Day: September 4, 2015

Mini-Review: Hayride

Posted on by bernardovillela

Introduction

This is a post that is a repurposing of an old-school Mini-Review Round-Up post. As stated here I am essentially done with running multi-film review posts. Each film deserves its own review. Therefore I will repost, and at times add to, old reviews periodically. Enjoy!

Hayride

About the only thing Hayride does in something akin to a proper fashion is create a legend. However, that legend is lodged a bit too deep into the story, nearly usurped by others and leads up to quite a clunker of a climax.

The film spends a bit of time with its characters, which is fine as an isolated fact, but it’s less desirable when they are so simply drawn and so unconvincingly interpreted. There is a supposed hayride attraction that is incredibly poorly staged in both filmic and hayride terms. Lastly, there is the open ending which is not only expected but is quite nearly an anti-jolt. There are very small patches that show promise, but overall it’s quite a wasted effort.


2/10

Mini-Review: House of Bodies

Posted on by bernardovillela

House of Bodies

If you’ve ever wanted to see a feature that legitimately ought not be due to the fact that it’s essentially an under-edited short then this film is for you. There are two main parallel sequences that are drawn out: the former home of a mass-murderer that’s now the home base of a porno site, and a police interrogation room with said killer. The interrogation feels like it will be a springboard for early escalating events instead they lead to an anti-climactic discovery at the very end. I viewed this on Netflix and the story developed in the synopsis, which sounds like merely an inciting incident also takes too long to occur. Forget that the character who is the subject of the synopsis is non-existent for a quite a few minutes. The bottom line is there’s not enough story and while the running time is short the pace is glacial. I don’t know why Terrence Howard, Peter Fonda and Queen Latifah are in any way involved in this film, but they are and that’s unfortunate as there’s nothing they can do to save this hopelessly cockeyed in structure, scarcely flinching tale.

I was “glad” to learn when searching for photos that the director has publicly Tweeted that the finished version of the film is something he does not recognize. I’m sad to hear that’s happened, however, it doesn’t alter the fact that the film as it exists it nightmarish.

1/10