Emergo

Here's The Lowedown on "Apartment 143" (A Horror/Fount Footage DVD review)...LIKED IT!!

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Genre: 7.5 Movie: 5.5

What's it about?

A parapsychologist team are asked to investigate Apartment 143. The White family, who have lost their wife/mother in a car crash, have been experiencing strange things since they moved in to the apartment. But, they were also experiencing things at their old place.

What did I think?

Found Footage movies are an acquired taste...and I for one have a taste for them. If you are a fan like I am, this movie is better than most. If it is not your style, however, You probably won't like it. The cast is recognizable and the acting was good...plus there are no misconceptions about it being real. Give it a shot...see what you think.

There are lights in every corner of the house, and the electricity is on, but the film is so amateur that only camera light is used just to "scare" people. I don't understand people using only camera light and get scared instead of simply turning the lights on. It's even pitch dark near the door- while the outside corridor is brightly illuminated. The owner of the house doesn't need to turn the lights on when opening the door. Another vampire movie scenario would be more appropriate. Amateur, amateur movie.

A four-year old kid is hanging around and not even scared when things go real crazy- another big fail. There's no rational and sensational explanation of a four-year old kid walking in the house without even screaming and taking everything so natural.

Why does not the family move away ? This is another question the scenario-maker needs to answer. Yes the "haunting" is about the family not the place, but at least the family needs to try communicating to the soul and solve the problem, instead of hiring a crew to put cameras and take pictures of the house. A lack of rational scenario.

'APARTMENT 143': Three Stars (Out of Five)

Another 'Found Footage' haunting movie. This one focuses on a family that recently lost their wife/mother who's haunted by the unknown, at their apartment and the house they lived at prior, and the team of parapsychologists tasked to investigate. It was written by Rodrigo Cortes (who also directed the claustrophobic thriller 'BURIED') and directed by rookie feature film director Carles Torrens. It's a Spanish film originally titled 'Emergo' but it's spoken all in English with American actors (including Michael O'Keefe of 'CADDYSHACK' fame). There's definitely nothing new or original to the story but the scares are effective and well done.

The story revolves around Alan White (Kai Lennox) and his daughter Caitlin (Gia Mantegna) and son Benny (Damian Roman) who recently moved in to apartment #143 of an apartment building after experiencing strange things at their old home. The unusual disturbances continue to haunt them at their new home and Alan asks a team of three parapsychologists, lead by Dr. Helzer (O'Keefe), to investigate what's going on. We soon learn that Alan lost his wife in a car accident and his daughter blames him for it. Helzer and his team constantly witness the drama between the two as well as weird occurrences they were told about. They're able to catch it all on video (of course) as the investigation becomes more and more bizarre.

Like I said there's absolutely nothing unique about this film but it is entertaining if you like spooky films full of shocks. The only problem is you'll soon forget everything as there's nothing memorable to the film. That's the thing about movies like this; they're a lot of fun while you're watching them but don't stay with you at all (I'm sure a year from now I'll barely remember this film). Still it's better made and more effective than something like 'PARANORMAL ACTIVITY'. Scary movie fans looking for a few scares could do a lot worse.

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Apartment 143 gives us a look at a supposedly haunted apartment. The difference here is that the scientific investigators are looking for scientific explanations rather than the supernatural. It's a neat idea, but leads to some heavy exposition scenes that betray the found-footage set-up. Perhaps if these had been explained in talking head interviews it wouldn't seem so clunky and forced. The film does well to have a little mystery behind it and the cast are generally rather impressive. One of the biggest problems is how quick it wants to start. I don't find that these films work without a decent amount of build up. Here, the camera crew walk in and stuff is happening almost immediately. I also got tired at the scientists continued explanations of stuff when it was clear that some of these things were impossible to explain. Some decent effects and genuine scary parts make this a fine effort, but with a bit more time and some better pacing this could have been so much better.

There are some great scares in this movie that kept me going. Then there were the terrible ones. And the long, drawn-out drama scenes that just didn't work for me. Maybe because they tended to be clichéd scenes that I already knew the ending to that they tried to extend for dramatic effect but fell flat. At the end of one of those scenes, one of the actors was laughing, and I don't think she was acting because it was ridiculous. The premise was okay, but I don't feel like they stuck to it. In the end, you don't know exactly what happened or why. And I didn't even care. It's just not that good. On a side note, as I looked this up, I saw Michael O'Keefe in the cast! I realized, "Oh! It's the kid from Caddyshack!" He didn't do a bad job, but I thought it was funny.