Review: Better Watch Out


Levi Miller is being babysat by Olivia DeJonge, an older girl he has a crush on. His best mate Ed Oxenbould (rounding out the trio of young Aussie actors here) thinks he’s dreaming. However, it’s Christmas, he’s alone with DeJonge and Miller has plans for he and his crush. Meanwhile, there appears to be an intruder on the premises. It’s going to be anything but a jolly Yuletide evening as DeJonge (showing some decent spunk alongside her “The Visit” co-star  Oxenbould) needs to see that both she and the minor she’s in charge of see it through the night alive. Patrick Warburton and Virginia Madsen appear early as Miller’s parents who are out at a party for the evening.



There’s nothing worse in cinema than a film that completely and utterly squanders potential. I’m not saying this 2017 Christmas-set horror-thriller from director Chris Peckover (whose previous effort was 2010’s “Undocumented”) and co-writer Zack Kahn (who wrote for an animated TV show version of the popular “Mad” magazine) was ever going to be a good film necessarily. However, there’s enough here to suggest that in other hands it could’ve been a lot better than it is. Sadly, what it is…is not ultimately worth watching.



The first 30 minutes in particular are dreadful, Nickelodeon, “Goosebumps”-ish sanitised ‘horror’. Even the music score has a cutesy vibe to it. When we’re suddenly – and at least for me – shockingly hit with quite a gleefully nasty twist at the 30 minute mark it just makes you even more pissed off that Peckover and Kahn have wasted 30 minutes of your time and a nasty twist on a film that even after the twist still isn’t much good, so much as less bad. ***** SPOILER ALERT ***** In fact, for the most part it plays like a poor man’s “The Good Son”, giving a pretty horrific idea the “Home Alone” treatment. I didn’t mind “The Good Son” for what it was back in 1993, but this could’ve taken the basic concept and gotten a lot nastier with it. At least “The Good Son” gave us that shocking ‘Mr. Highway’ scene. There’s a nice visual involving yellow paint and red blood dripping, but even then if you’re gonna steal the paint can bit from “Home Alone” but for a horror film, why do you not then ramp up the gore factor? 10 minutes to go and we finally get a bit of darkness and nihilism in practice to go with the nihilistic and dark concept, but it’s too late. I think this one got an MA15+ rating in Australia purely for swearing. It can’t be anything else. ***** END SPOILER *****



At the end of the day, the film would be absolutely unbearable without Levi Miller (Ed Oxenbould’s character isn’t in the film enough), and isn’t much good regardless. It also wastes the talent of Virginia Madsen and Patrick Warburton, who aren’t in the film after the first scene pretty much. Who hires David Puddy and only uses his awesomeness for the first five minutes as a vanilla ‘Dad’ character that gives him nothing to do? No, this one didn’t do it for me I’m afraid.



A safe and frankly dickless treatment of a potentially ballsy idea for a horror film. It’s all a bit awkward and far too tame in execution.



Rating: C-

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Review: Hellraiser (2022)

Recovering junkie Odessa A’zion accompanies scuzzy boyfriend Drew Starkey on a break-in where all they find is a weird puzzle box. A’zion later opens the box and after some weird shit happens, A’zion and Starkey figure it might be a good idea to learn more about this messed up trinket. Goran Visnjic plays a millionaire who possessed the box before our protagonist nicked it.   Is there any point in remaking/rebooting “Hellraiser” when the 1987 adaptation of Clive Barker’s original text was written and directed by Barker himself? And is considered a horror classic? On evidence here, absolutely not. Directed by David Bruckner ( “The Signal” ) and scripted by Ben Collins ( “The Night House” ) and Luke Piotrowski (ditto) this is an entirely tedious affair. I took a long time to get on board with the 1987 “Hellraiser” , I have to admit. It was wildly imaginative and original, like a nightmare transplanted on to film. However, the characters were stone cold and left me similarly chilly t
Read more

Review: Cinderella (1950)

The story of poor young Cinderella (voiced by Ilene Woods), treated as a servant by her nasty stepmother (voiced by Eleanor Audley), and dismissed by her thoroughly rotten, ugly stepsisters. Her only friends are a group of mice, who are forever being menaced by a cat named Lucifer (or as I call him, Grumpy Cheshire Cat). The King (hoping to find a wife for his charming son) is throwing a ball and every available young woman is invited to attend, and Cinderella is most excited to go. However, her stepmother and stepsisters do all they can to prevent this from happening. But with help from the mice and one fairy godmother (voiced by Verna Felton) later, and Cinderella looks set to attend the ball. You know the rest, folks.   Lovely 1950 Disney animated movie from directors Clyde Geronimi ( “Peter Pan” , “Lady and the Tramp” ), Wilfred Jackson ( “Fantasia” , “Alice in Wonderland” , “Peter Pan” ) & Hamilton Luske ( “Pinocchio” , “Fantasia” , “Peter Pan” ), that is a bit too s
Read more

Review: Eugenie de Sade

Eugenie (Soledad Miranda) makes a deathbed confession to author/biographer (Jesus ‘Jess’ Franco himself), recounting the tale of how her depraved stepfather (Paul Muller) groomed her into a life of depravity, debauchery, and murder.   Not to be confused with the similarly titled “Eugenie…The Story of Her Journey into Perversion” (by the same director) or “Justine de Sade” (which is not to be confused with Franco’s own “Justine” for that matter), this 1973 Marquis de Sade adaptation from writer-director Jesus Franco ( “99 Women” , “A Virgin Among the Living Dead” ) is perhaps the perfect marriage of Franco, sleazy material, and actors. Basically this is what Franco’s “She Killed in Ecstasy” might’ve been like if it were based on a Marquis de Sade work. There’s a few slow spots here and there, but overall I actually think this is Franco’s best film. Yes, even better than my previous choice “Vampyros Lesbos” , and better than his more ‘respectable’ films like “Count Dracula” (a
Read more