The Remains

There was some over-acting from the medium at the start. Other than that, I was mainly glad to see that the children could act, and did a pretty good job of it. Child-actors who are not just skilled enough to create the suspension of disbelief, but also are interesting to watch must be either difficult to find, or too expensive for most film-makers' budgets.

Apart from that the movie built up, built up, and then... poof. It was over, without a creative surprise or unusual twist- anywhere. Summary: some creepy things happened, it got more tense with the creepy things building up, we are waiting for the big blowout which was more of a predictable letdown, and then it was over (except for me sitting there swearing about what a crappy movie I'd just watched).

I recommend the viewers out there skip this one. Read a book, wash your dog, rearrange the sweaters in your closet by colour. I wish someone had told me the same.

So listen, the set design and style works and the basic premise is nothing special but it could work. The problem is there are many scenes that literally feel like the first take, as if actors are holding their script in their hands reading their lines out loud for the first time. It's rather painful at times and either they were short on time and could only do a couple takes, or the director needed a lot more experience directing actors. Some of the actors are in other projects and have performed much better so this really does fall onto director's responsibility. I don't recommend this movie.

We don't agree with the harsh reviews of this movie. This is a haunted house flick, and having lived in a big old haunted Victorian, we thought they did a very realistic job of giving you the feeling of what that is like. It's not constant terror or horror, but lots of creepy, weird things happening that you are always trying to explain away (seeing figures, crashes in the attic, noises and voices). The seance was a good idea, as that was very popular during the Victorian times and they did good job of making it seem like it could be a hoax. Our frustration was with the thin story line about the haunting (what was going on with the original family, what happened to the girl, etc). You can make an educated guess, but revealing that story through the haunted chest in the attic would have been much more interesting and scary and would have led to a better ending which seemed rushed and hokey. We thought the characters were well rendered and believable, seemed like a real family, not saccharine where you root for them to get offed. This is one where it would be worth someone with better writing skills taking a shot at fleshing it out. Has the potential to be a really good scary movie. Seemed like the unscrupulous Realtor idea came from American Horror Story's first season. Now that was scary!

The synopsis for "The Remains" is what lured me in, well, and also because I have always enjoyed horror movies. But I wasn't familiar with this movie prior to stumbling upon it by sheer random luck.

And now having seen it, I can check it off the list, and say that I have seen it. It wasn't a particularly impressive movie, to be bluntly honest. The movie had a huge potential, but director Thomas Della Bella didn't utilize the potential. And the few scare moments there were to be found throughout the movie ended up as being nothing impressive, mere moments that you shrugged off with a casual shake of the head.

I will say that the atmosphere in the movie was good, and Thomas Della Bella was good at building up the suspense, but he just lacked the conviction to bring it to a fulfilling climax. As such, then the movie suffered terribly, and ended up being less than mediocre.

For a horror movie, then the only really frightening thing about the movie was the lack of scary moments and things that actually made you want to turn on the light. It was a dull, slow experience if you are looking for a good scare.

The acting in "The Remains" was adequate, and it was Todd Lowe who was carrying the movie with his performance.

Usually a good horror movie also has fairly good special effects. "The Remains" hardly used any special effects. So don't expect this to be a glorious Hollywood special effects galore.

The best thing about the movie was actually the ending. That took me by surprise, and I hadn't seen that coming. So that was an upside to an otherwise flaccid and monotone movie.

"The Remains" is the type of horror movie that you watch once, then you bag and tag it, put it on the shelf, most likely never to see the light of day again.

The movie starts out interesting and it does pull you in. But as far as jumps and hair-raising...eh. It's the usual family finds a house way cheaper than it should be...(Haunted house red flag...) and moves in. Strange things begin to happen and they try to explain it away when anyone else...me included...would be sent screaming into the streets, clothed or not. The acting is not terrible and the jumps in the film keeps you hanging on hoping for that happy ending you know will never happen. This IS a horror movie, people. It's very rare. All in all not a complete waste of time and me and my wife were actually surprised by the 3.7 rating it received on IMDb. Didn't think it was quite that bad, but the people have spoken. Until the next bad movie.