Kill Katie Malone

Prior to actually switching on the movie, this had promise. The premise that somebody might buy a ghost on eBay (or the copyright friendly film version of YouBid) interested me and I was eager to see how the story unfolded.

Unfortunately, a promising idea has been sold out to the tune of yet another college/teen horror thriller where a bunch of attractive American teenagers spend half the film running around a college or dorm from some kind of terrifying something that wants to kill them. Feel free to replace terrifying something with 'murderous ghost', 'axe wielding maniac', 'Freddy Kreuger' or whatever. It doesn't matter. The play out is the same and we've all seen it a million times before.

Direction is typically brash and predictable, akin to an episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer with less camp. Our protagonists make all the usual horror movie victim mistakes and the haphazard introduction of the haunting is far too over-the-top. Too much is shown too soon and the inevitable killing scenes are silly to the point of absurd.

There's really nothing new here. An original idea is squandered for the sake of a safe return on the budget (one assumes). The result is something forgettable and bland.

I must admit that I had initially expected a bit more from "Kill Katie Malone" than what actually was presented on the screen. The DVD movie that I acquired was titled "The Haunting of Katie Malone", not "Kill Katie Malone", so needless to say that I had expected more in the ghost and haunting department.

"Kill Katie Malone" turned out to be a late teenage horror movie laced with elements of supernatural horror in form of an apparition. Was it scary? Far from it. Was it entertaining? Mildly so.

I don't really understand why Dean Cain was brandished as headlining on the movie cover, because he was in the movie less than 5 minutes. Sure, I know that it was because he was the most famous of all the cast in the movie, but it was so wrongfully a means of luring people in.

The story in "Kill Katie Malone" was a mediocre storyline which really didn't make much sense. It is about an ancient box which contains the malevolent spirit of Katie Malone. Anyone who buys the box will own her spirit and can set her free, but always with a deadly result. Once freed of captivity in the box, the owner can only part with the malevolent spirit by selling the box to someone else.

There were aspects of the story that were fair and interesting enough, but the overall picture was one of being less than mediocre. So don't get your hopes up for this movie.

The acting in the movie was adequate though, despite the fact that the actors and actresses were struggling with an inadequate storyline and script.

For a horror movie, then "Kill Katie Malone" was frightfully devoid of anything scary or capable of making you jump in your seat. So that was an anchor around the movie.

"Kill Katie Malone" was hardly a memorable movie in any sense, and it wasn't one that left any lasting impression in the horror genre.

After thinking they've purchased a gag-gift on an internet auction, a group of friends find their new toy actually contains a malicious ghost who stops at nothing to interfere with the outside forces amongst the group, forcing them to find a way of dealing with the angry spirit.

This turned out to be a rather enjoyable entry. One of the biggest pluses here is the fairly different take on the killer-ghost genre, with the ability thrown in that ghosts can be contained into an object and then used as what amounts to genies from the legend, a unique concept that does some good work here. The fact that this tends to go for long periods of time trying to set up points where the interaction become necessary is a bit of contention, since the film's not really that interesting in those periods and not a lot goes on worth getting excited about, but the decent amount of gore in the kills and a pretty tense number of confrontations throughout the storyline definitely save it and make it pretty entertaining.

Rated R: Graphic Violence and Graphic Language.

This one starts out with a reasonably fun premise - three college friends, Jim (Stephen Colletti), Dixie (Jonathan 'Lil J' McDaniel) and Ginger (Masiela Lusha), purchase a ghost in a box on an online auction, and stupidly release the spirit to wreak havoc - but the manner in which the film unfolds is so bland and unimaginative that I soon lost interest, propping open my eyelids, praying for it to all be over as soon as possible.

Director Carlos Ramos Jr. delivers mediocre spooky goings-on (CGI jump scares) and a couple of gore-free death scenes, while his cast give terrible performances, my award for worst acting going to the teacher who bites off her own tongue (she's hilariously bad!). Fortunately, Masiela Lusha is very easy on the eye and helps make the going a bit easier, but sadly doesn't go as far as getting her kit off - a shame, because if any horror film was crying out for a gratuitous shower scene to pep things up, it's this one.

(2010) Kill Katie Malone HORROR

Another low budget, straight to DVD movie starring Dean Cain as Robert, pleading with his daughter to not discard this small metal box, and something happens to her as a result without the movie telling viewers what. Then the movie jumps to this small group of three college teens with one of them bidding on this 'ghostly' box on-line, which runs like EBay. By the time they get the metal box, it said that it would grant some wishes. And as the movie is progressing, as it turns out, the name Katie Malone is a deathly ghostly figure who's lived a life of cruelty, and craves death to anybody connected to her. No police involve or any type of questioning. Extremely forgettable movie overall.