[EXPRESSO] Seance (2021) | Spooky Slashing Schoolgirls

Late February isn’t exactly the usual “dumping ground” in terms of releasing horror movies that actually came out last year in most english speaking market, but whatever, i’m game.

Didn’t exactly heard much about this one besides being kinda ok… and i’m not gonna tell you it’s this underrated gem mistreated by a cruel and fickle press. I just can’t.

Set in an elite women’s college, Seance tells of the new enlisted student, Camille, able to join after the mysterious death of a student named Kerrie, following a prank at her expenses to try and scare her with the legend of the ghost of Eveldyne, a female student who killed herself there decades ago.

The newcomer gets herself and some of her bitchy asshole classmates in detention by standing up to their bullshit, but they do get spooked and intrigued when they try to make a seance to contact Kerrie… and it seems to work, but things soon get worse as the girls are stalked and killed like flies by someone or something …

Yeah, it’s teen slasher…. a very middling one at that.

It’s not that bad as a first time directing piece by Simon Barrett, who previously produced and penned horror movies such as Frankenfish, You’Re Next, 2016’s Blair Witch… and 2017’s Temple.

Sure, it’s pretty obvious who the culprit is, most of the kills leading to the reveal are very limp…. but it’s short, it redeems itself enough in the final act in terms of both gore and entertainment, helped by a good cast, decent acting and solid production values.

Thought it’s really predictable, and it’s basically the director hodgepotching horror cliches more to see what sticks than using them in service of a precise vision or tone, making for a watchable but forgettable and throwaway flick.

[EXPRESSO] Temple (2017) | The J-Horror Clichès Shitsoup

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(BTW, this ISN’T the horror movie review i alluded to, this is a freebie)

I already did this one in my italian blog, but it’s quite the fun movie….. to review, and nothing else.

Mind you, if you saw the poster, you may expect some level of quality, since it’s “from the writer of You’Re Next and Blair Witch (2016)”, Simon Barrett, but it doesn’t tell you it’s directed by Michael Barrett (maybe a relative?), a cinematographer.

I didn’t knew any of this when i stumbled across it through Netflix “horror” catalogue (never even heard of it before), and – ultimately – it doesn’t matter.

Temple proclaims to be a movie, but i have the feel the director went to Japan to stock up on Gunplas, and while he was here, he decided to throw together a bunch of j-horror cliches and call it a film, not that it actually matters if it takes place in Japan or not (even more since everything else is distinctly american).

The plot: a couple and a childhood friend of the gal (yeah, it’s uncomfortable) go to Japan because she wants to finish her thesis on occult sacred grounds or something, they find out of a temple that the locals avoid like the plague, go there, and they get attacked by something, who the fuck knows for sure.

And i mean it, since the movie, on top of scarcely reaching the 70 minutes mark (and being comatosely boring all the way), filled with “just woke up” performances, being stock beyond belief (even if tried it couldn’t be more trite), for its climax can’t decide between the “there actually were monsters” or the “dude allucinated and did the killings himself” endings, so it does both and none at the same time.

It’s quite impressive how much nothing is in this film.

Just worthless, pointless, even if you wanna watch a bad horror movie.

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