It is officially October! You know what that means? Thirty-one days of horror movie reviews! Wait...never mind. I have only managed to do that once since starting this blog many years ago. I just don't have the time to do that, but I will try to get in as many reviews as I can. I'm thinking I will keep up my usual way of doing reviews and maybe push stuff I have at home a little more here and there. I will see as the month goes by. I will be attending a horror movie festival so I will have some reviews from there late in the month. To start the month off, I decided to watch Hillbilly Horror Show Volume Four (2014). I have not watched the other three in this series. I wanted to watch this one because it has a short film directed by someone I know on Facebook.
Hillbilly Horror Show is a horror anthology movie. Bo (Bo Keister), Cephus (Scott Geiter), and Lulu (Rachel Faulkner) are talking about a world leader coming for dinner, but in the meantime, they pop in a horror short film to watch. These segments are strictly comedy which didn't completely work for me, but it wasn't all that bad just the same. Each has their act down good so it wasn't badly acted at least. I didn't care for Cephus just because he mumbles a lot, which makes it hard to hear what he is saying. Since there are only five shorts, I will do a quick rundown of each one.
Strange Thing by director Alrick Bursell was first up. This is a simple short as far as the plot goes. A newly married couple, Kris (Hali Lula Hudson) and Jake (David O'Donnell), discover a door on a wall that had no door. Jake wants to get someone else to look at this, like their landlord. Kris wants to open the door. They make a deal to open the door just to see what is behind it and then go find someone. Behind the door is...nothing. It is just a pitch black space and they can hear their voice echo. Just when they decide to close the door, something reaches out to get Jake. Strange Thing was an easy film to guess what the twist would be once we see what is going on after where I left off with the plot. Even so, it isn't a bad short at all. It is well acted but the effects could have been slightly better at times. Not that they looked bad, but could have been better.
'Till Death by director Jason Tostevin was the second short. A few guys get together to hand out and talk for a little while. The subject of their wives comes up and one makes a crack about each other killing each or their wives. It is met with laughter, but soon enough they are standing over a place where all the wives are under the ground. What will they do when the wives come back though? 'Till Death was the whole reason I wanted to watch this anthology. I have Tostevin as a friend on Facebook and he happened to mention that this short could be found in this anthology. As it turns out, I had already watched it at a festival screening. That is okay though, I enjoyed it there and it was nice to watch it again. I haven't watched all of his short films, but it does seem that Tostevin leans towards comedy over horror. The reactions of the husbands are pretty funny. Each gave me a pretty good laugh. The acting is very good here. I especially liked Patrick Walters. His facial expressions are great. The effects are left for after someone has been killed but are still pretty good.
Foodie by director Christopher G. Moore was the third short. Mueller (Nick Karner) loves food. He is thrilled when a co-worker (David Berberian) invites him to Kitchen X, a top secret, don't you dare tell anyone type of dinner. After meeting the other people attending, they have a couple of things to eat. Mueller finds out that he is at this dinner for a very different reason than the rest of them. Foodie is another short that ventures into comedy, but it is the goriest short of them all. I thought that this one was just okay. It had some funny moments to it, but I never got into it much and it felt rather long. The acting is pretty good and the effects are a little mixed. I didn't find them to be bad, but at times they seem to hold back, like when fingers get cut off.
The Hourglass Figure by director Patrick Rea was the fourth short. Chelsea (Michelle Davidson) is a stay at home mom with two daughters to look after. She is having a hard time watching the kids, cleaning the house and doing whatever her husband (Brian Paulette) wants to be done as well. She finds an hourglass that her husband said was his mom's but she never let her family touch it. With it is a note saying that the hourglass will give her an extra hour a day. It seems to freeze time except for the person that uses it. It also comes with a warning, but that has gone missing. Chelsea finds out the hard way what that warning is. I'm pretty sure that The Hourglass Figure is another short that I caught at a festival screening. I'm not 100% on that, but I did get the feeling I had watched it before. It is an okay film as well. It didn't make a lot of sense at the end as the hourglass seemed to affect Chelsea's oldest daughter, but not her youngest. Even so, the acting is good and the effects are pretty good as well.
The last short was called Collision Course, which I can't find the information for. It is a very quick short about the last seven days Earth has. Venus has been knocked out of its orbit and is heading towards Earth. With it being such a short film, Collision Course wasn't that great. I think it is maybe five minutes long. It does have some interesting visuals at the end though.
