Hallucinations

Hallucinations - 1986 (This Film Rates a B+ ) A super low budget film that was shot on video during the winter. Three young and odd brothers (One adopted-Todd, one cognitively impaired-Mark and one sexually preoccupied-John) are left at home as their mom has to work a double shift, per her note. She won't be home until late, but dinner is in the fridge. Mark receives a frightening phone call and later that evening has wild hallucinations involving violence and mayhem in their basement. He wakes up with blood on his hands, but it quickly vanishes. Mark recounts the nightmare with his two brothers and John goes to the basement to inspect. He comes back up to confirm but the bloody scene disappears after Todd and John go down a second time. Meanwhile, Mark continues to have horrifying visions and these begin to spread. The storyline gets a little confusing from there. What is real and what is a hallucination are blurred. "You're not real, you're not real"! It takes a while to get to the only logical conclusion. Mind over matter. Yet, the film has good build and a fair amount of suspense. The bloody hallucinations are intense even if overlong and with very fake looking gore. But it's all very satisfying. Truly. There is snow, snow shoveling, and lots of cold winter goodness plus you get a ton of vomiting and one peeing plastic elf. Some of the sound effects are truly terrible (26-minute mark). I wonder if the cat in the litter box just about bad timing was or super well played (2-minute mark). Nothing here should work. Nothing! It all seems so absurd, but if you know what you are getting into, it's all a fun 60-minute ride into 80's horror.

Some of us watch horror films every day or almost that, the genre a fact of life rather than some mystical font of fear, I don't by and large approach the genre looking for fear and I'm not sure I know of many serious fans who do. And yet these films still work for us or work upon us, in such a way that a chord is struck and the viewing becomes valuable. Hallucinations may not be a film of great note, but it does approach the genre and its foundations in an unexpectedly interesting fashion, making somewhat astute comment on its operation. Especially unexpected given that it happens to be the debut film from the Polonia Brothers, Mark and John (RIP) who were best known for making a lot of films viewed by much of their audience as among the worst ever. Together with Todd Michael Smith they play three brothers left home alone when their mother has to work late. Frictions arise and grow between smart John, slow Mark and fractious adopted Todd, especially when a series of progressively bizarre and threatening hallucinations set in. Initially the hallucinations are fairly standard spooky affair, the sort of thing one could easily imagine result harmlessly from a young imagination fed on horror literature and cinema. A book about Herschell Gordon Lewis is shown, as is a Stephen King title and a poster for The Return of the Living Dead, standard stuff to breed standard fantasies. But without any figure to bring the brothers back to reality their fantasies move from the outside to the in, becoming body horror. Urination, defecation, vomiting and more are clearly alluded to, the implication being that the commercial horror referenced previously finds its roots, its essence in the body, the body and awareness of the body and its function. And as the film goes on it moves deeper, predictably finding the spring that feeds said roots. Its surprisingly well handled stuff until some needless exposition in the finale, yes the acting is not especially worth of the term, the film is unimaginatively shot on unattractive video and sometimes the blood is rather pink of hue, but it moves at a good clip and delivers several arresting scenes of grisly weirdness, even managing to mildly disquiet in the process with its ideas. It is not something I can really recommend to anyone other than devotees of 80's SOV horror or strangeness, but to those that way inclined this is well worth a watch. 7/10

Stuck home alone for the night, a group of brothers who are left by themselves suddenly begin to experience a series of strange violent hallucinations, and with no one to help must try to uncover the truth about the visions before it turns deadly.

This was quite a fun shot-on-video effort. Among the better features here is the fine setup that brings everything together quite nicely. The simple-minded idea of getting the kids home alone and by themselves through the parental note that ensures they're going to be without supervision for an extended period of time while the strange visions occur is quite creative. It also adds some suspense to everything while they're subjected to everything without being able to do anything about it as time goes on. The hallucinations that take place here are incredibly fun and give this quite a lot to like. Starting off innocently with the bloody chainsaw and the robed figure by the tree, this escalates incredibly well into far more terrifying encounters. Imagining themself passing a knife while using the bathroom, being chased by a machete-wielding killer, being tied down and tormented by a crazed maniac, or attacked by a monstrous being while in the bathroom, the hallucinations are generally far more fun and creepy than they should while providing some solid low-level indie gore. These factors are more than enough to hold it up since there isn't much that's really wrong with this one. Among the main issues here comes in the final half where this unexpectedly and unnecessarily switches gears into a haunted house film. Attempting to tie the source of the hallucinations as a singular entity taunting and targeting them in order to present a more unified familial unit feels out-of-place from what came before. It would've felt a lot more genuine had it stayed more mysterious, which is as damaging as the constant interactions of the low-budget, shot-on-video style that tend to hold this one down.

Rated Unrated/R: Graphic Violence, Language and Male Rear Nudity.

It's only fair to wonder how amateur horror like this, shot on consumer-grade electronics, ever manages to make it onto the Internet, or even just to survive beyond its initial creation. I definitely don't mean that as a knock against the filmmakers, and certainly the proliferation of like-minded fare in the twenty-first century is more easily explained by the advent of the modern web and graphics software. All I mean to say is that for something shot on home video in the 90s, or in this case the 80s, to even be able to have an audience more than a decade later is kind of incredible. At least in this case, though, maybe it's easier to explain since the finished film is surprisingly good. What John Polonia, Mark Polonia, and Todd Michael Smith lack in resources, or specific skill, they make up for with earnest effort and definite enthusiasm. Anyone can pick up a camera; not everyone can illustrate the heart and energy for their no-budget flicks to count for something. I'm not saying it's perfect or essential, but 'Hallucinations' is pretty fun!

With hard work and sincere care, titles of this nature can be more worthwhile and enjoyable than what major studio fare sometimes offers. Brent and Blake Cousins' 'Slaughter Day,' made in 1991, is a great example; in my opinion Archie Meyer and Nathan Cox's 2019 found footage feature 'XIII' is actually one of the best horror flicks I've watched recently. By comparison this 1986 project surely shows even more rough edges, and limitations that more distinctly betray the artifice, yet what Polonia, Polonia, and Smith were able to put together with nothing but their friends, their family, and their own creativity is nevertheless a minor joy. Some of the tangible creations are inventive and gnarly; others more clearly show that there were upper bounds on what the trio were able to achieve. The concept is fantastic, and they gleefully ran with it as an excuse to see what they could whip up; it also wouldn't have taken much - no more than a minute or so of video, really, and maybe one more person on camera - to tie up the tale at the end with some conclusion that would have made it all even more deviously delightful. Yet the fact that they conjured this lark and managed to bring it to fruition at all, let alone with as much success as they did, really says a lot.

One couldn't possibly accuse Polonia, Polonia, and Smith of not applying themselves, and that might be the number one lesson that I wish more filmmakers in subsequent years would take away from amateur film-making of years' past. It's silly, ridiculous, and low-grade, but it readily shows that those involved really poured themselves into making the best little romp that they could, and the results speak for themselves. By all means, 'Hallucinations' won't meet much favor with those who have a hard time engaging with pictures on this level. If you're open to all that the genre has to offer, however, I think this is a really good time, and worth checking out on its own merits!