Compound Fracture

Compound Fracture: written by Renae Geerlings & Tyler Mane, directed by A.J. Rickert-Epstein, and starring Tyler Mane, Muse Watson, Derek Mears, Leslie Easterbrook, Alex Saxon, and Renae Geerlings. Todd Farmer and Daniel Roebuck also make a special appearance (which was pretty awesome).

This supernatural thriller of a horror flick deals with rituals, old family bloodlines, & modern day family drama twisted up with a great story about ghosts. It reminded me of something you'd see on the show Supernatural, but if the Winchesters never showed up. What starts out as a simple visit to Michael's family home to take care of his aging father, quickly turns into a nightmare, visiting old sins of the father back on the whole family.

The most notable thing is the great chemistry between the actors. They all did a phenomenal job, but I have to say my favorites were Renae Geerling and Muse Watson. Derek Mears was extremely intimidating and scary, though his character didn't have much scope. His story was a very integral one being he is the main baddie in this flick. Tyler Mane did a great job achieving a very father figure/head of the house/normal guy yet heroic role. It was almost, but not quite, weird seeing him as the hero when he's sitting on my DVD shelves as a bad guy in everything. Bottom line, everyone did a fantastic job.

The story was really good, mostly because of its originality. It not the same old ghost story and it's got a lot of great details in it about certain lore and history of the supernatural. When you're done watching the movie you can tell two big things... 1. They did a lot of research. 2. They had a blast making this film. Their story translated very well to the audience and at points I was thinking "well played" because they totally got me on several occasions. They are really good at the "show them left, but then they go right" kind of thing. Much of the story is unexpected, including the extremely fun ending.

I'll be honest and say it did take a while to get to the parts I was waiting for. All the scares leading up to the main course was fun, but I was really pushed off my seat for the last third of the flick. Tension is well presented in this movie and builds to palpable levels, so much so that I noticed I was uncomfortable sitting in my seat at one point and even wanted to cover my eyes because of some of the disturbing violence that took place. They don't call it "Compound Fracture" for nothing. That's not all though, every great horror story needs a bit of humor and this has it for sure. It's not comical, but it's got some great moments that will make you laugh.

My hope is that this movie goes on to propel the group at Mane Entertainment to making some even better flicks for us fans to eat up. I mean, simply getting this specific group of people together is an inspiration in itself, but seeing what they did together gives me great hope for the future of horror entertainment. There are still people out there with new stories, new ideas, and the ability to put something together with little money that will still scare your pants off while keeping you entertained the whole time. I want more of that! As a filmmaker myself there was a lot of me thinking "how'd they do that" when it came to so many of their effects. I should know better, "hollywood magic" and all, but still, they left me curious because they did it so well and it was very cool to see.

Director A.J. Epstein was great too. He put together a very fun horror experience with a comprehensive story. Getting to meet the guy was pretty cool too as he can relate to many of the people I used to work with as a filmmaker. He mentioned having made several short films and that this was one of the first he'd be known by. I'm sure it's something he'll be proud to be known for because it's pretty awesome! The entire group who showed up, Tyler, Renae, A.J., they all were very humble and very friendly and it was so much fun to hang out with them and talk with them. They were very welcoming to every individual who came out and did a fun Q&A after the flick. I won't say much about it because I don't want to ruin anything for anyone, but like I said before, you knew they had a blast putting this together.

The one thing I never got to ask (because I thought it'd be a dumb question) was to see if this was at all a commentary about what it would be like for Jason and Michael to throw down. ;) - Mr. Frights

This was a fantastic movie! I LOVED it and highly recommend it. If you like movies that have demons, witchery, supernatural events then this one is for you. Keeps one on the edge of their seat during the who movie. Tyler Mane has become one of my favorite uprising stars ever since I watched him portray Michael Myers in Rob Zombie's Halloween movies. Tyler mane and Renae did a fabulous job writing this movie and Tyler showed his superb acting skills staring in the movie. I thought it was cool how they brought together several iconic killers (Tyler Mane "Michael Myers", Derek Mears "Jason Vorhees" and Muse Watson "Ben Willis") to star in this movie...it made for a great cast. If you are a horror fan this is one that you don't want to miss!!

