La Voûte

Having liked James Franco in other things, liking horror and thriller and being intrigued by the premise (bank heist films are not new in film or television, a very tried and tested formula, but a bank heist with a twist intrigued a lot), 'The Vault' had enough to make me want to see it. It had enough ingredients for it to be a good film, but in the end it ends up being just a lacklustre one with salvageable elements.

'The Vault' starts off very promisingly with an energetic and tension-filled opening that is easily the best thing about the film. Wasn't that impressed by the acting on the whole, but Franco gives it his all and is not bad at all. In fact, while it is a long way from being among his best performances, he is pretty good and convincing and actually looks like he's trying.

Generally the production values could have been better, but the sets are suitably creepy and the atmospheric lighting accentuates the creepiness further.

Sadly, 'The Vault' is lacking everywhere else. Taryn Manning and Francesca Eastwood don't have the screen presence to intimidate even a cat, marionettes have more animation than Manning who doesn't seem to try to act and Eastwood tries too hard. The rest of the cast struggle to do anything with characters that are basically just ciphers with nothing developed or distinct. The script tends to be very flabby with an air of smugness, while most of the film is clumsily directed in a way that's far too calculated.

Despite a great opening, 'The Vault' goes downhill quickly with momentum petering out far too early, meaning that a lot of the film limps along. The thriller elements lack suspense and can be implausible, implausibility turning into complete ridiculousness at the end, while the horror side fails to deliver on the scares, being too over-familiar, tension-lacking and the slow-burning taken to extremes. The film is really dull by this point and one is past caring what happens in the film or to anybody because the characters are so thinly sketched, make illogical decisions and mostly unconvincingly acted.

Just for the record, really liked that there was more than one genre. It was just the way it was executed, it was too much of a mishmash and the whole thing becomes disjointed.

Sets and lighting aside, the production values scream of straight-to-DVD quality with particularly slapdash editing. The music and sound editing can be overbearingly loud at points.

In summary, a strange lacklustre film that is not bad enough to keep buried in the vault but not good enough to warrant a permanent unlocking. 4/10 Bethany Cox

I think anything under a 5 is unfair as it's watchable. The acting is pretty decent the story is fine, but ultimately it's drags on too long for it's gimmick. It's not particularly interesting and you can guess the "twist" about 5 minutes into the movie. In fact if were being honest they literally tell you whats going to happen. It's weird that they do that. I'm not kidding. You'll see it and groan. The idea is intriguing enough that you A. hope that they would be stupid enough to give the plot and thats its a red herring or B. Just go with it and enjoy it for what it is. The movie doesn't look cheap so that's a plus. I tried to watch some other low rent horror just before this called berkshire county. The cinematography in the first 5 minutes was so bad and lazy I couldn't be bothered to battle through it. This looks solid and they have 3 or 4 journeyman actors holding this up around the edges. Im like 90 percent I've seen an extremely similar concept on twilight zone or tales from the crypt. However in those cases it was a tight 40-45 minute story. This film is..tiresome. So thats my advise. If you can handle a low-medium rent episode of TFTC stretched out maybe 30 minutes too long this is fine. I didn't hate it, but I got bored more than a few times and checked apps on my phone during it.

Pretty much everything about this movie was average or below average. At no point was i surprised or feeling the supposed suspense, which was a joke for anyone who has watched more than a handful of horror flicks in their life.

The premise was somewhat promising, but the potential got completely wrecked when the main antagonists were revealed, the movie turned from a promising and suspensful bank heist/hostage thriller flick into a laughable and childish monster story with no relevance in just a matter of seconds, well they tried to justify it, but nothing great came out of it as you are simply unable to take the actions seriously after that.

Overall nothing new or exciting, not worth watching, not the worst movie ever, by no means, but nothing you would like to invest your precious time in!

This is better than the rating, at the time of writing, of 4.7. This has hair-on-end horror not the standard jump-scares, with a touch of gore and suspense to boot. Something about it reminded me of "The Usual Suspects" and "Assault on Precinct 13" and now I have said that you will see it too! Really only commenting as 4.7 seems waay too low. Hardly a deep movie but a good movie. As I have hinted it is derivative but nevertheless entertaining with a charismatic cast and camera-work, lighting and action worthy of classic Hollywood fare. I know people will knock this review simply for me saying this is what Hollywood does best but I think Cannes would like this, even.

When starting The Vault up I had an overwhelming feeling of deja-vu, I felt like I'd seen it before but not because of a lack of originality more that I watched the trailer months ago and it left a lasting impression on me.

Telling the story of a bank robbery that gets complicated when the robbers discover that the vault is haunted it's a neat little tale (In theory) with a fascinating highly original concept. I was so excited to see where this would go, what a brilliant idea I thought.

Sadly despite having a great concept they really didn't think it through and certainly had no endgame. The potential is squandered to a painful extent, what an absolute heartbreaking shame.

Starring James Franco and a host of oddly competent folk including the excellent Francesca Eastwood (Who looks alarmingly like Amanda Seyfried) the film manages to look good but offers little else.

The concept is wasted, the antagonists are lackluster and the protagonists are quite frankly non-existent!

I wanted to like The Vault, I simply couldn't. It's a demonstration on how to drop the ball.

The Good:

Cast deliver

Very interesting premise

The Bad:

Concept feels wasted

Stock screams

No protagonists