Paranormal Activity 2 (2010)

*There might be spoilers ahead....it's sort of hard to even start reviewing this movie without giving away a bit of the premise*

I'm a little late on this post, sorry!  I saw Paranormal Activity 2 this weekend, and I loved it, dammit.  Usually I have equal hatred for both hype and sequels, but I really think that the Paranormal Activity series is sort of a new animal in the horror universe.

Paranormal Activity 2 serves as sort of a prequel to Paranormal Activity.  So if you've seen any of the crazy Tweets or whatever about "OMG MICAH IS ALIVE!!11!!!" it's not anything about ghosts.  PA2 simply takes place mostly simultaneously with the events in PA.

In PA2, Kristi is Katie's sister.  Kristi and her husband Dan have a baby Hunter, who joins their family with their older daughter, Ali.  We follow the first months of Hunter's life and everything is fine and he is super-cute.  All is well until their house is suddenly vandalized.  However, all that is stolen is a necklace that was a gift from Katie to Kristi.

Fear causes the family to install cameras around the house for their security.  But in the meantime, their housekeeper/nanny, Martine suspects that something supernatural is afoot.  Dan fires Martine for burning incense and trying to rid the house of spirits.  Meanwhile, the violence in the house escalates as a supposed demon continues to terrorize the family.

I really did like this movie and I found it seriously creepy.  The end was especially scary and I loveddddd how everything was tied together.  I especially appreciate the explanation for why their whole family (including Katie) was being terrorized.  It was definitely not a cop-out.  And of course, they left it open for Paranormal Activity 3.  In fact, the whole story worked together so seamlessly, I wonder if they were planning to make all three in the first place...?

Personally, I thought that Paranormal Activity was scarier, but my husband thought that this one was.  So your thoughts might go either way.  But definitely check it out.

Movie News: Hatchet 2 gets pulled from US theaters

The largest release of an unrated movie in 25 years came to a screeching halt on Monday morning when AMC pulled Hatchet 2 from theaters.  We all know there was a ton of hype about this thing being unrated and in theaters.  Honestly, I couldn't figure out why the damn thing was deemed NC-17 anyway.  Sure, there was tons of blood and gore, but I think something like Hostel was way more disgusting.

Anyway, Adam Green will get to slap the "BANNED FROM THEATERS" onto the DVD and make more sales that way.  Dark Sky Productions is already planning on pushing it out to the masses ASAP, so everyone else will get to see it soon enough. 

Personally, I think it's kind of crazy that you can buy unrated DVDs and such right at Best Buy (and I don't believe they card you or anything) but you can't go to the movies and see an unrated flick.  The whole rating system is bizarre in my opinion.  But I am glad I got to see this before it got pulled.

Session 9 (2001)

I'm a bad horror fan, but I just did not like this movie.  I've heard a lot of hype about it, and it looked really promising.  But I just did not get it.

Session 9 is the story of an old mental hospital, which is being refurbished to house some city offices.  However, in order to do so, a bunch of dangerous asbestos has to be removed.  Being a government agency and all, they have to bring in different contractors to review the job and bid on it.

Enter Gordon (Peter Mullan) and his crew.  Gordon is really struggling at home.  His new baby is sick and he and his wife are not getting much rest.  He really needs this job in order to make ends meet, so he makes the guy a ridiculous offer.  They'll finish the job in a week....where other contractors were quoting 3-4 weeks.  His co-workers are none too happy about finishing this job in a hurry, but with a bonus in their sights, they press on.

The mental hospital is definitely a creepy place, and this movie definitely did not fail in the way of ambiance.  As the men go to work, Mike (Stephen Gevedon) a law school dropout, begins to dig around the records, researching the case of Mary Hobbes.  He becomes enthralled by listening to the tapes of her interviews, which exhibit her multiple personalities.  I found these scenes to be seriously freaky, and I thought that the movie would focus on ghost/possession of Mary or somesuch thing, but this definitely went in a totally different direction.

Meanwhile, the rest of the crew is doing their own thing.  Phil (David Caruso) is angry at Hank (Josh Lucas) for stealing his longtime girlfriend.  He has taken up smoking pot, and becomes concerned about Gordon's mental condition.  Hank on the other hand, is a compulsive gambler looking for an out from the job and his girlfriend.  He finds this in some hidden treasure in the asylum's walls.  Jeff (Brendan Sexton III) is the youngest of the crew, and is terrified of the dark...therefore he should probably not be working in an old asylum. 

Strange things start happening on the job, beginning with Hank going missing, presumably running off to casino school in Miami.  The generator fails, and the men are left scrambling in the dark, all seeming to be chased by something.  But by who? 

