It's been odd that I haven't done one of these rapid-fire quick-shot reviews for horror films so let's do this first set:
Among the Shadows-
Supposedly a horror film, this abomination was a political thriller that just so happens to feature vampires and werewolves although none of those issues are overall important to the film. The political intrigue about whether or not he's being hunted down and the race to track down the responsible armies should produce more action here, but the pace is dull and leaden, the action itself is incompetent and haphazard and most of all, cheap-looking. There's badly-composited green-screen mattes, stand-ins facing away from the camera that don't look or sound anything like the character from seconds earlier and just makes for a wholly rushed experienced that doesn't make for an exciting time. The final nail in the coffin is the utterly banal and embarrassing werewolves that aren't even granted a true transformation scene and consist of glowing eyes and canine-like fangs but are otherwise nearly indistinguishable from other humans, furthering the lameness of why they're werewolves overall. An absolutely awful experience that could've been decent without much effort put into it but yet this fails in nearly every regard.
Ghost Boat-
This didn’t offer up much for it. One of the main problems here is the fact that there’s just not a whole lot of interest in what goes on with her traumatized condition. Despite it being set-up from the start as her having a kind of debilitating condition, nothing about what happens really makes it obvious that she really is and it just comes off as incredibly route and cliched from the start. The fact that she’s become quite flighty and jumpy doesn’t really endear itself all that much into inducing fear, and the action of what’s happening doesn’t really mean anything because it’s all so utterly hard to care about the events within. It builds to a mystery that’s impossible to care about, takes forever to do so and tries to force these conclusions onto her that it just seems so convoluted and haphazardly done that there’s nothing about it that draws any interest to what’s going on. The supposed scares are weak and unconvincing and lead to such a wild conclusion that there’s overall little appealing there, and with the repetitious nature of it all coming back around again and again it’s impossible to generate tension from there, and frankly the only thing that really works here is the suggested brutality of the kills that end her day as what this implies her doing to herself get somewhat creepy at times. Overall, though, there’s little about this one worth remembering.
Lady Psycho Killer-
This was quite a decent enough psycho/thriller that relies mostly on the different forms of behavior she exhibits while trying to get through her assignment. The change in behavior, from her sweet and naive disposition to the suddenly dark tone she heads towards once she starts her rampage, makes for the only watchable elements here as the openness of her acceptance towards revelling in the bloodshed makes her a compelling protagonist. The fact that this is so cliche and makes for such a familiar round of scenes here showing how she seduces her targets and carries out the brutal stabbings which makes this follow through more of a thriller vibe. That all really defeats a lot of the effectiveness and darker aspects of the scenes.
The Legend of Alice Flagg-
This was one of the better Lifetime Channel thrillers. The build-up of the haunted hotel with the traditional Southern ghost story, the atmosphere of the location and the general manner in which the secondary subplots start coming together give this one some enjoyable moments as it leads up to the final half where it finally produces some action. That this is mostly done during the raging Gothic thunderstorm is rather fun and gives this an extra ambiance normally missing meshes well with the action. This one isn't really much of a horror film though as these secondary elements also cause the film play out as a thriller since the ghost isn't in any form active in the film, isn't out for revenge and really doesn't impact the film at all since everything gets worked out without its involvement as this one is quite dragged out at points in the first half. It's rather enjoyable if not really much of a horror effort.
Maggie-
This was a somewhat frustrating effort. Most of the film's flaws are due to the decision to forgo the majority of zombie cliches in order to focus on a decidedly different side of the zombie contagion which isn't interesting in the slightest. It's not exciting or thrilling to constantly watch somebody go through the stages of deterioration as they succumb to an inevitable outcome that ends up occurring through outside means anyway which renders the entire exercise moot to begin with. As well, the utterly dreary pace and lack of action do this in on another level with the unduly dull setup never providing this one with a chance to do something interesting beyond yakking at each other for the duration of the film and renders whole sections of the film as dreadful to sit through as possible. While almost every technical level here is exceptionally well-handled, those areas don't make for an enjoyable time as this one doesn't have that at all.
Terror 5-
A rather bland and unappealing anthology, there's really not much to this one. The central plotline here doesn't really support much of a premise for stringing an anthology around, and the way it's done here with the intersecting stories taking place at the same time makes things far more confusing than they really should be. With a truly absurd round of shorts included in here that are just as confusing as they don't offer up any kind of scares, never really make sense and are just lame in concept with the idea of the guys sitting in the car waiting for a friend to drop off an item seemingly so stupid that it's inclusion just becomes all the more puzzling. The opening sequence with the troublesome gang at the school just makes no sense as for why that would carry on as long as it seems without anyone catching on to their exploits, the bickering couple in the motel goes nowhere beyond the nudity and ends on a lame execution and the absolutely lame one about the friends sitting around talking about snuff films is completely useless with no real suspense or surprise at where it's going. The zombies appearing in the finale have a creepy vibe that makes it the most tolerable, but on the whole, this is a pretty disappointing effort.
