The Houses October Built

The only reason I'm giving this a 2 is because of the interesting content that may or may not be real revolving around their interviews with haunted house workers. It's boring, predictable, and I think by now everyone with a clown phobia has made a decision to avoid movies like this, not flock to them.

For those of us looking for a thoughtful movie, a scary movie, a movie that you'll look back on the next day and go "Damn, that was good," this is not it. This is lazy, self-indulgent and drags across the screen like the corpse we never get dragged off camera but kind of wish we do, since nobody is the least bit likable. You sit through the end because you think, as with most FF movies, the slow build will pay off. It does not. If you think you can guess the ending, you're probably right, if you're over the age of eight. That's about as much worldly experience you need to call it.

You want to be scared sleepless? You want amazing writing and genius use of FF perspective? You want Hell House LLC. That movie kicks this house's butt, on so, so many levels.

I watched this thinking I'd get a least a similar thrill ride, and what I got was held hostage on a stupid RV for an hour and a half of my life. Oh, and hey, literally everyone involved with this movie? I also see there's a sequel who's trailer advertises any semblance of what you wanted us to believe about the ending—that right there kills your market for those who you wanted to leave hanging. You guys need to get off this ride before you dig your own grave.

Nevermind the actual film, the idea is one of the most potent I've seen in some time.

A group of friends set out in a van in search of horror, haunted house attractions scattered around rural America. It's the days leading up to Halloween so we can have a pervasive atmosphere of masks and monsters roaming the streets. I like that it's a glimpse outside the usual and tied to a larger fabric of make-believe.

The idea is that we'll venture into these houses where horror is supposed to be controlled around us, the work of fiction, only to discover more slippery boundaries of truth. This would touch at the very essence of horror, exploiting the same perturbations that move viewers in both the actual houses and film; see, we know it's not real, but what to do when your body tells you otherwise?

So nevermind that it's actors we see and scripted reactions. Some of the most potent footage here are from within these houses where we go in with a camera and a swirl of monsters lunges at us, staged but it comes alive. I'm guessing these are actual places that partnered with the filmmakers and this is what tantalized me going in; it would be at least in part an actual tour of that America that goes to pilgrimage in actual places.

They manage to bungle this for my taste, the part where fiction blurs and we go to something that comes alive in the moment of watching.

For one, they chose the "found footage" mode (silly name, largely the baggage of Blairwitch - it really means "someone is filming this now"). It's the most apt choice I've seen since Last Exorcism, but no one ever films a sense of place and passing time, a physical sense of journey; they waste it on lots of blathering around a camera so that it ends up feeling like an episode of cable TV. Indicative of the actual makers holding the camera I guess.

And then there's the ending. This is where the staged scenarios in these attractions don't cut it any more as the characters push for more and more "real" stuff. Lo, there's rumor of a secret place that you can only reach by invitation. But once there, it's the most obviously staged part of the film, the complete opposite of where we were meant to be viewing-wise.

So this is a miss, filmmakers with maybe the strongest idea of any of their peers this year but none of the tools of insight to cultivate it. They outline enough for me to imagine it in more intuitive hands so all in all I would have this over the next paranormal film.

Someone has gone out with the urge for horror in mind (and it's our very urge to inhabit illusion that made us build these houses), thinking he knows illusion from real, but it begins to spill outside, perturbing reality. From a certain point on, the apparitions become aware of someone watching, aware inside the fiction, so conspire to stage the real thing as a cosmic prank that shatters lives.

Watch The Funhouse, Hooper's film driven by the same instinct, a funhouse that extends from the actual place to haunt the whole film.

I've been using IMDB for over a decade and this is the first time I felt the need to leave a review. This film was boring start to finish. Not once did my heart race or was I ever remotely startled. Seriously, don't waste your time on this film. Found footage horror is my absolute favorite, and now I know why I've never even heard of this film until today, despite it being 6 years old.

This is not an entirely awful movie. I do think they could have done more with what the premise was supposed to be. There were about 5, maybe 6 times that I jumped in the movie, but it wasn't from the climax, at all... It was a tad bit gimmicky at times and when the actors were supposed to be "frightened" and "scared", they weren't good actors at all. All the other moments of the cast "acting" in between were alright though. They could've done a lot more than what they did, and made it a ton more scarier than what it was. I was disappointed with the ending as well.

I loved the plot of the movie and what I thought it was going to be, but ultimately I was let down.

I did enjoy going through the different haunted houses with the cast, but that was about all I enjoyed out of this movie. If you like haunted houses, and don't mind cheesy acting here and there, give this movie a go. If you're looking for something entirely inventive and scary, this movie is not that.

If you go into watching this movie with low expectations, you'll probably be more satisfied than me.

Set up as a "real footage" amateur documentary, a group of friends set off to find real scares on Halloween. They encounter various run of the mill "haunted" attractions and begin to inquire with the locals if they know of any "really scary" happenings in the area but are pretty much rebuffed. The build up in this movie is slow, but if you stay with it, the atmosphere will seep into you. Once the group gives up their search as fruitless, things begin to change, and the "real scary" things start to find them. I guess I am a sucker for silent, masked, boogeymen because they were effective in my book. May not be for everyone but I was glad I gave it a watch.