V/H/S – MOVIE REVIEW – Horror Anthology, Found Footage & More
By Geno McGahee
It’s gotten a boatload of hype and has been called “terrifying” by some and some have critics have even stated that the viewer will not “be prepared” for this horror. This is the shit your pants sort of horror film…at least that is what they led me to believe. V/H/S is unique in a way. It’s a found footage anthology. With the popularity of found footage, it was only a matter of time before somebody gave it a different spin and I tip my hat to V/H/S for doing so.
We begin with a group of unlikable pricks “sharking.” Sharking is running up to women and lifting up their shirts, exposing their boobs or yanking up their skirts, and showing their panties. It is basically sexual assault, but this group can’t get enough of it. They also break into places and smash things up, doing damage to personal property and writing the word “faggot” on things. They don’t really have a redeemable quality.
The sharking videos are sold to an underground porn business, but that’s not where the money is. According to one of the hooligans, there is a house that has a valuable VHS tape. If they steal it, they can sell it for a great deal of money. So the decision is made to enter this house, steal the tape, make a bundle and move on.
Inside the house, they find a dead body, sitting in a chair in front of a bunch of monitors. There is a boatload of VHS tapes and they elect to watch a few of them to see if they can find the right one. The problem is, none of them know exactly what they are looking for…so I don’t know how they would pick the right one. Why not just take them all and say ‘it’s in there somewhere’ to the buyer? OK, there are several elements of this film that are a little out of whack.
The first VHS tape was a tale of a group of guys that are going out to meet some chicks, and bring them back to a hotel room to triple team them. Most of the guys in this film are walking hard ons. The only guy in the group that seems to be a decent guy attracts a girl with big eyes that just keeps saying ‘I like you’ to him at a bar. Unfortunately, when she is brought back to the hotel room, his two buddies get it on with her. (SPOILERS) The girl turns into a demon and rips the dick and balls off of one guy. OUCH! She then chases the one she likes and tries giving him a blow job, but he can’t get it up. That traumatizes her. What guy wouldn’t get it up for a demon blow job? Overall, the tale was fun and I loved the girl/demon. I thought she was a riot!
The next tape is about this couple that is on vacation and they too are in a hotel room and they come across a strange young girl that wants a ride in the morning. The man declines and then tries to have sex with his girl on camera, but she won’t do it. Remember what I said…walking hard on. As the couple sleeps, the girl breaks in and steals money and then breaks in and (spoiler) kills the man and is exposed as the girlfriend’s lover. This was an incredibly weak tale that didn’t make much sense… There wasn’t much to it and was really unremarkable.
In the next tale, we have a group of four that are going to the woods where this murder happened. Nobody believed the girl that said a demonic force had done it. When they go there, strange visuals are picked up on tape and soon, the killer is up to his old tricks again. The girl rigs up some traps to kill this demon and does some positive things, but this is a horror movie and the bad guys are hard to beat in these things. This tale was relatively decent. I enjoyed it but it wasn’t fantastic.
Do you like big boobs rubbed in your face? Of course you do. In this next tale, we see a Skype sort of relationship between a doctor and his girlfriend. To excite him, she takes off her top and rubs her boobs at the camera for him. You can’t see anything, but I bet he’s jerking off. The girl continues to think that her apartment is haunted and she finally proves it by Skyping with her man as the stuff is happening. He witnesses children running around and is now working with her to solve it. Now this one had a pretty good ending and was overall a decent and unique tale.
In the last VHS tape tale, we have a group of beyond teenage trick-or-treaters on Halloween night. They go into a supposedly haunted house and shit begins to hit the fan. Some really cool stuff happens and they end up really screwing things up and causing their own demise. This tale was straight forward and enjoyable. It was rather predictable but still great fun.
When we get back to our sharking guys, we see an empty chair where the dead guy used to be. Any horror fan saw that one coming a mile away. Of course, these pricks have to pay and they do, but that was it. I wasn’t terrified. I didn’t scream and run out of my house crying. The hype was just that…hype.
V/H/S is a pretty good movie…very good by comparison to what is out there now, but if you are looking to shit your pants from fear, this movie is not for you. There were a few creepy moments, but overall, this falls under “interesting” or “entertaining” rather than “scary.” As a child of the 80s, I did like the VHS look of the movie and the atmosphere, but it wasn’t anything special. I recommend it, but don’t expect to be amazed by it.
Rating: 7/10.
