5150 rue des Ormes

As a big fan of horror movies I try to see everything that is released. When I read the "5150 Rue des Ormes" plot I thought it was going to be a good "different" horror movie but now I have to say I'm a bit disappointed. I can picture the whole movie as a short story rather than a movie, some stories are not movie material, this one is a big example. Just because you have a creepy thriller it doesn't mean you can dress it with actors. The whole background story is good, the acting is good, the characters are interesting but all together in this movie are messy. There are many story lines that lead no-where, there were symbolisms bad used and many clichés. I wasn't scared about the story, it's a bad nightmare. Bad script, bad direction, good intention.

It reminded me of the films of Alfred Hitchcock for some reason-maybe Psycho more than his other films. Maybe a bit strong in places but it is a well done movie that makes the statement that people are often not as ready to deal with a serious situation as they might think they are, which defines the predicament a character in this film faces. Disturbingly possible is maybe another point the film tries to make, and in that sense I think maybe, but not in most places in Quebec. The sub titles didn't always convey the right meaning of the french dialogue but maybe that was just me, but I thought they worked well enough to follow the story and see the characters. True 'nouveau cinema noir', for people who like horror movies, even though it is billed as a drama.

You'd think people would know that since the "Nightmare on ..." movies ... But seriously though, I haven't looked into the origin of the title and this has no "Freddy" in it. Though it has some other interesting characters in it. And it plays in a weird way and goes places you wouldn't expect. While the main character might do things, you wouldn't expect him to do at first, it does all make sense (well as much sense as there can be).

Of course this develops into a very strange little crazy movie, that will either leave you completely confused at the end or satisfied as can be. A movie about violence, but also about (and maybe even more) craziness. It won't give you any easy answers and the end will put quite some people off (I think that the fact, that it isn't as violent as some other genre movies, might be putting people off too).

It is a very weird movie and I can't really tell you to watch it, because it might not be your taste at all.

I enjoyed watching the movie. But I expected this movie to be better.

The story tells the story of a young man and a conservative-obsessed man who leaves his family and goes to a different city to study filmmaking.

The obsessive person has certain principles, habits and obsessions. These are to kill people he finds guilty and bad, to leave an heir like himself, to collect the corpses of good and bad people, and to never lose in chess.

The movie had an interesting story, but it didn't have many interesting scenes. It was good to show how the young man was under psychological influence after the events he experienced. The story was solid!

"5150" certainly does not get enough recognition from what I've just seen, and it's probably because it simply isn't well known! I only happened to stumble across it when it came up on my Amazon recommendations and I actually bothered to click on it, then I read about it and thought it sounded quite good, especially after reading it was French, and I know that nobody does horror better than the French. And then I watched the trailer that blew me away, I knew it was something I'd love and so almost immediately bought it straight after that! "5150 Elm's Way" certainly didn't disappoint much. In fact, if it was more horror heavy than drama heavy, then I would consider it up their with the greatest of French horror. It also surprised me as well, and gave an absolutely compelling and gripping drama/horror.

I don't know why not many people have heard of this, maybe it's because of the rubbish title, I mean come on! "5150 Elm's Way" is a bit of a mouthful isn't it? Maybe if it had something catchier like "51 Elm's Way" or simply just "Elm's Way" it might've appealed to more audiences, but maybe I'm just picking a bit their. The fact is that this film deserves to be seen by a wider audience, I'm sure if people knew about this and gave it the time of day they would love it almost as much as I did! Now maybe it wasn't as dark as the trailer suggested, but it did give much more in the way of plot and screenplay that I anticipated for. Maybe, if "5150 Elm's Way" was glossed over in a brush similar to "Frontier(s)" we might've had a little horror classic on our hands.

But don't let the drama aspect put you off! In some ways it is much more of a positive, and I was pleasantly surprised to see how the film went deeper into the psycho family's character, when usually horror films like to ignore the villain's so we feel zero sympathy for them, here the film quite cleverly takes a different route by showering us with excellent characterisation on both sides, the righteous and the unrighteous both get equal screen time. It also means that instead of getting two dimensional villains, we get very human ones, which is extremely refreshing to see. We get to understand how their family works and why they are like how they are. I felt such sympathy for Maude, the mother and at times felt very teary for the family (don't worry I didn't let go!) Everything did seem like a drama pretending to be a horror film at times, but actually when the game of chess was introduced in the final 40-30 minutes, horrifying things did start to pick up, and its air of realism slightly went out the window, which I actually quite admired in a way. I also wasn't expecting Yannick's psychological torment to be quite as mind-blowing as it was. The directing sometimes looked as if the person changed. Instead of interesting family drama we got psychological horror that was really cleverly expressed. It was absolutely captivating to see Yannick change and become obsessed, and also to see how he's affected their family.

Some scenes such as when Yannick plays chess and when he starts seeing "The Shining" styled blood, are marvellously done and it really helps for the audience to get into his character. "5150 Elm's Way" can often be thrilling as well! The film has you cheering for Yannick to get out all the way, and you do start to notice the complex bonds changing, giving us much, much more than a horror film. The acting was also very good, and very realistic. They looked like a normal family, so it was easy to relate, and Yannick also didn't make too many frustratingly stupid decisions like you see in almost every survival-based horror film.

In the end. "5150 Elm's Way" is more of an extremely dark drama than a horror film, although it does step into horror territory towards the end, and it also isn't afraid to shock like most horror films, it has no boundaries. It is brilliantly written and shows beautifully promising directional flourishes. It's also completely thrilling and captivating to watch, with a very clever ending that makes you wonder who really has won. "5150 Elm's Way" is one of the best psychological films, I've seen and is very nearly a 10/10 masterpiece.