Camera Obscura

For the life of me, I don't understand why Chiller continues to make movies. None of the films have been successful as horror movies, and I actively avoid movies that are made by the network. I rented this movie based on some glowing reviews, and I feel like I deserve to have my money returned to me, and the contents of this movie erased from my memory. It was just awful, boring and tame in the way Lifetime movies are. Nothing about it was scary, nothing about it was particularity well done, and the gore and blood that is shown is tame and limited. The acting was competent, I suppose, but it's unfortunate that the rest of the film is such a travesty. DO NOT PAY TO WATCH THIS MOVIE. This studio really needs to take the hint that their output is not doing anything to advance the horror genre in any meaningful way. SAD!

Saw 'Camera Obscura', being fond of horror regardless of budget (even if not my favourite genre) and being intrigued by the quite creative premise. Being behind on my film watching and reviewing, with a long to watch and review list that keeps getting longer, it took me a while to get round to watching and reviewing it.

Giving 'Camera Obscura' a fair chance with being interest and apprehension, it turned out to be far better than expected. Won't say that 'Camera Obscura' is a great film because it isn't and the potential, while not wasted, is not fully lived up to. Considering the large number of films seen recently being mediocre and less and wasting potential, was expecting worse and was relieved that while wanting in a fair few areas it was actually one of my better recent low-budget viewings.

Starting with the positives, generally the production values could have been much worse. There is a real sense of eeriness, foreboding and a decently stylish atmosphere, and it makes the most of the confined and at times effectively claustrophobic setting. The music is also suitably haunting and manages to not be too intrusive, likewise with the sound not being too obvious (a bugbear of mine with low-budget viewings recently).

There is tension, suspense and genuine creepiness. The acting is better than average, particularly from the leads and the direction is assured in the first half while slackening later.

Would have liked however more tension and suspense in the second half particularly and for some of the scares that become more prominent in the second half to be more creative and less trying-too-hard to the point of cheesiness, particularly when it becomes more prominent in the action. The dialogue is cheesy and awkward generally.

Found that the story could have been executed better too. Too many parts are uneventful, the narrative structure is not always coherent and it can feel padded, not to mention an ending that perplexes in its anti-climactic and muddled convolution. The mystery and psychological elements needed more focus, the latter was underexplored and muddled somewhat at times. There are exceptions to the better than expected production values, the effects are shoddy and the editing could have been tighter.

Overall, better than expected but didn't blow me away. 5/10 Bethany Cox

The actress portraying Claire in the film is untalented and unattractive making it a two-fer. And things get worse from there.

The plot isn't too bad (haunted camera) but film was ruined by mediocre to terrible acting by the leads. You just never believe the protagonist and his girlfriend are really couple or that his problems are really driving his motivations. They just seem to "show up" stand around and repeat their lines,

I rented this RedBox which is how I would advise people to watch , if they care to. Better yet...see if you find it on a streaming site and watch it there. It's not worth a purchase if you looking to do that.

The acting here is really quite poor, even Christopher Denham is far from the quality of his performance in Billions. The premise is quite fun in an obvious way, Photographer with PTSD, starts to unravel further when he finally musters the courage to start shooting again with an old camera that has as much baggage as he has, capturing things on film that may not be there... yet. It's really just a series of tropes, but despite its flaws it's oddly enjoyable and for all its predictability it does manage to raise the pulse, but there's no edge.

*Apologies for the poor title to this review, I needed a laugh after this.

Movie had a good premise and started off quite well but soon went down the toilet with its over the top gore, poor photography and confused story.

The music was actually not bad; very reminiscent of John Carpenter and in many places seemed out of place , the plot was confusing - was he actually a psycho and imagining everything which i presume was the end game there wasn't much explanation at the end and it seemed to end too soon. The over the top gore actually began to make it look like a comedy and we started laughing at points when we really shouldn't have!

Some poor acting and bizarre plot holes didn't help.

Overall it could have been good but ended up in the bargain bin bucket!