A Southern Haunting

I didn't even make it past 30 minutes from the beginning of the film.. realizing that the characters seemed to speak as if they were NOT just freed. Watching a movie like this from such a historical time, I would expect the actors to embody the "slave mentality", the way they would talk, etc.. I don't know any GOOD movie with slaves from the 1800s that looks like this. The way they talk throws me for a loop alone. It's discouraging to watch, nevermind the storyline.. makes it painful to watch as it just seems...idk.. fake. Django ain't even as old as the movie Roots and that movie did a great job at displaying authenticity. And the lil black girl picking up the rock to a white man who had her brother by the neck with his gun had me thrown too.. what the hell was she gon do with that rock to a gun?! That's like bringing a knife to a gunfight and even back in these times, I'd think former slaves would know that much. This is only part 1 of my review. Let me get through the rest of this movie and see if I can find more compelling aspects about this here acting because right now, it looks terrible.

Right, well as I sat down to watch this 2023 horror movie, it was with the release title of "A Southern Haunting", so I figured that I would be in for a ghost movie. However, the title of this movie from writer and directors M. J. Anderson and T. Huff is 40, and that is also what was shown on the screen, during the title sequence of the movie. So the title "A Southern Haunting" was rather misguiding.

The storyline in "40" was somewhat dull and slow paced. It wasn't a particularly interesting storyline, though it was semi-watchable for what it turned out to be. However, I was expecting more of an ordinary haunting movie, instead I was treated to a slow paced tale of former slaves gaining their freedom, but come to acquire some cursed lands. Sure, it sounds interesting enough, but writers and directors M. J. Anderson and T. Huff just never kicked the movie up into any gear.

I wasn't familiar with the cast ensemble in the movie, but given the circumstances of the weak script, then the actors and actresses actually fared well enough.

Visually, then you're not in for anything spectacular. There were a little bit of special effects throughout the course of the 94 minutes that the movie ran for, but nothing noteworthy or memorable.

All in all, the movie is a rather forgettable movie, and not one I would recommend for horror fans to rush out and get to watch.

My rating of "40" lands on a generous four out of ten stars.

Not a thriller nor a horror movie. I don't think the other reviews are for this movie. Nothing in those other reviews happened in this movie. Looks like it was shot on a phone. I think they just created as much of a story as they could and then started filming. I hate to bash what the crew and actors did but this is not worth the time we took to see it. We kept waiting for it to make sense but it just never gets there. Since it's based around the historical and famous underground railroad from civil war times, I thought it might have some redeeming qualities, but it just doesn't. It struggles with acting, lighting, story, and overall plot.

I think the concept might have been good, if I'm deciphering this mess correctly, but it's hard to tell. Disjointed, sloppy art direction, and some talented actors in search of a director. Ed Wood much?

And Rusty? You can do better than this dog.

It's a shame this concept wasn't better executed, because the story concept has real potential.

Pure Southern Gothic is great if it is well executed and the rich storyline of the a family in search of mother set in the reconstruction era and facing a haunted farm is a rich canvas. So why didn't we see a better set and costumes. I understand production during the pandemic was limiting, but surely we could have had moodier lighting and a little dirt and dust? It was like this was shot in a museum.

Whomever wrote, produced, filmed, created, or even acted in this movie should rethink this. The movie is not a horror, it's slow to watch, and confusing to follow.

I only continued watching it due to the female actress (Older daughter). I would love to be able to get my wasted time back, but I can't.

This was a horrible movie I would hope they wouldn't make another movie like this.

I have nothing else to say about the movie other than I wish I would not have seen it.

I actually thought the movie was made back in the early 2000's. I can't believe this movie was made in 2023. I could sworn they switched out the actors.