Among the Shadows-
Supposedly a horror film, this abomination was a political thriller that just so happens to feature vampires and werewolves although none of those issues are overall important to the film. The political intrigue about whether or not he's being hunted down and the race to track down the responsible armies should produce more action here, but the pace is dull and leaden, the action itself is incompetent and haphazard and most of all, cheap-looking. There's badly-composited green-screen mattes, stand-ins facing away from the camera that don't look or sound anything like the character from seconds earlier and just makes for a wholly rushed experienced that doesn't make for an exciting time. The final nail in the coffin is the utterly banal and embarrassing werewolves that aren't even granted a true transformation scene and consist of glowing eyes and canine-like fangs but are otherwise nearly indistinguishable from other humans, furthering the lameness of why they're werewolves overall. An absolutely awful experience that could've been decent without much effort put into it but yet this fails in nearly every regard.
Ghost Boat-
This didn’t offer up much for it. One of the main problems here is the fact that there’s just not a whole lot of interest in what goes on with her traumatized condition. Despite it being set-up from the start as her having a kind of debilitating condition, nothing about what happens really makes it obvious that she really is and it just comes off as incredibly route and cliched from the start. The fact that she’s become quite flighty and jumpy doesn’t really endear itself all that much into inducing fear, and the action of what’s happening doesn’t really mean anything because it’s all so utterly hard to care about the events within. It builds to a mystery that’s impossible to care about, takes forever to do so and tries to force these conclusions onto her that it just seems so convoluted and haphazardly done that there’s nothing about it that draws any interest to what’s going on. The supposed scares are weak and unconvincing and lead to such a wild conclusion that there’s overall little appealing there, and with the repetitious nature of it all coming back around again and again it’s impossible to generate tension from there, and frankly the only thing that really works here is the suggested brutality of the kills that end her day as what this implies her doing to herself get somewhat creepy at times. Overall, though, there’s little about this one worth remembering.
Lady Psycho Killer-
This was quite a decent enough psycho/thriller that relies mostly on the different forms of behavior she exhibits while trying to get through her assignment. The change in behavior, from her sweet and naive disposition to the suddenly dark tone she heads towards once she starts her rampage, makes for the only watchable elements here as the openness of her acceptance towards revelling in the bloodshed makes her a compelling protagonist. The fact that this is so cliche and makes for such a familiar round of scenes here showing how she seduces her targets and carries out the brutal stabbings which makes this follow through more of a thriller vibe. That all really defeats a lot of the effectiveness and darker aspects of the scenes.
The Legend of Alice Flagg-
This was one of the better Lifetime Channel thrillers. The build-up of the haunted hotel with the traditional Southern ghost story, the atmosphere of the location and the general manner in which the secondary subplots start coming together give this one some enjoyable moments as it leads up to the final half where it finally produces some action. That this is mostly done during the raging Gothic thunderstorm is rather fun and gives this an extra ambiance normally missing meshes well with the action. This one isn't really much of a horror film though as these secondary elements also cause the film play out as a thriller since the ghost isn't in any form active in the film, isn't out for revenge and really doesn't impact the film at all since everything gets worked out without its involvement as this one is quite dragged out at points in the first half. It's rather enjoyable if not really much of a horror effort.
Maggie-
This was a somewhat frustrating effort. Most of the film's flaws are due to the decision to forgo the majority of zombie cliches in order to focus on a decidedly different side of the zombie contagion which isn't interesting in the slightest. It's not exciting or thrilling to constantly watch somebody go through the stages of deterioration as they succumb to an inevitable outcome that ends up occurring through outside means anyway which renders the entire exercise moot to begin with. As well, the utterly dreary pace and lack of action do this in on another level with the unduly dull setup never providing this one with a chance to do something interesting beyond yakking at each other for the duration of the film and renders whole sections of the film as dreadful to sit through as possible. While almost every technical level here is exceptionally well-handled, those areas don't make for an enjoyable time as this one doesn't have that at all.
Terror 5-
A rather bland and unappealing anthology, there's really not much to this one. The central plotline here doesn't really support much of a premise for stringing an anthology around, and the way it's done here with the intersecting stories taking place at the same time makes things far more confusing than they really should be. With a truly absurd round of shorts included in here that are just as confusing as they don't offer up any kind of scares, never really make sense and are just lame in concept with the idea of the guys sitting in the car waiting for a friend to drop off an item seemingly so stupid that it's inclusion just becomes all the more puzzling. The opening sequence with the troublesome gang at the school just makes no sense as for why that would carry on as long as it seems without anyone catching on to their exploits, the bickering couple in the motel goes nowhere beyond the nudity and ends on a lame execution and the absolutely lame one about the friends sitting around talking about snuff films is completely useless with no real suspense or surprise at where it's going. The zombies appearing in the finale have a creepy vibe that makes it the most tolerable, but on the whole, this is a pretty disappointing effort.
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