A Savannah Haunting

Well, the cover for this 2021 horror movie wasn't really screaming - pardon the pun - of overly impressive horror movie. Yet, I still opted to sit down and watch it here late in 2022, as I happened to stumble upon it. Now, I hadn't heard about the movie when I sat down to watch it, so I didn't know what I was in for, aside from it being a horror movie.

I will say that writer and director William Mark McCullough was definitely on to something here, because there was potential in the storyline. However, the narrative was just too slow paced and the movie didn't have enough of exciting things happening to keep it interesting. And that made for a somewhat tedious viewing experience.

The acting performances in "A Savannah Haunting" were good, so it really was a shame that the actors and actresses didn't have a more compelling and exciting script to bring to life on the screen.

Visually then this movie was adequate. It is a movie that makes use of simplistic effects to layer the movie with scares. It works out well enough, but the special effects and practical effects could only do so much to lift up the monotonous and mundane pacing and subpar script.

"A Savannah Haunting" definitely had potential to be a good and proper horror movie, but sadly it was butchered by the pacing and the lack of excitement.

My rating of "A Savannah Haunting" lands on a very generous four out of ten stars.

There was some potential here for sure and it was lightly entertaining, but know that there is almost zero originality in this one. It felt like an amalgamation of every horror trope and cliché that you've ever seen being used as building blocks to create a generally mediocre film.

Now, while that sounds harsh, this wasn't totally unsuccessful. It held my attention enough and I was intrigued by said potential. I think two things that largely held it back were it's run time and the acting.

This one definitely dragged and I think with some editing and shortening providing for a more concise run, it would've been more successful. Also, the acting was generally unsuccessful and unconvincing. The stilted performances all around were distracting and pulled you out of the story. I think if you are able to look past these two major variables there is potential to be had.

This was mostly sitting at a 4 for me but I think it was recovered a bit largely due to the third act. It ended up becoming a bit more interesting and a bit more spooky. 4.5 rounding up to a 5 and I would only recommend if you have patience and a love for truly indi cinema.

"A Savannah Haunting" may be derivative but it's quite an enjoyable slow burn.

Yes the film is quite derivative; it takes tidbits from all the horror films we've seen before. There's some rough acting in parts too though overall it's decent.

One thing that's nice is the setting. The film is actually filmed where they say. A lot of times Hollywood says the actors are in one place and film 5 states away. The haunted house in Savannah is a good choice.

Where this film succeeded is it takes the suspense built in the first 3/4ths of the film and uses it to plunge into a terrifying ending that concludes with gusto.

Worth a watch for sure for any fans of the genre, and one of the scarier films I've seen in a while.

There is not a single redeeming quality to this movie. There is not the tiniest little glimmer or scrap of originality, creativity, though, or lasting impression to be found. I am actually impressed at how every. Single. Thing. Was some kind of horror joke stereotype. I'm not just referring to the plot, but every camera shot, every setting, every character, line, "big twist reveal", even the line delivery and the expressions of the actors is somehow the exact same thing that is in a thousand other horror movies. Once again, I'm almost surprised that they were able to take every single trope from every single horror movie and combine it into one 1hr 40min string of cliche, after cliche that felt like being slapped across the face with a wet fish with every horribly overdone line, character, and camera shot that you feel you've seen hundreds of times before. It's such drivel that I genuinely considered it to be satire poking fun at all the tropes that so many horror movies use. But unfortunately I don't think so. They either really committed to the bit or everyone involved is so lacking of self awareness that they somehow can't realize that they've basically made nothing. Nothing as in something that is just purely devoid of anything interesting. I don't even know that I believe someone actually wrote this movie. I think they may have just rounded up some actors, handed out zero script, said two words to them all, "haunted house", and did everything in one take while everyone just kept saying the most generic lines off the top of their head. The only way you could ever have even a sliver of an enjoyable time with this movie is to get some friends together and just mystery science theater it, making fun of it throughout. Maybe make some "generic horror trope" bingo cards that would get filled up after just ten minutes. But even then it's still hard to sit through, and really I say just do not waste your time.

What a load of rubbish! Absolute pants. Don't waste your time. The lesbian scenes are cringe and laughable. I get more of a fright opening my bills. I was intrigued that it supposedly was filmed in the original house. But that's not enough to endure this. It could have potential but it's all lost on a poor script, direction, acting. There are far many better horror films out there. I fast forwarded the end to put myself out of misery. These 10/10 ratings obviously were watching a different film! I'm unsure how movies like these get produced and who has enough money to waste on producing this drivel.