La casa dell'orrore

For those who grew up with horror made in the seventies this will be a throwback to that era. Those who are into the new horror genre will find it rather boring. Let me explain it a little bit.

There isn't that much action going on and before it becomes awry you have almost wait for an hour. Before that you will have your jump scenes and the atmosphere that will take you into the horror.

I see that some reviews are talking about unknown thespians but what the hell, Barbara Crampton of the Re-animator franchise fame and Monte Markham, well known in the eighties and seventies.

If you can sit through the first hour you will be surprised to see a lot of bloody and even gory shots. Really something to check out if you are a geek of Italian gory flicks (Fulci style) but if you like the flicks made nowadays avoid it at all costs.

Gore 2/5 Nudity 0/5 Effects 3/5 Story 3/5 Comedy 0/5

To be honest, this movie baffled me. Is it absolutely terrible? No. Did it have potential? Yes. But somehow all of it amounted to only this bizarre mess of a film. Let me put something out there first: "We Are Still Here" clocks in at one hour and 17 minutes. At the end I expected there to be 20 more minutes of movie left. The whole thing felt rushed, and the ending was...abrupt, to say the least.

The story follows a couple who move into a new house hoping to move past the death of their son. This is a time-tested plot. However, "We Are Still Here" proceeds to give us almost no information about the son and no time to feel the weight of his parent's grief. It merely establishes that his mother can "feel his presence" in the house before embarking on a series of cheap scares. There are several very sudden character deaths that in a better movie would seem bold. Here they just seem lazy. There is precisely one very creepy moment that would have been perfect if it hadn't immediately transitioned to a series of jump scares (that it was also intercut with Lisa Marie's "acting" didn't help).

The later scenes involve almost cartoonish amounts of gore. If the movie was an intentional horror-comedy this would have been fine. The first 3/4 of the movie seemed to be going for straight horror, though, so I didn't know what to make of it. I could talk about the bad writing and jarringly terrible lighting as well, but what would be the point? It ultimately felt like a short film stretched beyond its limit. The concept would have worked great in a tight 15-20 minutes, where movies can get away with the spareness and ambiguity that "We Are Still Here" features. As it is, though, it feels like a movie that ran out of budget and ideas long before it was truly finished.

I had high hopes for this one, especially after seeing where it was heading. Don't ask my why, cause there have been so many such productions, and still, somehow, I hoped for the best.

OK, let us begin: the movie is not bad, it has some good jump scares, OK effects, decent plot tho ever used, good actors and a cold chill surrounding. So, why does it fail? I'll tell you: the plot brings nothing new, the ending is as predictable as it gets and it acts exactly like so many before it. OK, maybe the production is better, maybe the budget was bigger and used for the best, still, the story behind it all, has nothing new to offer, just that tired old formula.

Once you see it, you'll understand. At points it even makes little sense. But more deaths had to occur therefore logic had to make a run for it. Overall, a 5, maybe even a solid 5 but nothing more.

Cheers!

I love horror that takes place around houses, conjures presence and unleashes energy. It's the gust of motion I'm after, the familiar geography thrown asunder by metaphysical winds that lift walls. Blood can be there or not, for me it's inhabiting something that is changed in the course, shown to be no thing, illusory, a prank of our investment in the idea of solid reality.

And this is horror that moves fast, dwells and conjures with some purity. Oh the parts are all familiar; old house with a presence in the basement, a bereaved couple moving in, small New England town harboring a secret. Some have likened it to a b-movie of old as if that were a bad thing, in fact that's part of the whole appeal. Not that it pays homage to movies of old as if they should be enshrined in our estimation but that it taps into a kind of energy we've forgotten.

You wouldn't be amiss of thinking of it with Fulci in mind, in those brief years when he could cut portals through his own murk. It's that type of lumbering energy that assuredly emanates from below, stands outside doors and makes floors creak before washing with blood. It knowingly mines that legacy but short of forcing it to be a certain type of film.

In the cold, wintry fields of New England, a lonely old house wakes up every thirty years - and demands a sacrifice.

Let's face it: Barbara Crampton delivers one of her stronger performances, whereas the male lead delivers his lines in a very stunted way. He shall not even be named here. But good on Crampton! Far too many "horror icons" feel the need to phone in their performances, thinking their name on the poster is all that matters. And while it is true that Crampton's name does sell, she adds a great deal of value to her name here, in what may be her best work since the Stuart Gordon years.

We also have a fun role for Larry Fessenden, who really deserves to have a little fun. Has any other creative genius launched more great independent filmmakers in the last decade? I would guess not.