Imagens do Mal

Saw 'Camera Obscura', being fond of horror regardless of budget (even if not my favourite genre) and being intrigued by the quite creative premise. Being behind on my film watching and reviewing, with a long to watch and review list that keeps getting longer, it took me a while to get round to watching and reviewing it.

Giving 'Camera Obscura' a fair chance with being interest and apprehension, it turned out to be far better than expected. Won't say that 'Camera Obscura' is a great film because it isn't and the potential, while not wasted, is not fully lived up to. Considering the large number of films seen recently being mediocre and less and wasting potential, was expecting worse and was relieved that while wanting in a fair few areas it was actually one of my better recent low-budget viewings.

Starting with the positives, generally the production values could have been much worse. There is a real sense of eeriness, foreboding and a decently stylish atmosphere, and it makes the most of the confined and at times effectively claustrophobic setting. The music is also suitably haunting and manages to not be too intrusive, likewise with the sound not being too obvious (a bugbear of mine with low-budget viewings recently).

There is tension, suspense and genuine creepiness. The acting is better than average, particularly from the leads and the direction is assured in the first half while slackening later.

Would have liked however more tension and suspense in the second half particularly and for some of the scares that become more prominent in the second half to be more creative and less trying-too-hard to the point of cheesiness, particularly when it becomes more prominent in the action. The dialogue is cheesy and awkward generally.

Found that the story could have been executed better too. Too many parts are uneventful, the narrative structure is not always coherent and it can feel padded, not to mention an ending that perplexes in its anti-climactic and muddled convolution. The mystery and psychological elements needed more focus, the latter was underexplored and muddled somewhat at times. There are exceptions to the better than expected production values, the effects are shoddy and the editing could have been tighter.

Overall, better than expected but didn't blow me away. 5/10 Bethany Cox

For the life of me, I don't understand why Chiller continues to make movies. None of the films have been successful as horror movies, and I actively avoid movies that are made by the network. I rented this movie based on some glowing reviews, and I feel like I deserve to have my money returned to me, and the contents of this movie erased from my memory. It was just awful, boring and tame in the way Lifetime movies are. Nothing about it was scary, nothing about it was particularity well done, and the gore and blood that is shown is tame and limited. The acting was competent, I suppose, but it's unfortunate that the rest of the film is such a travesty. DO NOT PAY TO WATCH THIS MOVIE. This studio really needs to take the hint that their output is not doing anything to advance the horror genre in any meaningful way. SAD!

Movie had a good premise and started off quite well but soon went down the toilet with its over the top gore, poor photography and confused story.

The music was actually not bad; very reminiscent of John Carpenter and in many places seemed out of place , the plot was confusing - was he actually a psycho and imagining everything which i presume was the end game there wasn't much explanation at the end and it seemed to end too soon. The over the top gore actually began to make it look like a comedy and we started laughing at points when we really shouldn't have!

Some poor acting and bizarre plot holes didn't help.

Overall it could have been good but ended up in the bargain bin bucket!

'CAMERA OBSCURA': Four Stars (Out of Five)

An indie horror flick about a veteran war photographer with PTSD, that sees future deaths in the photos that he takes (on a vintage World War II era camera). It was directed by first time feature filmmaker Aaron B. Koontz, and it was written by Koontz and Cameron Burns (Koontz and Burns also served as producers on the film). The movie stars Charlie Denham, Nadja Bobyleva, Catherine Curtin, Chase Williamson and Noah Segan. It's a very creepy and disturbing little indie horror flick.

Jack Zeller (Denham) is a professional photographer, and war veteran, who's dealing with some severe mental issues (due to his time in Afghanistan). To help him get through these mental problems, his fiancé, Claire (Bobyleva), buys him a vintage camera at a work auction. She then gets him a job taking photos for the real estate company she works for. When Jack gets the photos developed though, he starts to see images of future deaths in them. When those deaths start to become a reality, Jack becomes even more mentally unstable as he tries to figure out what to do about them.

The movie is extremely creepy, and it only gets creepier as it goes on. Denham gives a great performance in the lead, and he really makes you feel what it's like to go mad. You keep wanting the character to stop doing the things he's doing, as a result of his madness, but he keeps doing them anyway. It's a really disturbing and dark movie! Very effectively directed, and written, by Koontz and Burns. If you're a fan of really dark horror flicks, you should definitely give this one a try.

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Adjusting to a new life, a disturbed man receives a vintage camera as a present only to find the pictures he develops seem to predict the future with a series of accidental deaths, and when his fiancée appears in one of the pictures he tries to change history to ensure she stays alive.

Overall, this was a decent if entirely forgettable affair. One of the few enjoyable elements to this one is the fact that there's quite a decent mystery angle employed here with how this one plays out the camera's purpose. Since it's acquired in a manner that doesn't necessarily offer the most intensive knowledge of the situation, the eventual discovery of its history and how it was tied to the past atrocities has a really intriguing and occasionally chilling method to be featured here. As this becomes a bit more chilling with the connection of the incidents in the photographs and his race to prevent them from happening, it does have a somewhat decent storyline at play here. The other rather enjoyable aspect of this one comes from the way the film builds up its series of accidents as there's a lot to like with these scenes. Starting off innocently with the coincidences including the death at the playground he walked by to the construction site accident, it soon gives way to slightly more chilling scenes including the incident at the public swimming pool or his heroic attempts at the apartment as being a somewhat entertaining series of action scenes to give this some life. That it changes over in the later half to his attempts at saving her drive this into some rather shocking and brutal scenes that generate some solid gore and action scenes in the final half. These here manage to hold this up over its many flaws. Much of the film's problems stem from the central issue associated with films of this type of storyline in that it's entirely based on the obliviousness of characters to recognize the central danger. As we know from the beginning how dangerous the camera really is, the fact that nobody else recognizes this makes the film more of an exercise in frustration than terror as we spend more time trying to ensure they get rid of the cursed object than keep it around. Once it becomes obvious that the special pictures are coming true, the need to hide its powers becomes less and less obvious which basically renders the film far more a suspenseless slough through expected terrain rather than a terrifying ordeal. That manages to tie into another big problem here in the extremely dull pacing that pops up here. Not only is this film a product of not having an appropriate plot line to stretch out for as long as it does, but the fact that the majority of it's running time is spent devoted to an area that frustrates viewers leaves it cold. As these scenes go about running through these predetermined ideas that really deserve outside forces be brought onboard to help determine the cause of it all, these manage to really infuriate by going through so many scenarios that should've required something else come into play beforehand that film is troubling more often than not. The other big problem here is that a large portion of the accidents occur off- screen and reported later, making it hard to really get any real sense of fear out of these scenes. Overall, these are the issues that hold it down.

Rated Unrated/: Graphic Violence, Graphic Language, Brief Nudity, a sex scene and drug use.