Malum

Wow, I don't even know where to begin... it's not the worst thing ever made, but it's definitely not anywhere near as good as last shift. I'm a way, it feels like it's all around a worse film. I'm not really sure what the aim was in all of this?

There was moments that weren't terrible, but I can't think of anything that I enjoyed better than I did Last Shift?! It was just silly and dull til the end where it almost became haunted house level bad looking and tried way too hard to be "weird".

I'd highly recommend that you see Last Shift instead and don't really invest too much time or care into this one. I was rather excited for it, but in the end, I'm just underwhelmed.

When LAST SHIFT (2014) came out, it was the first film I'd seen in a few years that unnerved me. It was creepy & gritty. It felt like they did a lot with a small amount of money. When I found out that MALUM was a "re-imagining" of LAST SHIFT with the daughter being race-swapped, I had concerns.

Right from the jump, the acting in this movie is awful. It had some positive things going for it because its the same filmmaker. Its shot pretty decently and there's some good special effects. It just doesn't have that grittiness like LAST SHIFT. It's by no means high polish, but its more polished than its predecessor. It felt like a tv movie that was done to push a more diverse main character. Very unnecessary film.

I really liked Last Shift. It did a lot with it's low budget and managed to be a genuinely unnerving and interesting horror movie that felt new and original.

I was really quite excited to see Malum. Some more critical folks out there said it was unnecessary, but I really liked the idea of seeing what Di Blasi would do with the original story given feedback from the original, a bigger budget, and time to think.

Well, for the most part, Malum follows Last Shift quite closely. The overall plot is almost entirely the same and a lot of plot points from Last Shift are recreated.

But Malum does add a fair amount of background and extra exposition, either by adding to existing moments from the original film, qnd by adding entirely new scenes.

The problem is, these additions actually take away far more than they add to the film. It was the vaguearies of the original that helped it shine; the viewer being trusted to make connections and fill in the blanks. Malum, by comparison, spells everything out.

There are other issues too. The deranged cultists are so stereotypical that it's hard to take the performances seriously. The special effects, though apparently more sophisticated and expensive, are actually a lot less convincing (I'm trying to avoid spoilers but The Reveal is probably a prime example). And the ending is not only predictable, irrespective of whether you've seen the original film or not, but also deeply unsatisfying and frustrating.

I want to be clear: I didn't hate Malum. I actually enjoued it, despite some serious flaws; it kept me interested and entertained.

But, having seen Last Shift, the "original draft" of the film, I'm left wondering why it was made, because it has literally already been done much more effectively. By the same director, no less!

I want to preface this review with the fact that I had a good time with this movie. It was fun, scary and successful as a stand alone. Being a fan of its predecessor, Last Shift, inevitable parallels and comparisons will be made. While both had their own pros and cons, I think at the end of the day I personally liked Last Shift better. Two of my main criticisms with Last Shift was the backstory/elaboration on plot and the budget.

Right out the gate Malum does a great job at giving a little bit more background on the characters and their story, making it feel like a more well-rounded throughline with a cohesive and concise point. However, as quickly as it took up for the slack in the story, it added another element specifically regarding the main girl and her involvement that almost negated its prior clarity and was left open ended and me scratching my head. Now, with all that said, at its foundation this is still an entertaining, intriguing story regardless and they did a good job at really sticking to its original core.

As far as the budget goes, the picture quality was great in this and vastly improved from Last Shift. I think that ended up being a positive and a negative aspect because while Malum was "aesthetically superior", something about the grittiness of last shift with the picture quality and special effects almost made it a little bit more real, down to earth and therefore creepier. Something about Malum just wasn't quite as spooky as I wanted it to be and it definitely relied on jump scares. There were for sure some cool moments involving the breaking of appendages and gnarly movie make up, but even then, star-faced Hellraiser guy looked pretty silly... so it's a tossup.

As far as everything else goes, I thought it was generally successful. The scenery, props, lighting, makeup and effects were all very cool. The acting was decent across the board, if not a little mediocre. The main girl did a fine job, but was particularly successful in scenes of high intensity emotion. There was one stand out performance from a woman playing a prostitute that is to be of note.

I was really excited about this reimagining, and while it didn't hit exactly what I wanted it to be, it was still successful in its own right. I hope it gets the attention it deserves along with the director and Last Shift. Would recommend.

Last Shift (2014) actually happened to be my favorite horror movie of that year. It was a huge surprise watch for me going in completely blind, not having even seen a preview... Malum is a remake/reimagining of that movie by the same writer/director, Anthony DiBlasi. I questioned the existence of this remake after I saw the trailer since it's only 9 years after the original, and I still question its existence after watching it.

Don't get me wrong, it's a decent watch & a solid horror movie with improved production, graphic gore and an expansion of the cult premise. With all of the added aspects it's strange that it's only 4 minutes longer than the original. But I feel like this is an example of "less is more" where the ambiguity of Last Shift worked more in its favor, while the expansion of the lore regarding the cult makes Malum feel more derivative. There is a particular creepy "jingle" that is used in both movies, but I feel it is over-used in this movie. Also, there are certain aspects of Malum where it can't seem to decide what it wants to be. There's just too much here that reminds me of Hereditary (and other movies), which is somewhat ironic since the same evil entity is mentioned in Last Shift, but not in Malum (if I remember correctly).

However, I can recommend this movie whether or not you've seen Last Shift, but you may enjoy it more if you haven't seen it. It manages to be effectively creepy like the original while being more polished. For streaming, maybe wait for the rental price to go down.

I gave Last Shift (2014) a 8/10. I give Malum (2023) a 6/10. A solid effort with improved production, but it overall falls short of the effectiveness of the original. It's definitely not a bad remake, just not a necessary one.