It's in the Blood

HAUNTED is a largely uninteresting low budget horror feature notable only for casting Lance Henriksen in a leading role. It's an essential two-hander in which a father and son head into the woods to bond but soon find themselves tracked down by a mysterious demonic creature. Is there really something stalking them or are dark secrets from the past to blame?

The problem is that you won't really care because this film is sloppily written, focusing too much on uninteresting twists for the most part. The best thing about it by far is Henriksen, who delivers a performance of depth and disturbance, ably putting across the mind of a harrowed man. Henriksen has long been a cult favourite in supporting roles so it's nice to see him get the chance to shine here.

Unfortunately the actor playing opposite him, Sean Elliot as the son, just can't keep up with his performance and he feels wooden, his character dull. The cinematography is pretty poor, with too many tricks trying to hide the low budget, and in the end it's a film where nothing much really happens. There's little insight come the finale, just unpleasant gore effects and a production in need of a proper story.

It's not confusing, it's just so laden with obvious symbolism and deliberate ambiguity (like all too many faux "intellectual" student films) that it sloshes about struggling for "depth" and "deeper meaning" while never really delivering either. Out of focus shots and repetitious edits might mask some no-budget deficiencies but this film HAD a budget - they just didn't know what to do with it. Except hire Lance Henriksen. This is literally a case where it's worth watching just for the man's performance. It's a shame they didn't have a more focused script to be worthy of his involvement. Instead we have a twenty-minute arty student film stretched ponderously out to eighty minutes (yet feels a lot longer) when the same premise, intelligently presented (and grounded by Mr. Henriksen) could have made an excellent film at twice the length. The father and lost son dynamic; the horrifying incident in their past; the injury in the woods and, yes, even the threat of "something else in the woods" as a metaphor, all of these could have successfully been presented in a coherent fashion - even realistically as in Deliverance - instead of obscured by the art-house/third-year film student approach that makes this film far less than what it could have been. It's not that the film is simply bad - it isn't - it's just another example of "with a little more effort it could have been so much better." And then it might have been the showcase Lance Henriksen has long deserved.

Had a little bigger expectations for this movie, which is were I went wrong. "It's in the Blood" started off bad, and ending in same fashion. There is not to much to this movie, its very confusing, not very good special effects, and very jumpy. Add all those up and what do you get? A waste of 3 million dollars. The acting was OK at best and that is not saying very much. A story about a guy and his dad lost in the woods after his dad badly hurts himself, when they realize they are not the only ones out there. That had me intrigued. Do not let it fool you, you will be wishing you were in the woods, not watching this movie. 3 out of 10 stars (very generously) -TV or don't bother

Its somehow pleasantly atmospheric, the performances are better than ok, but the movie breaks about halfway through when the whole plot is exposed. the second half becomes painful to watch, and drags to a corny, unfulfilling end. i would 4.5 this based on lance henriksens performance, but given the choice id skip it altogether. not enough substance to fill out an already slim 80 minutes

Despite some good acting by Lance Henriksen, this movie is hamstrung by a plot that makes no sense at all. It's not even a "makes you think" kind of ambiguity, just a complete failure to understand the rudiments of plot. Utter waste of time, and the positive reviews for this are clearly either the producers or some publicist involved -- no one could claim this movie was anywhere near good. The cinematography is passable, the special effects laughable, the guy playing October is horrific and has the charisma of a piece of toast, the monster is more kitschy than scary, etc. The guy who plays the villain comes off as suitably creepy at least, but that's about the most one can say about this dim-witted exercise in obfuscation.