Horror

First off, I am a fan of Dante Tomaselli's work, ever since seeing the creepy and bizarre "Desecration," with it's disturbing visuals and obscure dark/erotic overtones. (A film featuring zombie nuns from Hell cannot fail IMO.) His other film, "Satan's Playground" I liked immensely as well, and found it a fun, atmospheric classic of low budget horror. So what happened here, i wonder? "Horror" is a disaster, and seems like it might have been his first film. While the eye catching cinematography is there, the style, the weird atmosphere etc, this one is sabotaged by the most laughable makeup effects since Ed Wood was making films. The "ghouls" here look like the kids on Halloween after being made up by their mothers with food coloring and cookie dough! Props meant to be scary look like plastic decorations you would find on any suburban front yard around the holidays. None of the "actors" could land a part as a bush in a high school play, and Kreskin is more zombie-like than the laughable zombies who appear halfway through the film (for no reason whatsoever.) What a wasted opportunity, as there are good things about this film, like the beautiful cinematography, the seeds of a fascinating story, and an ending that is actually the best thing about the whole thing. I like actor Danny Lopes, who appears in all of Tomaselli's films so far. He was good as the teen loner in Desecration, and believable as the autistic boy in 'Satan's Playground," and has a definite screen presence. "Horror" also suffers from going the sellout route of using the tired "teens in a haunted house" setup. A few good scenes drown in a sea of underwhelming tripe, "Horror" is perhaps the only film in history where the most interesting character was a billie goat...

HORROR is meant to be disjointed, disorienting, and disturbing. It succeeds at being all three. Like any nightmare, things jump around in chronology, or mutate into something completely different. The images -the goat, the jack-o-lanterns, etc.- are all part of Director Dante Tomaselli's dream / fun house approach to filmmaking. He prefers things off-kilter and gloomy.

The film's main character, Grace Salo (Lizzy Mahon) is at the mercy of her malevolent parents (Christie Sanford and Vincent Lamberti), who keep her drugged and imprisoned. Enter a trio of mushroom-eating teens, who arrive at the Salo place for a party. Due to the combination of drugs, the constant dream state, and the dark forces in play, the story twists around like a non-linear pretzel!

Since time and space cease to have much relevance, HORROR only makes sense on its own bizarre terms. Critics seem to take it far too seriously, as if the world may end after viewing it. Rabid fans take the opposite stance, as if this were the greatest horror movie ever filmed. Neither side is correct. In actuality, it's a decent little low-low-budget movie that gets high marks for heavy atmosphere and an overall sense of inescapable doom...

First of all, this is a low, low budget film. A basement film. A film clearly made by a gang of enthusiastic amateurs rather than a Hollywood production studio. The acting is basically what you'd expect from a movie starring your stoner friends. The sets are what you might find around town, or what a relative might lend you for the weekend. The camera-work, editing and cinematography, while occasionally inventive, are far from professional. Hell, even the special effects are rudimentary (when they're not flat-out laughable).

But I kinda liked it. I didn't love it, and I'm not even really recommending it, but it's definitely the most unique and troo-kvlt horror flick I've seen in quite a while. Basically, what you have is a bifurcated storyline in which two distinct threads unfold and eventually merge. In the first, a young girl struggles to understand her relationship to her spooky parents and the creepy old house she's seemingly trapped in. In the second thread, an escaped gang of teenage rehab patients finds themselves drawn into the same spooky house. Presiding over all this is the young girl's grandfather, a mysterious figure named Reverend Salo (played, for no good reason, by The Amazing Kreskin).

The plot of this movie, however, is inconsequential. Horror is almost entirely senseless. Like Suspiria (which it resembles but can't begin to compete with), Horror cares more about building atmosphere and presenting disturbing visuals than about telling any kind of coherent story. While one might hazard a theory this way or that about why the events of the film unfold the way they do, it hardly matters. I listened to enough to DVD commentary to realize that director Danta Thomaselli's explanation is far less enlightening than what the average viewer might come up with on their own. "This is a movie that challenges all reality," he says. Uhhhhh, yeah. Take it to the man, Dante.

Again, in spite of all that, I did like this movie. Its heart is in the right place, even if it doesn't have a brain in its head. The visuals are imaginative, unsettling and clearly tied to a personal sense of what horror is all about. And, at 77 minutes, it never gets a chance to wear out its welcome.

6/10 (though I get the feeling I'm being waaaaay too generous)

Reverand Salo Jr. invites five teenage druggies who escape from rehab to come to his secluded house on a promise of salvation. Salo Jr. and his wife's daughter, Grace, is very unhappy, but keeps getting dreams and visions of her grand-father, Salo Sr. (Kreskin, whom I refuse to call him 'Amazing'). Some of the teens have adverse effects to the drug that Salo Jr. had given them prior to them breaking out of rehab. Both the plot lines will entangle before long. OK, about this film. Weird & obtuse does NOT automatically equate to scariness and Kreskin is not a good actor bring the whole movie down. Is it a bad film? That's debatable. Is it a good horror movie? hell no it isn't.

My Grade: D

DVD Extras: Director's Commentary; 9 and a half minute Behind the scenes featurette; on the set with Kreskin; Photo Gallery; "Desecration" video short; Extended Horror Trailer; and Trailer for "Desecration"

Fool me twice, shame on me. I watched HORROR without associating the name Dante Tomaselli to that home movie horror film DESECRATION. So as I sat there, falling asleep and wondering if I had laundry to do, it dawned on me that I'd seen this mish-mash of confusing non-plot and "disturbing" imagery before somewhere, then I remembered. I almost turned the movie off right there, but I believe in giving every film I begin a chance to turn around and improve before it ends. No such luck.

Bad acting from C-grade horror celebs and amateurishly directed and edited. From the other posts I've read here, at least Mr. Tomaselli is entertaining his friends, family and colleagues.