V/H/S/94, on Shudder

Never take collectors lightly, because they know how to get what they want. That is especially true of old school VHS collectors. Indeed, the framing device truly puts the “cult” in cult film fanatics when the V/H/S franchise returns with V/H/S/94, which premieres today on Shudder.

In Jennifer Reeder’s wrap-arounds, “Holy Hell,” a SWAT team thinks they are executing a search warrant on a drug den, but the industrial warehouse actually houses what appears to be the video-head equivalent of the Heaven’s Gate cult. There are lots of dead bodies seated in front of video monitors, where naturally, we will watch the constituent stories unfold.

Chloe Okuno’s “Storm Drain” consists of the footage shot by Holly Marciano, a local Ohio TV reporter, and her cameraman, when they ventured down into the titular sewer in search of a weird rat creature. It is pretty straightforward, but nicely executed and it ends on an amusing kicker. Also, Anna Hopkins probably delivers the film’s most memorable performance as the shallow, soon-to-be freaked out Marciano.

Arguably, Simon Barrett’s “The Empty Wake” is the most effective and economical installment, in which, per a grieving family’s odd request, a mortuary worker must record an overnight wake, even though nobody comes to mourn—almost no one. It really is creepy, because it is so grounded in the lonely, late-night setting.

If you have the opportunity to see V/H/S/94 on a big-screen with audience, “The Subject” (directed by Timo Tjahjanto, one half of the Mo Brothers), might turn out to be the highlight instead, because it is so deliriously gory and unhinged. In this case an Indonesian SWAT (this is not a great film to elite squad cop in) raid a mad scientist’s lair in search of a kidnapped woman. What they find is a bit disturbing. Tjahjanto does his thing, but it plays better in a group. On your own, you might notice the thinness of the story, but the over-the-top splatter effects do their best to compensate.

Séance

"As soon as we held the séance, everything really started to improve,” said nobody ever, neither in horror movies or real life. Yet, kids will be kids—bored and hubristic kids. These privileged boarding school girls also brought Noh masks to the spirit-raising party, so bonus points for that. The ghost might not be exactly who they presume, but several of the classmates will still be just as dead in screenwriter-director Simon Barrett’s Séance, which releases in theaters and on-demand this Friday.

At Fairfield Academy, a clique of mean girls performs a “Bloody Mary”-style ritual to raise the school’s resident ghost. They think they are pranking their least-popular member, but when she jumps out her window—under mysterious circumstances—shortly thereafter, it doesn’t seem so funny anymore. Regardless, that opens up a space at the prestigious school for senior transfer Camille, who immediately fights back against their hazing. Stuck in detention with the mean girls (seriously, you won’t remember or care who is who), Camille agrees to participate in a séance to talk to the angry spirit. As you might expect, the experience rather freaks them out. Then, they start to get picked off, one by one.

Horror aficionados might expect something more ambitious from Barrett, who was considered a hip new screenwriter, based on You’re Next, The Guest, and several installments in the V/H/S franchise, but Séance is rather enjoyable in an unabashed, grungy throwback kind of way. So, yes, the vintage horror formula of killing off a bunch of catty boarding school princesses in an atmospheric old school building still basically works.

Temple: Its Bad Karma

According to legend, one Halloween night in the 1880s, the minister of Egg Hill Church in pastoral Pennsylvania poisoned his entire congregation with communion wine and then hung himself from the bell tower. This shrine nestled in a remote Japanese forest is sort of the Buddhist equivalent. It also has its share of dead children and a Buddhist priest who was possibly guilty, but very definitely lynched for the crimes.  Ever since, it just radiates bad grudges, but three American tourists will seek it out anyway, to move the story along in Michael Barrett’s Temple (trailer here), which opens today in New York.

Christopher is still recovering from a nervous breakdown precipitated by his brother’s death, but he agreed to accompany Kate, the childhood platonic friend he has long carried a torch for, and her smug boyfriend James on their Japanese vacation. He ought to know better than to put himself in that position, but he has it bad for her. She should also know better than to inflict that kind of torture on him, but Christopher speaks Japanese, so he will be handy to have around.

Kate is researching Buddhist and Shinto shrines for her comparative religion thesis, so when they come across an evocative sketch of our titular temple in a second-hand book, she insists they find it. She will not be dissuaded when the proprietor freaks out at the sight of the journal, refusing to sell it to her. Christopher displays an appalling lack of intuition when he later returns to the store, only finding a mysterious little boy, who is ever so willing to sell him the volume—but to be fair, he is very drunk.

