Hollows Grove

Hello everyone, I don't speak English very well, but I was not too lazy to even go to the translator. Looking for a super low budget version of Grave Encounters? So this is it. The film absorbed all the disadvantages, weaknesses at the same time losing the main advantages of Grave Encounters - the atmosphere of horror, appropriate humor flowing first into a thriller and then into a full-fledged horror. The director of this film, as well as the rest of the crew with the exception of Lance Henriksen, did not give anything worth watching either before or after this film. Who gave the money for this? Why does this even have one star at all? This is an excellent guide to how not to make films, how not to write a script, how not to act and how not to make scenery. Don't waste time on this movie, especially if you are a horror fan (like me) because you will experience pain and shame from this movie.

I was lucky enough to see a pre-screening of this movie, but I have to say that if I paid too see it in theaters, I wouldn't have been disappointed. For a scary movie, especially a low budget one, this is really good. Initially everybody watching it with me complained about the slow build and the fact that we were sick of the flood of "home movie" style scary movies. But this movie made up did it all very well. For starters, the home movie style isn't the same as in most movies. The camera isn't constantly running, shaking, flipping, and falling. It's steady for about 90% of the movie, and I thoroughly appreciate that. And the slow build I spoke about earlier is necessary, it helped me to settle in before it scared me. Which it definitely did. It didn't do it with crazy cheap scares or jump scenes, but with that slow build I mentioned earlier. It built the tension and then cut through it. The characters are pretty well developed and the acting is good. Nobody is going to win any Oscars for this, but I wasn't left wanting anything from the actors. Everybody played their part, and they played it well. The story is the usual "we go to a haunted place and discover it's actually haunted" but the perspective is pretty different. Though the movie was semi-predictable, it kept me and everybody I watched it with on the edge of our seats, especially near the end. My only real complaint about this movie is the beginning and end scenes with the detective. It made it seem too much like an interactive movie at Universal Studios or something. But stay after the credits, and the bad ending scene makes up for itself.

Yet another movie trying to take advance of the presence of this God of cinema called Lance Henriksen, putting him almost on the cover but not so much on the screen. Don't know why he puts up with this, he can and always will do better than this!

Now about the movie: I've seen too many like this. Nothing new out of production, acting, plot, scares, ideas, only difference between movies like this or SxTape, Grave Encounters and so many others simply consist on the director's decision or sometimes on the length of the film. Here, they kept it short, I do appreciate quality over quantity but as said they brought absolutely nothing new. Reason to recommend it? Only to pass the time if you are in the dying need of a time killer.

No point in saying more than needed, watch it, don't watch it, it all comes up to you. If you do so, expect the expected, you'll get just that. Another typical found footage film, with a crew going inside an abandoned hospital where strange things begin to happen. Ba da dumb!

Cheers!

Lance Henrikson has become a horror icon. He's protected the Antichrist, fought the Terminator, battled demons, Aliens and Predators. He's been in over 200 movies and now he's in a found footage horror movie. Too bad he only has 2 scenes.

I went into this thinking it would be along the lines of Grave Encounters, which I really like, and it sort of is. The problem is that it's missing most of the scares. Whereas Grave Encounters went right for the jugular, this one has most of the spooky stuff happening off camera (singing and whispering heard, things disappearing when an area is returned to). The setting is creepy and some genuinely frightening stuff happens near the end, but it is almost too late by then.

Hollows Grove did keep me interested throughout however and is definitely worth a watch for fans of these types of movies. 6.5/10.

The acting is pretty bad. The guy who plays Chad is the best of the lot I'd say. Matt Doherty is up there in the absolute worst horror movie actors I've seen. I actually looked him up on IMDb just to see who he was and what other acting jobs he'd gotten, which is when I decided to leave a review. There were a couple scenes where I laughed out loud from the absurdity of his acting.

The plot and script are decent. Overall, if it's a rainy day, you've blown through everything on Netflix that looks good to you, and you have nothing else to do, give it a look. There are some okay jump scares and a few creepy moments. Lance Henriksen was a pleasant surprise. It's always interesting to see where he'll pop up.