The Guest House

Bad acting, unbelievable plot and characters. Don't understand how they even got financing to make this.

The Guest House is an offbeat quirky thriller that puts a fresh twist on the Stalker Genre. Jake Roth, (Tom Alper), is kicked out of his house, and with limited funds and bad credit must find a place to live. Enter Max Foster, the seemingly perfect landlord with a cool-back house, (pool included), for rent. Jake and Max bond right away, becoming best of friends. That is of course, until Jake uncovers Max's dark secret. When Jake realizes he must distance himself from Max, the intensity truly begins.

This is clearly a low budget "indie", which is unusually well made for its seemingly modest budget. The acting is superb, with fine performances across the board, including some of the supporting roles by Daniel Baldwin who is perfectly cast as the arrogant-jerk boss. And Eileen Davidson, (Emmy award winning actress), who gives a rememberable performance as the "villians' therapist, who is put in an unenviable task of trying to provide therapy to a "psychopath".

The story is also very engaging, as it mixes dark humor, and plenty of action, into what is ultimately a psychological thriller. The film also features quite a compelling score that only adds towards the films appeal.

Perhaps if this movie was made by a big studio, with a big budget and big stars, The Guest House would have made of a lot more noise on a national, and worldwide level. But that is not to take away from this film. This is a fun, well made film, that won numerous awards at the Hollywood Reel Independent Festival. The Guest House keeps your attention, from beginning to end, and is well worth the hour and a half of your time.

Was drawn into seeing 'The Guest House' with a cool poster/cover, an slightly intriguing but very derivative premise and as someone with a general appreciation for horror. That it was low-budget, which from frequent personal experience is rarely a good sign due to that there are so many poor ones out there, made me though apprehensive.

'The Guest House' is sadly however yet another film seen recently, hence some reiteration because the exact same strengths and flaws those films are present here, that to me was incredibly disappointing considering its potential which it doesn't do anywhere near enough with. As a film it's weak, with a plethora of problems (huge ones too) and doesn't do enough with its potential, which was hardly small. There is very little good about it

Lets start with the positives. The scenery is atmospheric and spooky.

Although most of it looks schlocky, some of the shots look decent. The start intrigues somewhat, shame the rest of the film completely goes downhill and never recovers.

Unfortunately, the story does feel paper thin, disjointed and over-stretched and some of it feels vague, under-explained in the last third where the film especially became duller, more predictable, more senseless and less scary. Too many characters are too sketchy and with nowhere near enough to make one want to endear to them. Their annoying and illogical decision making and behaviours frustrates.

Making the film feel bland and forgettable with not enough heart put into it. The effects are ropy at best, the sound quality is obvious and utilised cheaply (being too loud in the build ups and people's reactions) and it's best not mentioning the uniformly lumbering and histrionic acting.

Dialogue can be stilted and rambling, with lots of clichés and no depth whatsoever, while the pace goes to a standstill very quickly and drags on forever with very little going on worth caring about, never recovering. Found too many the supposedly shocking moments not surprising or scary and the supposedly creepy atmosphere dreary, due to the excessive obviousness, a lot of dumb and vague moments and explanations and the lack of tension and suspense. Would not have minded the lack of originality (the film is extremely derivative and in a dumbed and watered down way) if the story and atmosphere were at least alright in execution, in reality they were both dreadfully done. Not to mention a whole novel's worth of inconsistencies and continuity errors and a structure so aimless and confused it renders some of the film incoherent.

There are a good deal of underdeveloped plot elements and often nonsensical and confusing character motivations, while too many of the things to make you jump or shocked are far from creative or scary and are pretty tame. The ending can be seen from miles away and is so ludicrous that the viewer's intelligence is insulted.

There is not enough threat here and what there is of it tends to be used poorly, it is completely unimaginative, very repetitive and more odd than creepy, completely failing to show any sense of horror and resorting to cheap typical horror tropes. Some badly sagging momentum too. The direction is leaden, inexperience seems to be all over the film, and the music doesn't really fit. There is no creativity or anything shocking.

In summation, weak. 3/10 Bethany Cox

Amazon and Netflix seems to be hitting their stride with horrible horror movies. This one is different.

I thought I was renting a cheesy horror film based on the cover on Amazon. However, I was greatly surprised. This is a well made, stalker movie, which actually plays more like a dark comedy/psychological thriller. Yes, the film was low budget, but was executed with a lot of effort and craftsmanship. Everything from the music, writing, acting, casting, was superbly done.

I often found myself laughing out loud at the premise of the movie. Imagine being stalked and pursued, by a six foot 7, muscular-athletic, black man, who has a crush on you and won't leave you alone, because he's lonely, and decided that you were his soul-mate. Tom Alper, who I've never heard of before, played the part to if not to perfection, then to a tee. At first you think Alper is a first rate jerk, since he's part racist, part homophobe, cheats on his ex. But the more you watch Alper, you realize he's not such a bad guy, just rough around the edges. In fact, Alper slowly wins you over as you see how much he loves his daughter, and his ex.

Just when you start feeling empathy for the lead, you realize what a mess he's in, and what a mess he's created for his family. Which of course, is what the writers had in mind. All of this leads to an exciting, action-packed climax and resolution. Alper's emotionally charged, crying scene at the end as he pleads with the villain, had me literally on the edge of my seat.

This film is fun, entertaining, original and about 100 times better than the average indy film. Big thumbs up.