This is a collection of nice looking scenes with high quality visual design and some fairly good acting. Hooray. And yet the story is ridiculous, and it just doesn't hang together. By the time you get to the clichés that serve as an ending, you'll want to slap something. The garish color and playful effects really do work as individual moments, but the story line is more a serious of dots that start to connect up and then veer into some kind of weird scribble. The waste of acting talent here is particularly odd. Annette Benning is rocking it for much of the film, until she morphs into Laurie Anderson. Downey is only in part of the third reel, and he's fairly restrained but effective. Rea has it dialed way down, to the point where there's almost nothing to it.
Reviews
2 Reviews
Altar
(2014)
Cliché mash-up that never gels
23 April 2015
If you've seen a fair share of horror films, you can tick off not only the mash up of plot points but the composition of shots, camera tricks, and the musical flourishes.
The Legend of Hell House, The Amityville Horror, The Shining, The Haunting, Rose Red, Dead Again, Darkness, Burnt Offerings, Poltergeist, The Ninth Gate, etc. It's strange and weird enough, but the plot doesn't cohere and devolves into the straight to video mess it is.
By the time things turn a corner and the elder daughter starts to get rolled into the mix, it's like you're watching a new movie, as if they're trying to restart in the third reel. But that's the film in a nutshell, constantly restarting with a new conflict that sort of connects but not really.
The Legend of Hell House, The Amityville Horror, The Shining, The Haunting, Rose Red, Dead Again, Darkness, Burnt Offerings, Poltergeist, The Ninth Gate, etc. It's strange and weird enough, but the plot doesn't cohere and devolves into the straight to video mess it is.
By the time things turn a corner and the elder daughter starts to get rolled into the mix, it's like you're watching a new movie, as if they're trying to restart in the third reel. But that's the film in a nutshell, constantly restarting with a new conflict that sort of connects but not really.
Tell Your Friends