I found this movie to be really slow moving and actually not very scary at all.  I felt like it really kicked off the creepiness with the freaky old building and the chilling multiple personality voices, but then it just never really continued from there.  The ending was seriously weak, and I had to look it up on Wikipedia just to even figure out what happened.  So sorry to all that liked this movie, but I found it to be a fail.

Cloverfield (2008)

I'm not sure this is exactly considered a horror movie (Netflix says Action/Adventure, IMDB says Action/Sci-Fi) but I feel it's fit to review this movie here.

Cloverfield was filmed over 34 days in both New York and Los Angeles. When they were filming here in New York, it was a big to-do, as the other New York disaster movie, I Am Legend, had recently made the Brooklyn Bridge appear to be under attack. The "No Parking" signs on the street read "Cheese" and many New Yorkers were confused as to what was being filmed.

In fact, Cloverfield was filmed, produced, and shipped under several code names including "Cheese," "Slusho," "Clover," "Bertha," and surprisingly, "Cloverfield" which ended up being the actual title of the movie. Cloverfied is actually the name of the boulevard in Santa Monica where the Bad Robot offices are located.

I cannot remember a single horror/sci-fi movie generating this much speculation, confusion and interest since The Blair Witch Project. The producers did such a great job of building up so much mystery around the film that people just could not wait to see it.

Cloverfield centers around a group of twenty-somethings attending a party in Manhattan when it comes under attack. The entire movie is filmed from the prospective of a handheld camera, which results in some very bumpy footage. (There were warning signs outside the theaters akin to those for roller coasters)

A small group of friends scrambles to escape whatever is attacking (running past a downed Statue of Liberty head on the way) They attempt to run over the Brooklyn Bridge, which of course, is immediately destroyed. They run around like everyone else, trying to figure out what's going on, and end up down in the subway. This part of the movie totally freaks me out. Ugh, even when the train slows down/stops in the tunnels, I start to feel claustrophic...the thought of running through the tunnels makes me have a mild panic attack. Also, the calculations on this part were a little off...they run through the tunnels from Spring Street to 59th and Lex in a short period of time, when any New Yorker knows that trip takes a solid 20 minutes on the subway.

Anyway, I digress. They arrive at Bloomingdales to encounter a military presence rounding up what appears to be cases of zombieism. Then, in a ridiculous move of stupidity/heroism, they decide to forego the military-offered transport and swing on over to Columbus Circle to try and find their friend. Once again, only takes them about two minutes to get there (in reality it's about a 20 minute walk) and no one in their 20s could afford an apartment in that building as they go for several thousand dollars a month.

This movie ends about how you'd expect for a "monster-destroys-New York" movie. This was a pretty solid end-of-the-world movie. It was pretty much like the Blair Witch Project, if you picked up that little group and their camera equipment and dropped them off in SoHo.

Grade: C (Blair Witch Project...after the kids were on Oprah and we all found out it wasn't real)

The Happening (2008)

Oh, Marky-Mark, I love you. You were so bad-ass in Fear, so hot in Boogie Nights, and you rocked in The Departed. I could have even given you a pass on that piece of crap, We Own the Night.

Zooey Deschanel, I love you as well. Almost Famous is my favorite non-horror movie and you were so good in it. You were so cute in Elf, even though that's not really your genre. When I saw you in the previews for this movie, I was all, you go, Anita!

This movie was awful. Seriously. People have given M. Night Shamala-whatever too many chances. Yes, the Sixth Sense was awesome. Unbreakable was so damn good. But then you let yourself go, sir. The parody of The Village in Scary Movie 4 was far superior to the actual production. However, when I saw a trailer with some cool actors running around and people throwing themselves off of buildings, I was strangely entranced. I'm a sucker for end-of-the-world movies, evidenced by the fact that I have seen The Stand a dozen times, even though it's over six hours long.

I held on through the beginning of the movie, when this "virus" began in Central Park (honestly, if I have to see one more tragedy strike my neighborhood on the big screen, I'm going to lose it) I remained optimistic as the truly horrible acting of this movie dragged on and on. I laughed hysterically with the rest of the theater through all of the so-called "scary"parts. I really tried to feel for these poor bastards who kept making one terrible decision after another.

After an hour and a half of senseless dialogue, people committing suicide over and over, and trees "communicating" with everyone, I was ready for the twist. Come on, M. Knight, this is your speciality! Where's Mr. Glass? Who's really a ghost? Will Marky-Mark die and resurrect as some sort of super-plant?

There was no twist. No surprises. The ending and the explanation were truly, truly awful. The whole movie was a total joke, and a packed theater in Union Square on a Friday night were left shaking their heads.

Grade: F (Leprechaun in Space -- there are just. no. words.)