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Demonic (2015)
Mediocre. Nothing more, nothing less.
So as we have all seen this is yet another haunted house movie, produced by James Wan and directed by Will Canon. It seems todays horror films are just following a trend with little to none of any other horror sub-genres that don't make it to direct-to-DVD. Hopefully with this new installment to the paranormal horror genre it will bring something fresh.
So onto the meat of the film this isn't a regular haunted house flick, it is a crime/mystery movie as well. Which actually makes it feels like an elongated X-Files episode with pretty predictable jump-scares. The scares will not surprise you very much even if you're caught off guard because you already know who will die in the film since the movie begins at the crime scene with the corpses lying around the house, so when it focuses on a side character you're already expecting the worst for them.
This is when the dialogue comes to play, the movies dialogue is split into the past and the present so there is lots of relaying and common detective talk tropes in the present time. Most of the conversations in the past is very basic and dry. Nothing far out or compelling most of the chatting seems like small talk with strangers coming from friends and everyone in the past just don't seem to care.
Then there's the character motives. John who's being plagued by nightmares of the haunted house decides to to do something about it, so he holds a séance with his girlfriend Michelle and friends who just happen to be paranormal investigators and including Michelle's ex-boyfriend for some reason even though he seems to have no experience with the paranormal. I can only think he was put there as to be predictable antagonist which is pointed out obviously. So they prepare for the séance and pretty much everyone gets their own scares, which aren't little enough to dismiss and when it get's worse they decide not to leave.
The biggest flaw. So as the movie suggests this isn't a haunted house, no it's a prison for demons. What do demons do? Possess. So as the movie goes on we find out that someone is possessed by a demon trying to kill Michelle, which is believed to be her ex boyfriend Bryan who's body is missing with Michelle's. So a couple of scenes later Bryan is found in a car accident & as soon as he wakes up he kills a cop and holes himself up in a gas station and doesn't comply with the cops until they give him a walkie talkie, where the other detective with John is speaking and he hears him and gives off a yell that seems to hurt John through the talkie. Cut to the ending and you find out that John was the demon this whole time.. So then why did the yell hurt John if it was just a yell? Truly the biggest flaw, very inexplicable.
Onto the acting it was decent all across the board, the major standout was Maria Bello who could play off a caring yet lawful psychiatrist considering she's top billed i'm not surprised. With Frank Grillo he did fair as the detective nothing horrible nothing great. Dustin Milligan was alright although some of his scenes when he cries didn't seem to suit him, but he pulled through. The other actors we're fine considering they're just death fodder, except Cody Horn's character seemed bland and didn't add much to care for her except that she's in possible danger.
So in the end this film adds little to the genre that hasn't been done before except for the ending which will probably halve the audience but isn't memorable enough to consider fresh or one-up other horror films. So the verdict is.. a mediocre film. that is a haunted house movie with bland dialogue, forgettable scares, bad character motivations, and a very nonsensical moment & with not much happening in the present but the past, just like this movie.
Deserving IMDb score: 5.5
Just watch X-files~
Sex Tape (2014)
Pointless.
Why would you even make a sex tape if you're just going to delete it later? Usually a thing like this would be kept as a memento or something. Also only rich white people would buy all their friends ipad 2's. With also very stale jokes already being thrown at us that cannot even get a smirk out of you or me for that matter. If you enjoyed this movie good for you, and your bad sense of humor. Already unbelievable, you'd expect more from four writers including Jason Segel who has read scripts before. I guess this was just for a quick buck (out of our pockets of course)and to not bring anything new or refreshing.
Praying they give this useless film and the actors Razzies. 1 out of 10.
Dawn of the Planet of the Apes (2014)
Plot holes. (contains spoilers)
As said above there are plot holes (and spoilers) that make the humans in this movie seem more like stupid apes then the apes themselves.
First plot hole which is necessarily just the story's fault is how exactly did the simian flu happen, i watched the first film where one character was infected and the main sign given when he possibly might have spread the flu was when he sneezed blood but most would know how to protect themselves from a flu that's spread that way. The only way it could infect so many is if it was a protean virus that could manipulate ways it infected, not a flu.
Second plot hole is how people seem to have forgotten that the apes ever existed, even though they were the cause of the flu and also what happened on the bridge. You would also think the government would take some action but it seems they just forgot about their existence, even though there were so many possible eye witnesses even James Francos character.
Third is how exactly could the world fall apart? I can understand the flu part to an extent but as to why it fell apart where everything that was working perfectly fine is not being put to use. Also considering that the woods where the apes live were the only place affected by the apes so it's not like they were in constant peril around the world to not be able to use everyday tools.
The the final big plot hole is in the end of the film when they find out that there are people "up north" coming to help as soon as they make contact with them. You'd think that people would stick together in a time like this, but later on it's explained that they are soldiers.. So why were they not sticking together the whole time? Why did they barely find out that they exist? It's even more confusing when you know they've had power the whole time enough to communicate with them via radio. Shouldn't they have united sooner?
I'm also tired of hearing people say to be in suspension of disbelief, because I watched Hocus Pocus a movie about witches were almost anything can go. Where a cat can get run over and be perfectly fine after wards but a zombie gets hit in the head an it falls off even though they are both under the same witches magic and have both been dead for years. LOL NO.
Well in the end the movie may have plot holes, but it isn't a bad movie, even though i think Keri Russel and Kodi Smit-McPhee's characters have no real reason to exist. Some of the apes are kinda hard to tell apart until you hear their names. Personally I don't think it's deserving of it's current rating of 8.5 or to place #152 in the top 250 films. But hey, when Jurassic Park has only the great effects for its time keeping it in the top 250 who am I to say that this can't right? :)
I rate it a 7.5 for good effort and decently executed film.