sit through what felt like was the eternities these brats have been alive and watch it.

There's no spoiling this movie either. It's the exact same story again, and again, and again. There's a mid-credits scene, but it seems like no one told this husband/wife or brother/sister duo what a 'scene' is (psst, it's usually under a minute for these things!), because it's another damn poorly written sloppy mess hidden under some vaguely expensive looking shots and poor cgi. Oh, and the whole meaning behind this 'scene' includes a glaring plothole, but i'm most people wouldn't have noticed anyway, as they would be deeply asleep by now, so i wouldn't worry about it too much.

Oh, and to top it off, the audience can tell when you use a.i. Images in your movie. Notably in the little snapshots before the mid-credits 'scene'. That's not what a spider looks like, that's not what cobwebs look like, or flowers, or owls, or paintings, or anything honestly! There's other points in the film when i was suspicious, but seeing this little series of poorly compiled images you could've taken yourself instead of spending what had to have been daddy's money on all those wide, slow, utterly pointless scenery shots. My god, have you people exhausted me of the forest. I don't even want to see a tree anymore, it'll remind me of this.

Not even to mention the entire 'trivia' for this movie is twenty repetitive entries CLEARLY written by either director/writer, or some friend of theirs who told them this was a good idea, because there's no way it came from anything but someone who sunk too much money into this to have it come out without a little buzz. But hey, spare yourself a trip to the trivia section, i've got it right here; "i heart sucking dick of nick + lexie, please let my emotional and financial investment mean something, and here's my exclusive fun fact, they made this movie after watching other movies! Wow!".

No exaggeration. I don't directly do reviews a lot, especially not little indie things i chose to watch of my own accord, but my god if you can afford one million lame shots of the same stupid forest and slow motion dirt falling, you can afford a little criticism.

I was trying to find something nice to say so here it is: hey, it's only 90 minutes!

Not even sure if this is a movie. I'll start with the positive. It's a good-looking picture. Shot well. Doesn't look cheap. Pleasing to the eyes.

But it's all a big nothing burger. It's not even an anthology. It's just a series of vignettes throughout time, based on a family that found a way to cheat death. Runs from the 1300s to the future. But each one is just voice-overs on top of way too much slow motion. And they're all the same. No real conflict. No real stakes. No one to root for. Not a damn reason to care. It's just dull.

I guess if there's any point to this movie, it's that living forever can get really boring. Almost as boring as this movie.