Neverknock

This is a film on a far from original theme, even though it owes nothing to the "Halloween" franchise. In 1986, some kids knock on the door of a house at Halloween, something they are not supposed to do. They are murdered, and the first police officer on the scene - who reappears later in the film - sees something unreal.

Fastforward 31 years, and it's Halloween again. This time, whatever was inside emerges to wreak its horrors on the wider world. Then our first responder rescues two of the damsels, telling them this sort of thing has been happening in other locations for a long time, going back to at least the 1940s. The key to the mystery is the door to the house. And this is where the film really begins to lose its way because this line of investigation is not developed, instead the guy is killed off.

There is a bit more to it, the creature, daemon or whatever it is, feeds off fear, producing custom-made hallucinations for its victims, hallucinations that pack a punch or even burn. This could have been a decent film but it takes too much for granted, and the ending is utterly predictable.

In 1986 Halloween, 3 trick-or-treaters are killed after knocking on the door of 59 Oakwood Lane. One is found with Never Never Knock carved into his belly. The case remains unsolved and the house becomes urban legend over the next 40 years. In present day, Leah (Jodelle Ferland) and her friends invite troubled Grace (Dominique Provost-Chalkley) to a haunted house show. Grace survived a car fire which killed her mother. She brings along little sister Jenna. The group decides to do the Never Knock. Jenna disobeys Grace and knocks on the door after bloodying her hand.

Daylight often kills horrors. That is the major drawback in this movie. It would help in the kills and especially the CGI monster. All the CGI looks cheap which is par for TV movies. The idea of a creature killing with your greatest fear is good. The creature design is feasible and should only come on the screen after day turns into night. The horror designs are simply not good enough. It needs more creepy atmosphere. Otherwise, it's functional as a lower grade horror. The filmmaking is inferior but passable as a TV movie.

The Scyfy Channel are infamous for their bad films but it's rare they do horror. History has shown they can actually pull it off and within the first 15 minutes of Neverknock I was oddly gripped.

The film was tense, the concept original and I expected this to turn out to be a surprisingly entertaining little gem.

Sadly the movie runs out of steam quite early on, as if they ran out of ideas. Alas this doesn't turn around and plods along to a laughable pitiful finale that I actually did facepalm at.

Don't get me wrong Neverknock has a lot going for it and is still perfectly watchable, it's just one of those films that should/could have been so much better.

Further to its credit it actually looks great and raises the question why more Scyfy originals don't have the same level of cgi and practical effects.

Starring former child star favourite Jodelle Ferland this is still worth your time but don't expect the greatness that it failed to attain.

The Good:

Original

Fairly decent kills

Good antagonist

The Bad:

Loses steam real quick

Incredibly dumb ending

Things I Learnt From This Movie:

I suddenly want to knock on that door just to see what I'm scared of

Decades after a horrific tragedy, a group of teens innocently partaking of a Halloween tradition release a ravenous creature in their small-town which begins feeding on their fears in order to kill them one-by-one and forces them to find a way to stop the creature's rampage.

This one here wasn't all that bad of an effort. One of the more prominent aspects of this one is the fact that this one really manages to incorporate a fine small-town feel throughout here. From the beginning with the crowded streets bustling with trick-or-treaters and seeing the decorations spread out here, it sets up the close-knit community very nicely while all the fine attractions and games that grounds this one nicely for its later set-up with the creature. Coming to life in the form of the superstitious ritual where the remote house is brought into play and the actions featured manage to give this the kind of charge which comes from this early setup as the idea that the creature needs to exploit your fears is woven nicely into the film as a whole. Those scenes here are where this one really works as the startling creepy ideas of their fears get exploited while in creepy locations, as the strong scenes in the haunted house where it features the fear of the lost sister and one characters' fear of blood to great effect in the darkened corridors of the house which gives this a strong and wholly stylish start to this. The later scenes here that take advantage of this factor, from the frantic search for her sister that includes the dizzying exploits in the corn maze to the scenes in the woods and finally them coming back into town where it shows how each one tends to let their fears get the better of them as they deal with the creature attacking them following an encounter. These offer up not only some rather fun action scenes here as the creature's constant activities bring about a thrilling pace while also giving this rather creepy moments. The other bit that works well here is the exceptional creature at the center of this one, which works so well here due to the idea of making this a real-life creature rather than a CGI creation as this blends into the scenes so well and adds an extra dimension to these scenes. Coupled with the fine gore featured, these here hold this one up rather nicely over it's few minor troublesome areas. The main sore point with this one is the fact that there's just way too much time spent in the first half of the group going around on the disappearance, tending to take up a little bit more time than would be expected in the corn-maze or out wandering the woods doing nothing but running in circles which is a bit redundant. As well, the final resolution to beat the monster is a bit weak and seems like a lame cheat to finally end it all which makes no sense and gives it a rather weak conclusion. Otherwise, there's a lot to like with this one.

Rated Unrated/R: Graphic Violence and Language.

So this is the typical teenage scream movie. Dominique Provost-Chalkley spent two hours screaming throughout the whole thing. For me, it got to be too much. I like her in Wynona Earp but not so much in this movie. The really disappointing thing was the cheesy monster I think they could have done better. Anyway, after about 20 minutes I was pretty sure how it would end.