This movie was much better than I expected. When I first started watching this movie, I could not get past the bad acting in the beginning and I had to stop. I went back to it today and I actually pushed past the bad script and poor acting. Tyler Mane was decent, but he could have done better. Muse Watson was essentially the only good actor - no surprise. The color of the movie was actually really strange, but I feel that it added to the aura of the movie. It was a nice change from the movies that are so dark you cannot even see what is happening. It has a really interesting story and an ending I did not expect. For the most part, it was very predictable, but it had some things that caught me off guard. The story was choppy at parts and a bit hard to follow, but it all made sense eventually. It was also a little bloodier than I expected, but I liked it all the same. I was expecting a 4/10, but it was better than that. For a low budget film, this was pretty decent; much better than ones I've seen before.

In short, poor acting, OK script, interesting story, good plot, odd coloration (but it works), and it has a few good scares.

Check it out if you're just looking for something to watch that you've never seen before. It's not a MUST SEE, but it's alright.

After returning to his family home, a man finds the fractured nature of their past has come back to haunt them when a thought-dead ghost returns to seek vengeance against them and must find a way of dealing with the wrathful being.

For the most part this one was just a bland, awfully lame and tired effort that has very little to like about it. The main issue striking this one down is the fact that there's just no horror elements at all within the first hour or so of the film, all taken up with utterly lame drama scenes of the family getting together and showing off the concern for his worsening condition. Not only does that not endear the film to anyone for having to force them to sift through that length of time to get the good parts on-screen but these really make it hard to make us care for what goes on since this one tends to rely on the same old set- up of the father trying to get them aware of something only to make a minor mistake in the facts, either by getting dates or names mixed up, and then have everyone gang up on him like his mental condition is deteriorating and everyone begins yelling at each other. Due to that and the utterly irritating factor of presenting all these scenes as dramas based on his condition there's very little appeal in them anyway before realizing that all they do in the mean-time is drag the pace down to a sluggish, barely-moving crawl that takes forever to get to the point and by then you've lost interest. These are nowhere near interesting or enjoyable since nothing's happening and what's going on anyway doesn't warrant that kind of behavior or reaction possible, and by making all of this reliant on a storyline that is never explained or makes sense compounds matters by keeping us in the dark about the true nature of not only the origins of the curse but also the reasoning behind it. There's a small amount given at the beginning of it being used to tie the family together, but nothing about the true purpose or intent behind it since all it seems to do is allow vengeful ghosts to be able to haunt the area and nothing else. Otherwise, there's not much else here that's worthwhile as the attacks in the house at the end are about all that's good here with the creepiness of his appearance making for a chilling, imposing villain and the action contained to some admittedly impressive supernatural battles involving the use of spells and tomes to completely finish him off. That does bring up some nice gore and kills because of the creepy action, but as this is contained all in the final minutes it's too little too late.

Rated R: Graphic Language, Graphic Violence and supposed scenes of child abuse.

Compound Fracture feels like a first outing, and it is. Tyler Mane's new company offers us a passable thriller that ultimately never truly thrills.

The story works. It offers characters with interesting drama and characterization, and a villain with a purpose. There are a few forced moments, where the emotion just shows up instead of being earned organically, but that could be in part to the directing and editing, which I will get to later. The story definitely had potential for thrills, and each character is memorable in their own way, and that is something you don't often find in indie horrors/thrillers, especially first timers like Geerlings.

The acting was weak. Muse Watson, the patriarch with dementia, often felt way over the top as he went in and out of lucidity. Sometimes it felt like dementia, sometimes if felt like he was tired and ready to go home. Tyler Mane will always feel like a giant to me, and it was hard, but not impossible, to see him as a family man. I think his strengths come from playing more fringe characters, less 'everyman'. Alex Saxon was a point of awkwardness for me. He fear noises really drew me out of the moment.

I think, even with the acting, there is potential in the film, but it all fell flat due to the direction/editing. I'm going to group those since they were done by the same guy, Anthony J. Rickert-Epstein. First, a look at his page reveals he is a cinematographer (he was also DP on this film, that's a lot of hats for a feature). And it shows. There were some technical shots going on but usually at the cost of performance and story telling. The film plays slow, and not "slow burn", just slow. The action scenes feel forced. I felt like I was supposed to be scared or thrilled but everything was moving so slow I was usually left just watching, unengaged. There were moments that didn't fit the rest of the film. I can't say it enough: everything felt forced. It felt like they wanted us to be scared, but didn't know how to pull it off, so they just copied a lot of techniques with sound and editing and tried to make it work. And for me, it didn't.

I think it was a good first effort. Hopefully they learn from the mistakes, mostly of letting one man head three departments, and can produce more films.

Compound Fracture isn't a great movie, but it shows that this team has potential, and I look forward to seeing what they come up with next.