“The Family”
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31 Days of Horror Challenge: Movie #23
Brothers, Jacob (Mark Hanson) and Jonathon (Joe Hollow), are filming their latest movie, but not all of their talent exactly volunteered for their roles in the pornographic snuff film.
It took me a little bit longer than I wanted to sort out what was happening in this film. The story itself is fairly straight forward, it’s the details and little twists (some expected, some not) that make the film worth seeing.
Several different devices are used to give the viewer background information. Once the story gets going, the flashes to newspaper articles with voice over narration, gets a little distracting. The jumps between the scenes, such as the movie that the characters are watching at the beginning, and what other characters in the story are doing, gets a bit jumbled together. That may be an editing issue or an unfortunate stylistic choice, either way, it didn’t work for me.
There were things about this film that I enjoyed. There were several beautifully shot, creative scenes, and cameos by some favorite horror icons: Tony Todd, Kane Hodder, and Michael Berryman. The rest of the cast did a solid job of pulling off crazy. I did like the music, though occasionally, the sound was inconsistent. Overall, I felt it tried too hard to be intense and serious. Because I have thoroughly enjoyed other Joe Hollow films, I will likely revisit this at some point.
If you’re into independent, violent, artistic films with brutal kill scenes, that try to be serious, this might be a film you’d enjoy.
1/2
