V/H/S

VHS is bad... plain and simple. Where is the plot? Where is the story? Where is anything? In VHS you just watch four different VHS tapes, while you're supposed to watch the main "found-footage" tape...confusing? Yeah, but that's it... VHS doesn't have any plot, any back-story, closer, nothing... I was very disappointed, because I have read some good reviews about it. It was boring, and, with the exception of the first tape, it was not at all entertaining... If you want to watch a good movie, VHS isn't your choice. You'll only see a random selection of stories that seem to drag for 2 hours...awful. I recommend you avoid this one, unless you're a fan of "found-footage" material movies, and even so...

Listen, the only way to truly enjoy a horror film is in a large, pitch black room with deafening surround sound and a group of people just as scared as you are. Other times, a laptop works too. But I, and a group of about 100 others were privileged to catch the first Canadian premiere of V/H/S presented by the Toronto After Dark Film Festival. Enough plugs, onto the film right? My review. See it! If you love horror, if you hate horror, if you think you might like it and wanna try it out, just see it! Without spoiling anything I will say that there are about 5 or 6 anthology stories tied around a main story in which four guys break into a house to look for a specific video tape. They find a lot more, let me tell you. Some of the segments are better than others (trust me, you'll know which ones) but overall, V/H/S is one of the most imaginative, jolting, riveting, heart-beating-outside-of-your-chest-because-its-so-intense horror films of recent time. Fans of Creepshow 1 and 2, Tales From the Darkside, Twilight Zone (the movie) and even Stephen King, if you get the chance to watch V/H/S, do it! It's bloody, it's scary, it's haunting, and if you're anything like me, you'll know it scared you when it's 1:43 in the morning and the only thing you can do to make yourself fall asleep, is to review the film on IMDb.

I'm a big fan of anthology horror movies, and horror in general and I'm willing to accept found footage movies if they're done well enough. That being said this is not done well at all. They use every found footage cliché except night vision. Constant "glitch cuts", people carrying the camera around while in danger for no reason, disoriented confusing action sequences. The found footage aspects are the main weakness in this movie, but I'll put that aside for now and review this movie on its other aspects.

First of all every character in this movie is terrible. They're either perverted frat boy assholes or completely void of personality. They're not the kind of characters you can't wait to be killed, they're the kind of characters you can't wait to stop listening to. I know there's no time to really flesh out any characters in an anthology, but you can at least give them a personality, these guys are just boring, boring, boring.

The plot of most of these shorts are only possible through monumentally stupid decisions from the characters. They never call the call the cops, are constantly tripping while running away (maybe if you dropped the camera...), and the overarching plot characters are the stupidest of them all.

There's no bow-tie at the end connecting all these stories, and therefore no need for the very bland overarching story itself. However in a few of the tapes the mystery is strong enough to keep you interested and some of the tension is pretty thrilling, although it never really pays off.

I would be more forgiving of the cliché story and characters if it was easier to watch, and I'd be more forgiving of the found footage faux-pas if it had better stories. But this is the worst of both worlds, I would give this a 4/10 but I'm bumping it up 1 for the tits.

What's your initial reaction to "Found footage Anthology" or found footage in general? That should give you a bit of a clue, if you should watch this or not. One thing is for sure, if an Anthology movie is only as good as it's weakest link/story, than this would be really bad (the story covering the whole thing is tedious, boring and annoying at best)! But I don't think that it would do the short movies justice that accompany the movie.

I actually enjoyed most of them. They don't make sense as usual when it comes to Found Footage (why would they film that again? The who cut/edited them is either easy to answer or makes even less sense, depending on the way you look at it), but the stories themselves are mostly decent. Acting is good to OK (apart from the "covering" overall story as mentioned) and the scares are decent too. I still don't get the fascination with Found footage and I sure can't tell you why this spawned a sequel ...

I love found-footage films, especially when they are done well. I also love horror anthologies withe some of my favourite TV shows being The Twilight Zone, The Outer Limits, and Tales From The Darkside. The two joining together for V/H/S was a very exciting idea and gave me very lofty expectations. I was amazed to find that for the most part they were met. V/H/S sees a gang of guys break into a house in order to steal a video cassette for blackmailing purposes. Once in he house they find a huge collection of videos, each one showing a different tale of horror. The first is the story about a couple of girls picked up from a bar and recorded secretly on camera glasses. This is probably the scariest tale with some very disturbing imagery. I still can't get the look of a certain character out of my head. In it's short running time it also hits upon some emotional notes that I wasn't expecting. Perfect effects and nailbiting tension make this a great start. Video number two sees a couple on a road trip who are secretly filmed at night. The idea of an intruder watching you at your most vulnerable is nerve-racking. Story number three was my least favourite but was still mostly effective. It was let down by cheesy dialogue that over explained the details of the plot. The effects here were again very well done with a sickening look at an eyeball sliding out of a socket. Story number 4 is shot through Skype and has the biggest ambitions in terms of plot. I would like to see this again as I didn't enjoy it at first because of a terrible performance from the male lead, but there is a reason for this which makes sense after viewing. The final tale is a haunted house film that builds up incredibly well. It starts with an empty house and moves towards all hell breaking loose with some of the most flawless effects I have ever seen. Each story was interesting and most importantly it kept to the rules of found-footage. Everything appears as though it was done in-camera. It's left me thinking about the stories and getting my imagination to work overtime as not a lot is explained. The only real let down was the wrap-around that tried to connect these stories. It really didn't work and just made the film a bit too long. When I buy this on DVD I am pretty certain I will be skipping those parts. Hope we see a V/H/S 2.