House of Bones

House of Bones isn't terrible. That might usually be the best thing I can say about it, but the writers and director do deserve a little credit. The direction is competent and the cinematography is actually impressive for a straight-to-TV feature (meaning it doesn't look like crap or made rushed or hyper-stylized or tinted or whatever). And the script has a few legitimately funny lines of dialog between the baffled crew members on the reality TV show about to film an episode on a haunted-HUNGRY house (must emphasize hungry as it needs to eat). And when it comes time to get to the gore and effects and some of the usual lot of chincy CGI, it's not half-bad. And yet the script does falter when it comes time to really get to internal logic, or to explaining things in exposition, or bringing on the stereotypical a-hole TV show host who comes in the last third of the movie for a lot of useless yammering until his fate comes clear.

But most depressing of all is seeing Charisma Carpenter here. She's never been a Shakespearean thespian or anything, but she's never needed to be. Featured on Buffy and Angel for many of their best seasons, she's always been a solid actress for those and other shows. But here she looks kind of bored and almost a little sad to be having the dubious pleasure of starring in a straight-to-SyFy channel movie. While her fate isn't quite as abysmal as her co-stars on those shows (Amber Benson in Gryphon and Nicholas Brendon in Fire Serpent), it's no great shakes for her character, a psychic and ghost-talker of some kind who should be leaving the house the moment she starts coughing up blood, but stays on for the good (or bad) of those around her in this crazy old piece of property. She doesn't bring the film down, but it's hard for her to do anything to bring up the standard at best so-so at worst stupid and laughable piece of horror drek before her.

While not actually scary, House of Bones does succeed in giving the audience the impression the house is haunted. I've seen haunted house films before where it wasn't convincing that people couldn't just leave.

Even compared to other films syfy commissioned, the cast's pretty small and there aren't many throwaway characters introduced for body count purposes. The pacing is pretty good actually as one character is taken by the house early leaving the others first confused and later unwilling to leave (assuming the house would even let them).

Incidentally there's also less use of CGI than most syfy-commissioned films. The only real problem with "House of Bones" is its anti-climatic ending.

I would simply suggest watching this movie for what it is, a simple low budget horror movie. Everything in this is just correct... not bad or not that good. The story is pretty much classic , a haunted house, but they had a few thing to make it goes out of the ordinary. Special Effects are neither awesome but not bad at all, they are lets say believable. Actors where average at best but you are not watching an horror movie for its acting right? Charisma Carpenter should had less clothes on but well... lol. Seriously i enjoyed this little movie on a late night, it won't remain burned in my head for long, but it was entertaining on the moment.

TV ghost hunters investigate a haunted house, but unlike their previous episodes this one is for real. A former plantation home, the house is alive and has a taste for human blood! Well for a start this thankfully didn't jump on the paranormal activity found footage bandwagon, a very popular - and often annoying - sub genre at the time. Made for TV this movie is at times cheesy and a bit cheap looking, but it does also manage a few decent scares and has some good gore scenes. The acting was OK but the ending wasn't very convincing. Overall this film was an adequate watch, I have sat through many far worse ghost movies than this. Worth 86 minutes if your time.

To be honest, I was expecting House of Bones to be really bad. But actually, while heavily flawed it is not as bad as other SyFy movies. It is competently made, with decent editing and atmospheric lighting. Effects are kept at minimal and while nothing great when they are there they are much better than those in other SyFy efforts, not as fake-looking. Apart from an irritating performance from Corin Nemec and a disengaged Charisma Carpenter, the acting is about average, with nobody bad but also nobody standing out. The house is well-used and quite creepy, and the well-house twist was pretty nice. However, the sound effects and such are rather obvious sometimes, and the film is further brought down by a cheesy script, really obnoxious and stereotypical characters(especially the TV host), a story that while not dull is predictable, implausible(this may have been avoided if some of the ideas took slower to unfold) and completely let down by a suspense-less, downbeat and utterly ridiculous final third and too many scenes that are rather tame in alternative to unsettling. All in all, better than expected but nothing all that special at the end of the day. 4/10 Bethany Cox