A Casa dos Mortos

For a perfect rate I would have put down 5.5 stars, cause 6 is too much and 5 still too little, but, we have to work with what we have, so 5 stars from me and one positive review!

Without spoiling it or give away unnecessary information, I'm going to keep it short and let you know, that Demonic, even tho such a cliché of a name, plot and even cover, stands up much better than most such productions probably because it was kept simple. Effective, intriguing, good acting, well picked actors, it wasn't the "let's do a horror in the woods" or "in a haunted house", but I genuinely think they wanted to make a horror. And they sure succeed!

So, compared to a lot of similar movies, Demonic offers thrills, scares, a little bit of mystery, overall, a good time!

Cheers!

This wasn't a bad movie. I had no expectations for this to be good at all. However, I was surprised. It wasn't great, but it was pretty original, and the acting was well done.

My big problem with the movie was all the jumping back-and-forth between the past and present scenes. They should've just stuck with the people going to the house, and then they could've dealt with the aftermath with the police. It was confusing for the first few times.

I gave this a 5-star rating. If you're in the mood for a fairly original story that actually does have some jump moments that are well executed, you might want to give this a try.

... and they are all made of ticky-tacky and they all look just the same. The sad thing is that I like most of the lead actors. We've seen Frank Grillo in Captain America as a decent villain and many other films as well. Maria Bello still looks gorgeous, even at her age. Cody Horn is cute as hell. Even the other actors were decent, considering they were all playing cardboard characters (like the Asian tech-savy expendable character).

The script, though, as well as the entire direction and structure of the film was identical to some others haunted house features. The oh so predictable twist at the end, the loud bass noises, the electronics that fail in case of ghosts or show a ghost when you can't see it or don't show a ghost when you can, the self closing and locking doors, the stupid people that stay in the house when they are attacked by supernatural forces, the police that are always a step behind the events and so on and so on and so on.

Bottom line: if you feel like another haunted house film with young idiots trying to prove the existence of the supernatural only to whine when they find it, this is the film for you. If you are looking for anything original, skip it.

I see reviews here from people who saw this in the theater. If I saw it in the theater, and paid actual money for it, I'd probably give it a 5 as well. But I watched it on Netflix while doing my hobby. For that it's perfectly fun. It's not a great horror movie. It relies on pretty predictable jump scares and quick shots of creepy things. You can see the "twist" coming from a mile away. But it's not terrible. It's acted well-enough, has decent pacing, and the production quality is good.

If you're like me and have watched pretty much every other horror movie on Netflix, then you'll probably enjoy it well enough. If you want a great horror movie, though, then you'll want to keep looking.

The film's premise is a straightforward concept that incorporates classic, overdone horror tropes with slices of Gen X flavor, in the form of found footage - as in documentary footage recovered from the scene. The dual concepts, although not original, are offered up in a clever parallel time line. It creates a sort of murder mystery aspect, broken up by standard paranormal horror moments next to found footage sequences. To a small degree the mixture sometimes feels disjointed, but the back and forth does break up any monotony that would otherwise be present.

The cast give quality performances, the line up consists of recognizable faces, and known names. There is a glare of underdevelopment to the characters, that if a bit of tweaking had been done, could have really became full-bodied portrayals. Still there is enough to make them relatable.

Special effects are the typical gimmicks one expects in these kind of films. Shock gags and sound bites meant to give a fright are over used and often fall flat. Still "Demonic" has its moments of genuine chills, and the gore elements are quality. Think "Insidious" -esque trickery, just a few more misses. The horror moments run the gambit of "see it coming" to "cool and creepy".

Overall the film is a mediocre but watchable horror flick with some quality actors, refreshing concepts, entertaining climax, and enough death to hit that ghoulish spot. It does have some redundancy issues, and a cloud of "know what's going to happen before it happens", but the movie gives enough to make it enjoyable.