Review of Horror

Horror (2003)
3/10
Dante's Miscarriage
5 December 2008
First off, I am a fan of Dante Tomaselli's work, ever since seeing the creepy and bizarre "Desecration," with it's disturbing visuals and obscure dark/erotic overtones. (A film featuring zombie nuns from Hell cannot fail IMO.) His other film, "Satan's Playground" I liked immensely as well, and found it a fun, atmospheric classic of low budget horror. So what happened here, i wonder? "Horror" is a disaster, and seems like it might have been his first film. While the eye catching cinematography is there, the style, the weird atmosphere etc, this one is sabotaged by the most laughable makeup effects since Ed Wood was making films. The "ghouls" here look like the kids on Halloween after being made up by their mothers with food coloring and cookie dough! Props meant to be scary look like plastic decorations you would find on any suburban front yard around the holidays. None of the "actors" could land a part as a bush in a high school play, and Kreskin is more zombie-like than the laughable zombies who appear halfway through the film (for no reason whatsoever.) What a wasted opportunity, as there are good things about this film, like the beautiful cinematography, the seeds of a fascinating story, and an ending that is actually the best thing about the whole thing. I like actor Danny Lopes, who appears in all of Tomaselli's films so far. He was good as the teen loner in Desecration, and believable as the autistic boy in 'Satan's Playground," and has a definite screen presence. "Horror" also suffers from going the sellout route of using the tired "teens in a haunted house" setup. A few good scenes drown in a sea of underwhelming tripe, "Horror" is perhaps the only film in history where the most interesting character was a billie goat...
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