Against The Dark + Boogeyman 3 + Vacancy 2 - The First Cut (Sony DVD)
Picture:
C+ Sound: C+ Extras: D/C-/D Films: D/C-/D
As the
Horror genre continues to witness record abuse, three new titles from Sony
demonstrate how desperate the industry has become to have product. Two of them are of the “unnecessary sequel”
nature and the other is the genre-mix type.
That film would be Richard Crudo’s Against
The Dark, another attempt to keep Steven Segal’s career going, this time
mixing martial arts and vampires who also happen to eat human flesh like
zombies. Looks like they ate the script
too as every cliché in the world is on display, but no one seems to know how to
put a stake through their hearts.
Boogeyman 3 has some brief promise before it
gets killed by bad digital work and silliness.
When the extras have the makers say dumb things like the monster is
really what you fear inside your mind, the first response is “then why do we
need to watch your dumb movie?” and this is one sequel that is pointless. Vacancy
2 is a quick follow-up to the dumb non-hit as we go back to the hotel
rigged with close-circuit analog TV where people watch others in secret and
enjoy seeing them killed. It is a
prequel as we see the tapes of the first victims, as if that is a good
idea. It is the most desperate of the
three and boring!
The
anamorphically enhanced 1.85 X 1 image on all three are detail-challenged,
color challenged and stylized to look like the current clichéd look for Horror
films that are not scary at all. Depth
and bad digital effects only add to the troubles. The Dolby Digital 5.1 mixes (5.0 on Boogeyman) are also on the weak side,
are all rather unimaginative and expose budget limits. Extras include behind the scenes featurettes
in the case of all three releases, deleted scenes and two more featurettes are
added to Boogeyman and an audio commentary,
second featurette and deleted scenes “grace” Vacancy.
- Nicholas Sheffo
