The 100 Candles Game

I'm down with a collection of horror stories - but this one is a wee bit boring. The mini tales were predictable for the most part, as was the ending of the short stories.

As it was an anthology,none of the stories connected to each other, aside from being a "horror" tale told, which is too loose a tie to make any cohesion. The ONLY two stories that were actually fully fleshed out were--ironically the one NOT in english --(my subtitles worked perfectly,so i knew what was going on. Apparently some others weren't so lucky,and were lost as to what was goung on). And even that had two giant plot holes--one being that all cell phones can dial 911--even defunct bricks from the 90's,and two--where was that "companion" the entire time?!? And the pregnant girl story. That one was really well acted with great effects. Too bad it ended up in thus dumpster fire of a movie,it's a real gem! And these friends?!? Russian goth hooker, mousy blonde, weirdo jersey boy hipster whose accent fades in and out and other russian guy,who also cannot maintain an accent. It has been stated in a more eloquent review that this movie could have been so much more, but the disjointed nature really took it's toll on my enjoyment. And final story was interesting,but all i ultimately came away with from this movie were 2.5 decent stories,and actors with failing accents.

The whole anthology is fine, many of the short stories are great but the red string that ties them together is weak and ridiculously bad, from the effects to the acting cast. Thumbs up for the cat, the best actor of them.

I thought the film was very weak. The plot is unconvincing. Those stories they tell just aren't scary. By the third story about the child who can't leave home, I was already disappointed. The following story of the woman in an oxygen mask is just boring. And the ending is so abrupt that I literally gasped - not from horror but from exasperation.

Sitting in a circle surrounded by candles, a group of friends is forced to tell scary stories in front of a mirror in order to escape a witch's curse.

On the whole, this is a serviceable if unremarkable anthology. The initial setup here, involving the friends sitting in the darkened room surrounded by the candles and forced to tell scary stories is highly enjoyable and serves this well as an excuse to launch into this type of film. The atmosphere is effective and there's some tension with the involvement of the mirror calling the rules of the game into play, making for an overall workable format to get going. When it comes to the stories, it's hit-or-miss but generally above average. The first one involving the girl in the woods is pretty solid and has a fun final twist to capitalize on, while the second story has some atmospheric images and ideas undone by the lack of action or context about the setup involving the two living together or weird twist ending which leaves the segment fun but wholly mismatched and out-of-place in this type of film. The middle parts of the film, namely the segments involving the mischievous children tormenting the woman in her house or the mother confronting the demonic entity threatening her children, are where this one shines. Bringing forth some fun, fast-paced efforts with plenty of atmosphere and graphic kills mixed alongside the chilling action, while the period pieces involve a rather enjoyable condensed take on the demonically-possessed to be a great segment. This does have its fair share of misses as well. The buried alive segment is an unoriginal tale with a lame finale undermined by tons of stupidity packed into a brief running time, the lone woman in the apartment has some creepy imagery and it's hard to tell what's going on or why we should care because of that, and the wraparound in the room feels repetitive with the same type of scares we're constantly told mean nothing anyway, making for some pointless segments here.

Rated Unrated/R: Graphic Language and Graphic Violence.