If you are interested in watching Hillbilly Horror Show, you can find it on Amazon Prime. I haven't checked, but I do believe all four volumes are there. There are some pretty good shorts in this volume at least so I would suggest giving it a watch sometime. I may not have cared a lot about the hillbilly's but the shorts were worth watching. Give it a try someday if it sounds all good to you.
3 out of 5 I think I would skip having dinner with these three
Hillbilly Horror Show is a horror anthology movie. Bo (Bo Keister), Cephus (Scott Geiter), and Lulu (Rachel Faulkner) are talking about a world leader coming for dinner, but in the meantime, they pop in a horror short film to watch. These segments are strictly comedy which didn't completely work for me, but it wasn't all that bad just the same. Each has their act down good so it wasn't badly acted at least. I didn't care for Cephus just because he mumbles a lot, which makes it hard to hear what he is saying. Since there are only five shorts, I will do a quick rundown of each one.
Strange Thing by director Alrick Bursell was first up. This is a simple short as far as the plot goes. A newly married couple, Kris (Hali Lula Hudson) and Jake (David O'Donnell), discover a door on a wall that had no door. Jake wants to get someone else to look at this, like their landlord. Kris wants to open the door. They make a deal to open the door just to see what is behind it and then go find someone. Behind the door is...nothing. It is just a pitch black space and they can hear their voice echo. Just when they decide to close the door, something reaches out to get Jake. Strange Thing was an easy film to guess what the twist would be once we see what is going on after where I left off with the plot. Even so, it isn't a bad short at all. It is well acted but the effects could have been slightly better at times. Not that they looked bad, but could have been better.
'Till Death by director Jason Tostevin was the second short. A few guys get together to hand out and talk for a little while. The subject of their wives comes up and one makes a crack about each other killing each or their wives. It is met with laughter, but soon enough they are standing over a place where all the wives are under the ground. What will they do when the wives come back though? 'Till Death was the whole reason I wanted to watch this anthology. I have Tostevin as a friend on Facebook and he happened to mention that this short could be found in this anthology. As it turns out, I had already watched it at a festival screening. That is okay though, I enjoyed it there and it was nice to watch it again. I haven't watched all of his short films, but it does seem that Tostevin leans towards comedy over horror. The reactions of the husbands are pretty funny. Each gave me a pretty good laugh. The acting is very good here. I especially liked Patrick Walters. His facial expressions are great. The effects are left for after someone has been killed but are still pretty good.
Foodie by director Christopher G. Moore was the third short. Mueller (Nick Karner) loves food. He is thrilled when a co-worker (David Berberian) invites him to Kitchen X, a top secret, don't you dare tell anyone type of dinner. After meeting the other people attending, they have a couple of things to eat. Mueller finds out that he is at this dinner for a very different reason than the rest of them. Foodie is another short that ventures into comedy, but it is the goriest short of them all. I thought that this one was just okay. It had some funny moments to it, but I never got into it much and it felt rather long. The acting is pretty good and the effects are a little mixed. I didn't find them to be bad, but at times they seem to hold back, like when fingers get cut off.
The Hourglass Figure by director Patrick Rea was the fourth short. Chelsea (Michelle Davidson) is a stay at home mom with two daughters to look after. She is having a hard time watching the kids, cleaning the house and doing whatever her husband (Brian Paulette) wants to be done as well. She finds an hourglass that her husband said was his mom's but she never let her family touch it. With it is a note saying that the hourglass will give her an extra hour a day. It seems to freeze time except for the person that uses it. It also comes with a warning, but that has gone missing. Chelsea finds out the hard way what that warning is. I'm pretty sure that The Hourglass Figure is another short that I caught at a festival screening. I'm not 100% on that, but I did get the feeling I had watched it before. It is an okay film as well. It didn't make a lot of sense at the end as the hourglass seemed to affect Chelsea's oldest daughter, but not her youngest. Even so, the acting is good and the effects are pretty good as well.
The last short was called Collision Course, which I can't find the information for. It is a very quick short about the last seven days Earth has. Venus has been knocked out of its orbit and is heading towards Earth. With it being such a short film, Collision Course wasn't that great. I think it is maybe five minutes long. It does have some interesting visuals at the end though.
If you are interested in watching Hillbilly Horror Show, you can find it on Amazon Prime. I haven't checked, but I do believe all four volumes are there. There are some pretty good shorts in this volume at least so I would suggest giving it a watch sometime. I may not have cared a lot about the hillbilly's but the shorts were worth watching. Give it a try someday if it sounds all good to you.
3 out of 5 I think I would skip having dinner with these three
