Evangeline

I have to admit, I was rather surprised by the really well done cinematography of this movie. The acting and the story did not live up to the quality of the "picture", but I have seen worse movies (horror and otherwise) too.

Having said that, the movie has quite a few cringe worthy moments. Some worse than others. The effects are good and the movie is quite short overall ... so there is that.

The premise is nothing really original. There have been many many other movies with certain and slight variations of this theme. Some that come to mind are "The Crow" and "Pumpkinhead" just to mane a few. I'm sure there are plenty of others.

The acting was OK but nothing spectacular. No potential Oscar material here.

The special effects again are just OK but no eye candy here. I always thought blood was opaque however in this movie it looks kind of like dark fruit punch.

There are some serious plot holes throughout the movie. There is such a lack of character development that its amazing anyone watches the whole thing through. Where some very simple dialogue should be, there is none, just bizarre images. Images don't make up for plot explanation. I guess there is a certain amount of viewer imagination and or interpretation required here. I detest movies with plot holes and character under-development.

Anyhow that about sums it up. Enjoy and use your imagination.

When I stumbled upon the 2013 horror movie "Evangeline", from writer and director Karen Lam, here in 2024, of course I opted to watch it, as it was a horror movie that I had never seen, nor actually heard about. And given my life-long romance with the horror genre, of course I gave this movie a fair chance.

The storyline in "Evangeline" made very little coherent sense. It felt mostly like a sequence of random dream patterns conjured up by Karen Lam and then laid out and pieced together in order to attempt to make a movie. And the end result just wasn't a particularly compelling, interesting or entertaining result. Truth be told, it was quite a struggle to sit through the ordeal that is "Evangeline".

Sure, there was a lot of visually interesting scenes, but the movie was just lacking a proper script and red thread throughout the course of the 79 minutes that the movie ran for.

I wasn't familiar with a single actor or actress on the cast list in this movie, aside from actor Richard Harmon. And that is actually something that I do enjoy when I sit down to watch a movie, as the actors and actresses are not associated with previously portrayed characters from other movies.

"Evangeline" was a disappointing horror movie experience. And it is definitely not a movie that will ever grace my screen again. Nor is it a movie that I would recommend for horror fans to rush out and get to watch. It just simply wasn't worth the 79 minutes. When the movie draws to a prolonged end, you are left with a staggering sense of 'was that really it?'.

Actually, the movie's cover was the best part about the entire experience.

My rating of Karen Lam's 2013 movie lands on a three out of ten stars.

Acting was terrible and the plot wasn't original at all. I would it a negative rating if only it were possible so this one star is very generous! This is a new low for low budget movies!

I think maybe the people who put this thing together wanted to tell the story of a woman scorned. I'm guessing that there was some sort of proverb, or old wives tale, possibly from an Asian culture, that fed into this idea, as well. I'm also guessing that the writer and director wanted us as viewers to travel emotionally with Evangeline throughout this film.

I say these things, because they never actually made themselves apparent.

If you've seen "The Crow" or "Jennifer's Body," skip this one. At least then, you won't have to watch those in the future and be reminded of this.

However, if you want to take notes on what to avoid when making a movie, please, indulge. You'll learn how to create a movie containing one dimensional characters, no back story, plot lines that come out of no-where and disappear mid stream, and a general feeling of "what the...?" when the credits start rolling.

Tip of the hat. Good day.