V/H/S Viral

Coming off of a franchise that I at least enjoyed V/H/S Viral was a massive disappointment! This film feels like nothing more than a cheap parody off of the other two (far superior) films in the franchise. As found footage horror film, the goal is to be scary and/or disturbing using the realism factor of "found footage", something that the first two films pulled off fairly well. Viral takes that film premise and makes a mockery out of it. While V/H/S Viral can be at least "entertaining" at times, I can with certainty tell you that you aren't missing much if you skip this one and stick to the first two.

This movie is borderline unwatchable. I tried watching this in two sittings and by the third I fell asleep. It's so bad, it's like they hunted down the worst horror writers and directors in hopes to sabotage a continuing V/H/S franchise and they succeeded. The camera-work is horrendous. It makes the final fight in Alex Cross look like The Raid 2. Awkward edits, annoying static every five seconds, terribly uninteresting plots and terribly written too. It's a shame because there was much potential from the first two V/H/S movies that this could become a good horror anthology franchise because it's such a great premise and found-footage is best in small 20-30 minutes doses but this movie tried to make an actual story with a couple random segments that make no sense.

Gun to my head, if I had to pick the best segment it would have to be the one with the alien penises. That sentence alone should tell you enough about this movie. It was such a dumb segment and it made no sense but actually attempted suspense and some form of story. The main story is dogsh*t. I hate this movie a lot. I remember thinking after V/H/S/2 "man, what a great idea for a horror franchise. I hope they continue these" and then Viral had to come along and take a heaping dump on film and sell it as a V/H/S movie.

If you liked the first two V/H/S movies, don't watch this. Don't ever watch this movie unless you want to feel depressed and p*ssed off in which case by all means V/H/S: Viral is the only thing you should watch. This movie sucks balls. It should have never been made and whoever greenlit this atrocious script should be fired if they haven't been already. I wish I could unwatch this movie. Spare yourselves.

This movie is so awful it put me in a bad mood. Stay away, and I say this as a guy with an original VHS poser.

The wraparound story tries to break formula but ends up being a mess. I'm fine with a mess if it's entertaining or scary, but this felt like it was shot in a weekend.

The first story doesn't feel like it belongs in a VHS movie and the tone doesn't match. It's something your mom would like.

The middle story starts out promising but manages to feel like a parody of itself by the end. My favorite (?) of the bunch.

The third story feels like it should be airing on MTV in 2003.

Another bummer is that the directors have done good movies (Resolution and Timecrimes), I don't know how they lost their mojo here.

Also, there are only three stories. I'm cool with a shorter movie if it's a better movie, but they cut the fourth. People speculate bit was axed because it was so bad. How terrible must it have been to be left out of this limp, toothless pile?

Any soul, any scary or funny from the first two is not here. Avoid.

V/H/S 1 and 2 were amazing in my opinion. They had mostly no clichés and were really engaging. I'd re-watch them any day. I recently got to getting V/H/S: Viral and my friend and I love these movies so we were really excited to see this one. Sorry to say, but it was a huge disappointment... There were some very blunt parts, and some parts that seemed out of place. I also liked how in V/H/S 1 and 2 they were all from P.O.V Cameras. Or how it's also called, Shaky Cam. Everything is recorded from a personal camera making it seem more realistic. Some parts of this movie didn't have that. They were higher budget shots. I think they were going for a higher budget type movie to make it better but it made it worse. There are those Shaky cam parts but with it but not all like that, it didn't feel the same. I would hope that the Writers and Producers of this movie see all these reviews and decide to make V/H/S: Redemtion or V/H/S: Revival or something. A name of re-newel that stuck to the first two movies. I'm sorry to say, but If you're a fan of V/H/S, I wouldn't watch this. There are a couple decent parts, but nothing like the first two.

First I'd like to say, as with any horror film, the less you know about the film going in the better it will be. For those wondering if they should spend their money on this. I would say wait for Netflix, IMO it does not live up to the previous VHS movies, and actually seems to lose what the unique premise was. I love VHS and I liked VHS 2 a good bit, but this feels like a drop off of sorts. If VHS was a 9 and VHS 2 was a 7.5 then VHS Viral is probably an average of 5.5 (but the second segment is a MUST SEE).

The previous 2 movies have gotten many talented young horror film makers and collectives together to make interesting short films. VHS was probably my favorite horror film of 2012, some of the shorts fell flat (static monster and connecting story) but most of the others are really amazing, especially the last. VHS 2 lacked some of the originality but still felt like a solid horror film. VHS Viral just feels like it lacks the same vision and direction that VHS 1 and 2 had.

Whether you like it or hate it VHS is built around the idea of playing with portable cameras, experimenting with the "found footage" horror sub-genre, and really presenting a horror film from the POV of those going through it. It is basically like a haunted house on film, some with interesting stories and ideas. VHS 2 didn't really revolutionize anything but was still interesting. It stuck with the premise and kept it going in interesting ways. Probably my biggest issue with VHS Viral is that it ostensibly completely drops the found footage premise, but still sticks with the found footage type editing and shooting. This breaks the immersion, which is The whole point of found footage stuff.

As you can tell I didn't like the movie for the most part. The second segment is the ONLY reason it even has 4 stars out of 10. Ultimately though I am disappointed because they didn't really try anything interesting with the found footage format, especially the way that the previous 2 films did. Also 3 segments feels too short, even though this film has a lot of filler.