Death by Invitation

I agree with the other reviews - so why am i writing. Because watching this actually made me angry. I've dabbled in low-budget filmmaking and its a real challenge. But there is no excuse for two things: 1. an absolute crap script. 2. Tedium in the locations you choose. Follow the rules set down by low-budget filmmakers from the past and don't do what Herschel Gordon Lewis did and shoot against ugly walls in boring living rooms. This film has one scene after another take place at a dinner table. Also, did anyone have any fun whatsoever in making this film? There is little joy in evidence. Hard for me to believe our writer/director went on to write White Line Fever. there is no talent whatsoever in evidence in this ludicrous, uninteresting, incomplete, incompetent script.

I like bad movies. Or, shall I say movies so bad that they are funny--such as "Plan 9 From Outer Space", "The Apple", "The Room" or "Robot Monster". However, there is another type of bad movie that I simply cannot stand--BORING bad movies. These are movies that you can't even enjoy on a camp level and they therefore have nothing to offer. "Death by Invitation" is clearly in the latter category. Now this truly is amazing given the plot--as almost any director should have been able to make this interesting--any director but Ken Friedman that is. While he might be a very nice person and has written a few good films, when it comes to directing, this is not his forte and this first directorial effort possibly is the reason he's directed very few films.

The film is about a lady whose ancestor was killed during the witch trials*. Now, centuries later, she is out to avenge this death by killing the relatives of her killers. And what is her weapon? UTTER AND COMPLETE BOREDOM!!! A great example of this is relatively early in the film when instead of just killing some bad actor (and wow, he was bad), she talked on and on and on about some tribe of female warriors. As for the killing, you really couldn't even see how it happened...nor did you care. You just wanted it to get moving! Add to that that normal incidental music was absent and you've got a ponderous scene and a ponderous movie. Add to that that the cast was made up of mostly first-time actors, very bad editing and composition, a first-time director and a budget (I'm guessing here) of about $324 and you've got a lousy picture. I have actually seen worse films (hence the score of 2) but few that were as dull as this one.

This film does have the feel of an Andy Milligan movie from around this same time zone of 1968-1974. But it rises above that level in spots. It starts rather lamely with a protracted witch trial sequence but then effectively and abruptly cuts to modern day. The modern story plays off the troubles of the times, the family breaking apart with the hippie children and 50's era work ethics of the parents and their strick religious belief--which mirrors a bit the witch trial beliefs.

The modern day version of the wronged witch uses these tensions to help her revenge. As in other films like this the same actors appear in the modern day story who are also in the "flashback" opening. Parts of the flashbacks continue through the whole film and eventually we see more of the flashback story than is presented at the start. Though some of this flashback stuff does just seem like padding in spots.

There is also an underplayed and non-nudity sexual element to the film-- also part of the era. Would the film be more powerful if it had more nudity? Probably given how the story would lend itself to that. I say all this just to give some context to the film as those elements will all seem alien to people watching it now, by and large anyway.

The acting is not great, but not inept either, which is pretty much true of the whole film in most regards. I saw this on TCM and the description says it's about an ax murderer which it isn't, though an ax figures into one scene. Though slowish the film has some memorable things, a double murder, a head floating in a bag full of blood, odd attempts at comedy in one office scene, and the story of the Brazilian tribe of female hunters. That's probably the most memorable scene in the film and is well acted by the generally good looking female lead Shelby Leverington, who went on to a full-on career in acting. The film has that poverty row NYC feel in spots in a good way. It also features that oddly thick blood from the era. Yes this is for fans of the fringes of filmmaking and indie horror, but what's wrong with that? The ending is good and unexpected. The music score is odd and usually dated and ineffective but it too has some good moments. The film has a very thin sound mix and sometimes uses only music in an effective way. If you like this kind of supernatural revenge story and the feel of films of this era give it a shot, it has a few shocks and value amid the clumsy or dullish bits.

Reborn in modern times, the ancestor of a crucified witch begins a path of vengeance against the descendants of those who targeted her as the burgeoning body count forces a skeptical police officer to stop the rampage.

This is one of the most bland and lifeless of the kind of films of the genre. This is merely due to one important factor where it's so light on horror hardly anything really happens here. Instead, this one turns into such a talky, drama-centered film that this one eats up nearly a third on its running time on several different monologues that just eat up time here doing nothing but generate extreme boredom recounting a story about her encounter with the Devil that would've been better served as an on-screen flashback instead of a dialogue-only sequence, or even the unimportant tale about the female warrior tribe which is just endless, tiresome and has little to do with the movie itself which all combined together make it's inclusion an incredibly weird one but the decision to make it last so long is really puzzling and troublesome for the film as a whole. The revenge tactics employed here are mostly done off-camera and quite rarely make for interesting viewing as to how it plays out here with such a decided lack of interesting moments as the entire film goes through the notion of not following through with anything of value. The attempts at building suspense by focusing on the family around her going about their lives are just flat-out boring, the scenarios presented here are even more so and it really features nothing even remotely engaging or enjoyable. The only remotely tolerable part is the finale, where the full revenge is accomplished in a remotely engaging manner, but it really is just the one scene here that works while nearly everything else here is a disaster.

Rated R: Violence and Language.

In colonial times, a woman is killed for witchcraft. In present day, Lise seeks revenge upon her ancestor's killers' descendants. Writer/director Ken Friedman seems to have been a minor filmmaker. That's the feel of this indie. It's a minor work of a minor creator. It's boring. Even with an indie, the filmmaker's style can be retrieved. One can see the skills even without the budget. Kevin Smith has his humor in Clerks. Christopher Nolan has his intrigue in Following. Darren Aronofsky has his weirdness in Pi. This indie is boring. Friedman does try but he isn't doing anything good. Shelby Leverington has some beauty but staring at her face in closeup for extended time ends up being boring and pretentious. It's not weird enough to be camp. It's not daring enough to be interesting. It's boring. Even the blood looks weak. There is some competency in the filmmaking but it's not enough.