Director: Andrea Mugnaini
Year: 2018
Country: Italy
Alternate Titles: N/A
Genre: Supernatural
Plot:
After a change of plans, a group of friends are forced to spend the weekend at a remote villa in the Italian countryside in order to sort out an inheritance, and when they find an old ouija board inside they unwittingly unleash a deadly supernatural force that targets everyone involved.
Review:
For the most part, this one wasn't all that great. One of the more enjoyable aspects here is the rather nice atmosphere of the house, which is highly enjoyable and sets an imposing setting. Being the remote lodge in the middle of the woods, it looks quite creepy with the dust-covered furniture, several dark corridors with plenty of rather chilling ideas and causes this one to really work out plenty of dark atmosphere for the chilling work to come later on. When the craziness starts, it goes off rather suddenly as the actions spawned here are ripped off in a hurry with a pretty brutal ambush and some fun action to be had around the house as the fine series of encounters offer some halfway decent action here that at least attempts to bring some action into the mix. This is really all that works here as there are some rather big problems at play within this one.
Among it's biggest problems is the fact that there's just not a lot going on here for much of it's running time. The film barely runs eighty minutes long and yet is filled with plenty of filler material for a story that doesn't really need it. The exploits of the group preparing for their trip doesn't need to be there, nor does the useless series of scenes showing them wandering around before arriving at the house since they don't really offer character building material or any sort of suspense so that it's way too late in the film before anything really happens. That this one spends so much time on group at the house before the spirit is unleashed, basically detailing their party sitting around talking to each other, getting high or just spending their time arguing over perceived jealousies and insecurities that the amount of time spent on the actual haunting here isn't that high with these issues taking up way too much time in the film.
The other big issue to really hold this one back is the fact that a lot of the horror here is completely underwhelming and not that scary. There's really nothing here given about the cursed board game as for what it's actually doing in the house in the first since it never gives any reasoning why it's there or how it affects the family, the actual exploits of what it's purpose is for and what it's trying to do which is the main purpose of a film of any caliber. So much of this is left to the imagination that it's finale, filled with a half-hearted haunting filled with body-hopping makes no sense of any kind and it just doesn't serve any kind of scares that matter here since everything's left not only unexplained but also is weak and let-down by the low-budget nature of the film. These here are what really hold this one back.
Overview: */5
Among the gluttony of shows that partake in this type of style, there's very little need for this entry where it has so many problematic issues that end up holding it back. Really only go for this one if you're a hardcore completist of these kinds of supernatural genre fare, although all others should avoid this one in favor of other genre efforts of similar style.
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