Revenant

In my 8 years on IMDb, I've never once reviewed a movie. I watched this film last night, and given a couple of scathing reviews on here for it, I felt it was only fair to give my 2 cents worth and say what I thought of it. Especially given the shoestring budget and heart and soul the film makers obviously put into it.

This movie scared the HELL out of me. I love horror films, and I've seen hundreds in the last few years. My favourites are easily ghost films (especially the Asian ones), and despite having seen so many I still have a tendency to sit there with my hand half covering my eyes. I'm kinda proud to say this film had that effect through most of it's running time.

The gist of the film is a guy and his girlfriend move into a supposedly haunted house in the hopes of experiencing "paranormal activity". Guess they got more than they bargained for. It's a pretty simple premise but that's what makes it work so well. From looking under a bed to investigating whispering in a darkened living room, it's the little things that give the film it's atmosphere and intensity.

Sorry for my extremely amateurish review, just wanted to try and contribute something is all. Sick of so many 1 star reviews putting down good films. If you like ghost movies give this one a go, you might be surprised.

"An American Ghost Story" is a film about a couple who move into a supposedly haunted house where a family had been killed years before. The main character is an aspiring writer that wants to write a book about and paranormal activity he may experience in the house.

I would give this one a 6 1/2. If you are looking for top Hollywood style horror you probably would skip this one. IMDb has this one listed with an estimated budget of around $10k, That being said it did get the best bang for the budget, and beats out a lot of movies with much loftier budgets. I give it a 6 and not in a bad way.

The script was pretty weak, and the dialog at times was just plain bad. The effects were decent. There was some "make you jump" moments. All in all, if you are into low budget films not too bad. Derek Cole, the Director deserves some props for putting this out on the shoe-string budget, and given a robust one could most likely turn out some good movies in the future.

This film epitomizes a couple of guys who really want to make a horror movie but don't have the patience to hone their craft into creating a well written script that is deftly acted. It's distracting how bad the lead guy is in this (not to mention that he's also the writer). In the hands of a better actor this would have been really effective.

The direction is challenging enough and there are some great moments that would have benefited even more with a better camera and a bigger budget.

In the end it's the details that does this film in. The lead guy never changes his clothes once in 90 days! He sleeps in the same t-shirt and jeans throughout the film. The end chase scene starts off really well but due to the low budget and a bad camera turns into a farce really quickly.

I know I'm being cynical in all of this, but this film can be enjoyed as a promising first effort from a couple of guys who want to make a good movie. They just need more education and skill to pull off what they attempt to.

Just to cut to the chase, I liked this movie. I found it scary and that was the point so it worked for me. So why am I only giving this a 4 out of 10? Because while I kind of liked it, I have no interest in ever wanting to see it again (unless it is edited WAY down) and there were way too many parts of it that just weren't very good.

I understand this had a low budget and a small crew, and I think they did do a pretty good job with what they had to work with - but that doesn't make this movie "good." It's not a 1 star movie, but it's definitely not a 10 star movie either.

Not everyone who wants to be a film maker is good at it. There was definitely some talent here but it wasn't consistent throughout the film. I've seen people with better budgets make much worse movies than this, but there are too many places in this movie where the framing of the shot just wasn't right and the close ups were ridiculously close and the timing was off and the scene went on too long and give it a rest with the background music already... Things like that. They overdid it a little with some of the cheap scares in my opinion, too.

But then there were the beautifully framed shots and moments where the editing was perfect and on point and scares that I thought were awesome and well done. I thought the acting was passable (the kind of acting where you can tell they're acting but it isn't quite bad enough to take you out of the movie), the lighting was decent and perfectly set the spooky mood in most of the movie, and the effects were decently done. Unfortunately the effects are things we've seen before in other movies, but fortunately they're done pretty well - but then they go on way too long and it just gets cheesy.

I bet the filmmakers themselves know which parts of this movie work and which parts don't and which scenes could use some serious trimming. If this didn't have to be a 90 minute feature, I am sure they could edit it down into an absolutely brilliant 30 minute horror segment that would knock our socks off and get them all a lot more work.

I would love to see THAT version.

The segments with the landlord and the guy's pranky friend could be completely cut from this. That would be a start. They didn't do a bad job, they just aren't necessary to the story and don't really add anything to it. Honestly, I fast forwarded through way too much of this movie.

It's been difficult to find good haunted house or ghost story movies that are actually scary, and when I find one, I gotta say I like it. If you like that sort of thing and can get past it being drawn out longer than it should be, then I think this is probably worth a shot for you.

Calling this movie "good" is too much of a stretch. It's definitely good in parts, but in too many parts it's just not.

I feel bad, because i watched this movie and thought it was no good in any way, shape or form.

However... i cut the guys some slack. Because, i read they made it for $2,000. That's less than i've seen people ask for on crowd funding websites for a YouTube video.

Here's the thing though. The audience doesn't know the budget of a movie when they chose to watch it on Netflix. The thumbnail for the movie looks alright. How do you know it will be 1000x less impressive than something like "The Collection?" You don't. It's not the fault of these guys just trying to make a movie with some friends and a couple thousand dollars. I guess i'm more upset at Netflix recommending it right on my front page like i'll enjoy it because i watched "The Collection."