Alone in the Ghost House

Mockfilms or documovies, whatever you prefer to them, are one of my favorite types of horror films. That being said, this is undoubtedly one of the worst ones I have ever seen. Its like a group of friends bought video cameras and wanted to use them immediately. There are numerous scenes that serve no purpose, and the film as a whole- lacks any direction. Transitioning from hunting paranormal activity, to all of the sudden, Bloody Mary without any coherence.

The only frightening moment is when the cameraman hides to jump scare the blonde woman. There is even a pointless shower scene that leads to the main character mentioning her pregnancy, which is then never addressed again in the film. The impro lines a terrible idea, and that is all they do in this movie. The cameraman is the worst character in the film. He's loud and overacts throughout the entire thing. He talks about things that make absolutely no sense nor have any relevance to the film. All in all, do not waste your time with this one.

Nothing to see here... Literally nothing. No ghosts, no demons, no things that go bump in the night... NOTHING! 4 people enter a house, with a " psychic" then nothing happens, the psychic leaves, and then... Nothing happens. They go to sleep, and something stupid happens that is not worth an hour and a half of your time to see. Like I said... Move along, nothing to see here.

Normally I'm not a big fan of found footage movies as they can be very predictable. I was very pleased to find this movie NOT predictable! I enjoyed seeing various types of cameras used as well as seeing the footage itself vary between type of camera. Some found footage movies suffer from having different cameras yet they all look exactly the same.

Another enjoyable item was not seeing the cameraman, Ford, for a big chunk of time. We knew who he was, he interacted with the other characters, but was never seen until about 15 minutes into the film and it was mainly on accident. After that the viewer began to see him more often but it was nice to have that extra mystery.

The only problem I had with the film is that there were a few opportunities where a small change could have made the scene from a great scene to a fantastic scene. I don't want to go into details as to not spoil anything, but one involves the timing of a practical joke that could have been moved up to get the most jump from the viewer. As the joke was laid out in the film it worked great for the scene and got the desired effect! One thing that was impressive was how each of the character was fleshed out in ways that aren't shoved down the viewer's throat. Main example is we get a very small snippet of Ford on the phone that completely shifts how you can perceive his character, and the scene itself wasn't important to the plot and could even be viewed as an unimportant scene, yet it worked perfectly for what we knew about Ford.

The acting itself was great as usual with most of director Couto's films. Erin R Ryan did a great job in her role as an eccentric medium. Joni Durian was able to capture the essence of documentarians with a wide-eyed look that pushes extra emphasis to key words.

How can you make a movie about the paranormal without anything paranormal taking place? It just boggles my mind. The only reason I am giving this movie 3 stars is because Joni is really cute.

Worth watching only for the hilariously over the top performance from the "psychic". 15 minutes of unintentional comedy gold buried in the middle of a real stinker of a movie.