On this page you can find the Constructinghorror.com movie reviews.
The reviews are divided into three different areas of discussion; Story, ConstructingHorror.com and Storytelling Highlights;
a short synopsis of the movie, personal reflections and opinions about the movie and finally a few examples of the storytelling highlights found in the movie under review.
It is in place to warn you that in the review section there are SPOILERS as the tools and crafts of effective storytelling are discussed.
- THE SKELETON KEY [Steve Ericsson]
Caroline Ellis, a live-in nurse hired to care for stroke-patient Ben Devereaux, never believed in the supernatural. But Ben is not an ordinary patient and the isolated mansion on the banks of a New Orleans swamp, is not an ordinary home. It has a history of murder, magic and sacrifice. Caroline, sca…
Read more >> - PURE BLOOD [Julian Grant]
Winner of the Lucio Fulci Award at the Roma Fantafestival and an official selection of the Ft. Lauderdale, Gothenburg and Cork Film Festivals, Pure Blood comes to DVD courtesy of NYC genre schlockmeisters the Troma Team. Anyone familiar with the genre output of this illustrious company know that the…
Read more >> - REC [Jason Meredith]
Being one of several movies of the last years to take the “live on tape” approach as Cloverfield, Diary of the Dead, The Last Horror Movie and Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon, REC starts out as routine shoot for the TV Show, “While You Where Sleeping”. Skipping the customary title sequen…
Read more >> - HAZE [Jason Meredith]
A man awakens in a dark and tight space with just enough room to fit into. Everywhere he looks there is only the cold damp concrete walls surrounding him. When the initial shock settles he starts his struggle to find a way out and answers to the questions, what am I doing here? Who is doing this to…
Read more >> - THE MIST [Julian Grant]
I’m a long time Stephen King fan and believe he’s the American equivalent of Mark Twain. He cranks out feel good homilies about life and death and couches them in a way to make them passable to the masses. It’s no surprise that King calls himself, “the McDonalds of literature.” Frank Darabont has m…
Read more >> - THE DEVIL'S BACKBONE [Sara Caldwell]
The story takes place in an isolated orphanage toward the end of Spain’s bloody civil war. A young orphan, Carlos, arrives and is soon picked on by a boy named Jaime. Carlos begins to have supernatural encounters with a ghostly boy who he later discovers disappeared from the orphanage on the day a…
Read more >> - VIY [Jason Meredith]
Three young students at a monastery get lost in the woods during their journey home. They come upon a small house, inhabited by an old woman. She lets them spend the night on the farm on the condition that they all sleep in different spots… The old woman turns out to be a witch and lures philosophy…
Read more >> - HALLOWEEN [Julian Grant]
Young Michael Myers is tormented at school by bullies and suffers at the hands of his abusive stepfather in this origin story that shows us how he becomes ‘The Shape’ that terrorizes Haddonfield, Illinois and generations of horror fans. The cycle of personal abuse and his murderous intent results in…
Read more >> - SEVERANCE [Sara Caldwell]
A hybrid comedy/horror billed as Deliverance meets The Office, Severance begins with the sales division of a multi-national defense company (Palisade) heading into Hungarian mountains for a team-building weekend. From the offset, things go terribly wrong – a road is blocked by a fallen tree and the…
Read more >> - RIGHT AT YOUR DOOR [Julian Grant]
Brad (Rory Cochrane) and Lexi (Mary McCormack) have just moved into their new house near downtown LA as she heads off to Century City and all hell breaks lose as Brad finds out on the radio that a suspected ‘dirty’ bomb has been detonated nearby. He tries to call his wife but gets no answer on her…
Read more >> - ISOLATION [Sara Caldwell]
In ISOLATION, a young runaway couple take refuge at a lonely Irish dairy farm, only to find that the farmer has been supplementing his income by allowing genetic experiments on his cattle. A mutated calf is born and goes on the hunt. ConstructingHorror.com: When Billy O’Brien set out to make his direc…
Read more >> - THEM [Jason Meredith]
Cleméntine (Olivia Bonamy) and Lucas (Michaël Cohen) are living in a rural countryside house somewhere in Romania. One night they are awoken by strange lights and intimidating sounds from outside their house. Slowly their idyllic accommodation becomes their worst nightmare as they soon realize, what…
Read more >> - THE ORPHANAGE [Sara Caldwell]
A woman, Laura, returns to the orphanage where she spent her early childhood. She and her husband Carlos have bought the property with the intent of converting it to a home for sick and disabled children. Their adopted son, Simón, has a host of imaginary friends. Soon, his imaginary friends become…
Read more >> - CANNIBAL APOCALYPSE [Julian Grant]
One of the great genre-bending things about Italian cinema back in the 1970’s and 8o’s is that they had no qualms in mixing and When Mad Max and Mad Max 2 broke, we saw a host of adaptations, rip-offs and Italian versions of the near future and don’t get me started with friggin’ Zombies and the who…
Read more >> - FALLEN [Steve Ericsson]
The vicious serial killer Edgar Reese has been brought to justice by homicide detective John Hobbes. Everyone believes that the execution of Reese will close the case, but the killings continue and this time the crime scenes contain messages and clues for the detective. John Hobbes soon finds himsel…
Read more >> - CARVED [Sara Caldwell]
An Urban Legend claims that 30 years ago, a small town was terrorized by the spirit of a woman whose beautiful face had been mutilated. Wearing a long coat and surgical mask, she would approach children and, after removing the mask, ask if she was pretty. The hapless children were then snatched and…
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