The Frightening

The eighteen years old Corey Peterson (Matt Twining) moves with his mother to a small town due a trauma in the past. On his first day at Hallows End High School, he is approached by the student also new arrival in town Mason (James Foley) that tells him about a death of a friend of him in the school and advises Corey to stay away from the wrestler Perry (Jack Carlisle III) and his gang. When two other students vanish, Corey decides to talk to Principal Rizcheck (Robert Donavan), who does not give any attention to him. Together with Mason, they investigate the secret about the school and disclose the dark truth about Hallows End and the missing students.

"The Frightening" has a good premise, but the screenplay and the edition are terrible. The story is flawed, but entertaining and watchable; however, the use of annoying noises and music score, and the successive cuts in many scenes are really irritating. My vote is five.

Title (Brazil): "Grito de Pavor" ("Fright Scream")

This isn't as bad as some reviewers would have you believe, but it's still not good. The story is borrowed from half-a-dozen other movies, though there are a couple of decent plot points that are semi-original. The flaws are numerous: bad acting, bad slasher FX, and very bad script. The only one who impressed me was the main character's mother, who was suitably subtle in her role. The FX are just laughable, and whoever thought up the costumes for the killers was just not putting any effort into it. Of course, the actors were all burdened with lines that make it evident that the writer(s) put TOO much effort into them. (What 17-year-olds talk like that?) But even with these flaws, the story unrolls at a reasonable pace and the movie makes progress towards the final resolution in a determined and dogged fashion. The end itself makes you feel a bit cheated.

If you have nothing better to do on some late night, this is an acceptable slasher movie. But just barely.

Although the plot looked like something a 13 year old might concoct with his buddies, there was a suprisingly erotic touch to this movie. From the leather clad boy in the opening sequence to the loving shots of Matt Twining's golden body one would think that this was designed for an avant-garde audience. If this were the intent, it would have been a nice touch to see the blonde girl bind Matt's wrists and ankles when she forced him to his knees in the dream sequence. The costume designed could have put her in a nice dominatrix outfit and she could have proceeded to give Matt a nice beating for having intruded on her little session with the underwear boys. Given the goofiness of the rest of the movie, replete with too-red blood and monotone lines, a little s&m in the basement would have made the movie far more watchable.

A teenager haunted by visions of accidently killing someone during a wrestling tournament moves to a new town w/ his mother (Brinke Stevens) to get away from it all. At his now school though a series of murders have been occuring and it looks like he could be next.

What is frightening about this film is that it was made and got a pretty decent release into video stores. It totally lacks any character development, its gore and fright scenes are poorly excuted, and it seems like more of an excuse to show cute, well toned young men parade about in their boxer briefs then an actual movie. And by the way, the final twist is as lame as they get.

Rated R; Graphic Violence and Guys Running Around in Their Boxer Briefs

Well written, well acted, well photographed, well directed but absolutely hideously edited horror film. Good editing should be invisible. It should never call attention to itself. The editing in THE FRIGHTENING makes the film unwatchable. There are these absolutely ridiculous and unnecessary flashes of white every two seconds. This makes watching THE FRIGHTENING about the same as experiencing Chinese water torture. What were they thinking? Brinke Stevens makes a nice cameo appearance, and the lead actor who plays her son is very good. I can't believe a director as accomplished as David DeCoteau would give his movie to an editor who made the film an unwatchable experience.