Amityville: The Awakening (2017) Directed by Franck Khalfoun
Just what the world needed. Another movie based on the 'Amityville' events, said no one ever.
Putting the name 'Amityville' on your movie nowadays feels like never more but a cheap trick to grab a few extra bucks. Everybody knows the name Amityville and what it stands for. It has horror written all over it, even for those who have no idea what happened in Amityville, in 1974. It doesn't matter too much, since in all truth most of those movies have very little to do with the 1974 events and the stories simply feature an average haunted house concept, or something along those lines. This movie is no exception. It is just as average and standard as any other haunted house flick story-wise, with as a big difference though that it is actually worse to watch than the average attempt.
Horror basically is all about its build up. It first needs to create a certain mood and atmosphere for the movie and build up its tension and mystery. While this movie build up plenty of mystery, it yet fails to build up any tension as well. It is mostly because its mystery fails to ever become anything truly interesting. It is not necessarily a bore to watch, but the movie is needlessly slow and it too often gives its viewers far too little. There are never any decent scares, never really any excitement and the characters fail to make this movie anymore interesting either.
The movie features all of the predictable and basic characters in it. I also don't really know who was supposed to carry this movie. I guess it was supposed to be the Bella Thorne character, but for most part of the movie she is just an annoyed and also annoying teen. It is hard to ever feel anything for her character. It is weird in general how this movie handles its characters. Characters go through some too sudden and weird transitions, which I guess was supposed to add to the mystery and suspense of the movie, but it makes things rather confusing and even somewhat annoying to watch instead.
It also feels that the movie is constantly building up toward something that just never comes. There is never a decent enough payoff or any other developments that work out as either surprising or solid enough. It is a rather unlikely movie with all of its developments, even by normal horror standards. The fact that this movie was first supposed to be released in 2015 should already tell you enough about its 'quality'. It is a mess, filled with plenty of decent ideas, but it just never seems to be able to focus on- or develop one thing properly enough.
Although it still is far from the worst thing you will ever see and the movie remains a rather short one, it just really isn't worth your time.
4/10
Watch trailer
Putting the name 'Amityville' on your movie nowadays feels like never more but a cheap trick to grab a few extra bucks. Everybody knows the name Amityville and what it stands for. It has horror written all over it, even for those who have no idea what happened in Amityville, in 1974. It doesn't matter too much, since in all truth most of those movies have very little to do with the 1974 events and the stories simply feature an average haunted house concept, or something along those lines. This movie is no exception. It is just as average and standard as any other haunted house flick story-wise, with as a big difference though that it is actually worse to watch than the average attempt.
Horror basically is all about its build up. It first needs to create a certain mood and atmosphere for the movie and build up its tension and mystery. While this movie build up plenty of mystery, it yet fails to build up any tension as well. It is mostly because its mystery fails to ever become anything truly interesting. It is not necessarily a bore to watch, but the movie is needlessly slow and it too often gives its viewers far too little. There are never any decent scares, never really any excitement and the characters fail to make this movie anymore interesting either.
The movie features all of the predictable and basic characters in it. I also don't really know who was supposed to carry this movie. I guess it was supposed to be the Bella Thorne character, but for most part of the movie she is just an annoyed and also annoying teen. It is hard to ever feel anything for her character. It is weird in general how this movie handles its characters. Characters go through some too sudden and weird transitions, which I guess was supposed to add to the mystery and suspense of the movie, but it makes things rather confusing and even somewhat annoying to watch instead.
It also feels that the movie is constantly building up toward something that just never comes. There is never a decent enough payoff or any other developments that work out as either surprising or solid enough. It is a rather unlikely movie with all of its developments, even by normal horror standards. The fact that this movie was first supposed to be released in 2015 should already tell you enough about its 'quality'. It is a mess, filled with plenty of decent ideas, but it just never seems to be able to focus on- or develop one thing properly enough.
Although it still is far from the worst thing you will ever see and the movie remains a rather short one, it just really isn't worth your time.
4/10
Watch trailer
