belladonna2054 Blog

Under discussion:

An American Haunting  (2006)

Being from Virginia, the legend of the Bell Witch is not unknown to me.  Her story is interesting for the simple fact that not only is she the only supernatural being to have murdered a human, but that the president of that time actually visited the site, after hearing the stories of what happened, and was frightened. 

When the film came out I was a bit skeptical because when films are made based on real life events, they don't always picture it correctly.  Unfortunately this was the case here.

The film is set going back and forth between two different settings, the present and the early 1800s.  The present finds a young girl in her teens alone in house in which her mother bought after her parents had seperated.  Unfortunately for the girl, the house was built on the former Bell family land. 

The movie then goes back and forth between times and quickly gather that the Bell Witch is now tormenting the present day girl.  However the reason given as to why the Bell Witch has been tormenting both girls is troublesome: that both girls' fathers are sexually abusing them.

The reason does not make sense nor does it make a connection between the time jumps.  It was poorly done and was done at the waste of great talented actors Donald Sutherland and Sissy Spacek.

Under discussion:

Alien vs. Predator  (2004)

Alien Vs Predator is based on two of the most popular sci-fi/horror franchases in the history of film.  Fans of both series, in both film, book and comic book culture, were very much looking forward to a film being made involving these legendary characters.  Finally Paul W. S. Anderson made such one.

 And it sucked.

Background on the film: The movie takes place in Antartica in the present day.  A heat source has been discovered by Weyland Industries (which is commonly referred to as 'The Company' in the Alien films) which ends up being an ancient.  In a race against other companies looking to discover what this is, Bishop Weyland compiles a team of explorers, researchers and cave divers. 

When they begin exploring the pyramid they discovered several cultures developed it (Egyptian, Incan, etc).  Suddenlly one of the team members inadvertanly sets off the pyramid to begin the process that has been done every few hundred years: the breeding of Aliens so the Predators can fight them and therefore, prove themselves to be true warriors.  From there it all goes downhill.

It wasn't so much so that script or story sucked.  It was the fact that this movie was degraded down to a PG-13 rating.  When both franchises have always been rated R.  Because of this degrading it has affected the plot and much of the action sequences of the film in order to advertise it to younger audiences. 

What also affected this film is that Anderson even went out of his way to mess with the design of the reputed adversaries themselves.  The Predators looked like oversized, steroid-laced things.  Which in watching the film, you can obviously tell that the actors that wore these costumes had a hard time walking, much less running and fighting.    The Aliens, which were based on the artwork of H. R. Giger, were made too bulky.  They were supposed to be fluid in their movement as they have in previous films.  But like their Predator counterparts, they can hardly move. 

The ending is an obvious hint that a sequel will be made - and was - and thankfully was done in a much better fashion than what Anderson did.    

Under discussion:

Are You in the House Alone?  (1978)

Are You Alone In The House?  Is a late 1970s film about a girl who has a secret admirer turned stalker.  The acting is pretty good for a tv movie.  In reality it does feel like one of ABC's After School Specials. 

It delves into an interesting topic that was not really discussed nor studied (outside a horror movie aspect) with teenagers at that time: stalking and date rape.  You can see how society viewed it at the time if a female student should make complaints.

Kathleen Beller does a good job protraying the student that is a victim of this and Dennis Quaid, in one of his starting roles, as the rich student/psycho that is actually believable. 

If you want to see how early stalker thrillers started out.  Then I would recommend this film.