Even though random strangers try to warn Christopher off, the trio follows the clues laid out in the journal to a rustic mountain village. Much to Christopher’s surprise, but still not stirring any of his suspicions, they come across the same little boy. Of course, he will be happy to guide them to the temple in the morning, but the absolutely, positively must be back before sundown. No problem, right? Or maybe so, judging from the in media res opening that takes place in a high security mental hospital.

In demand horror scribe Simon Barrett (no relation to Michael) is credited with the screenplay, but he has essentially disavowed the film. It sounds like he just completed some piecemeal work-for-hire treatments way back when that bear only the vaguest resemblance to the final shooting script, but the truth is Temple is not so very far removed from his screenplay for the thoroughly conventional Blair Witch reboot. Michael Barrett and cinematographer Cory Geryak also shrewdly capitalize on the Japanese settings and imagery.

Naoto Takenaka is so awesomely grizzled and world-weary as Prof. Ryo, the headshrinker interrogating Christopher in the wrap-around segments, we wish the film were really about his investigation. By the same token, it is cool to see recognizable Japanese character actor Kanji Furutachi (After the Storm, Harmonium, Au Revoir L’été) as the Shinjuku bar patron who tries to convince Christopher to forget all about the temple. In contrast, the three Yanks are all competent on a professional level, but there is so little to distinguish them, you probably would not recognize them the next morning if you sat next to them on the subway.

Temple has a wonderfully picturesque sense of place and some nice atmospherics, but the characters’ relationship dynamics are just the same old stuff. Frankly, it could have used some Simon Barrett doctoring and polish, but much like the notorious cut of Dying of the Light re-edited without Paul Schrader’s involvement, Temple is far more watchable than its reputation suggests. Recommended as a future stream for those who dig Japanese-flavored horror without the standard issue j-horror tropes, Temple opens today (9/1) in New York, at the Cinema Village.

Blair Witch: Don’t Call It a Comeback, She Never Went Away

Even though Daniel Myrick and Eduardo Sánchez have yet to duplicate the box office magic of their breakout 1999 hit The Blair Witch Project, they still deserve stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. By launching the cheap-to-produce “found footage” sub-genre, they have enriched the industry’s coffers enormously. Unfortunately, they were not able to maintain the franchise as a going concern. As a result, the newest sequel-reboot has been transferred to the promising hands of screenwriter Simon Barrett and director Adam Wingard, who duly take us back into Maryland’s Black Hills in Blair Witch (trailer here), which opens this Friday in New York.

Like everyone else, James Donahue has seen the video of his big sister Heather’s ill-fated documentary shoot, but the lack of absolute certainty regarding her fate still torments him. Finding another internet video apparently shot in that ominous abandoned house (the very same one search parties could never find), Donahue convinces his best bud Peter Jones and their girlfriends, Lisa Arlington and Ashley Bennett to accompany him on a fact-finding mission. Naturally, Arlington is also a film student, who is logically making a documentary on Donahue and his sister’s disappearance.

You can pretty much guess the rest. However, video technology has advanced quite a bit since 1999, so Arlington comes fully stocked with hand-helds, go-pros and even a drone-cam. Of course none of that matters when the witch’s curse kicks in. To Barrett’s credit, Donahue calls a retreat relatively early on, but it is already too late.

If you watched the 1999 Blair Witch and Barrett and Wingard’s revamp in isolation, you would most likely conclude the new film is far superior. However, anyone who has seen the original in its day as well as a fair smattering of horror films in the intervening years will find the spruced-up sequel to be highly derivative. (Of course, this does not take into account the disastrous sequel Book of Shadows: Blair Witch 2. Even your white-haired grandma who will never watch a horror movie knows it sucks.) Still, the greater visual clarity is a blessing. Also, when all Hell breaks loose in the third act, the film is considerably more intense than the original (which sort of collapses down the stretch).

Believe it or not, James Allen McCune shows presence and personality as Donahue. It is a decent performance by general standards and pretty darn impressive when judged against the baseline of found footage horror. Callie Hernandez has a few moments as Arlington, but the other members of the horrible no-good camping trip are either blandly forgettable or slightly annoying, at best.

The mechanics of this Blair Witch are generally solid, but like Nathan Ambrosioni’s Therapy it makes no attempt to explain how the disparate footage (including digital and analog formats) was spliced together into a sequential narrative. Regular horror patrons have seen worse. In truth, it works on a basic visceral level, but anyone who knows the genre will expect more from Wingard and Barrett (the team responsible for You’re Next and segments in the first two V/H/S films). While we keep hoping they will take found footage to an insane new level, they never do. Mainly for hardcore fans of the franchise mythos, Blair Witch opens nationwide tomorrow (9/16), including the AMC Empire in New York.