V/H/S

Today's movie was the horror anthology V/H/S. V/H/S is comprised of several short films all tied together by a greater short film that provides a backdrop to all the stories. Essentially, a group of petty criminals breaks into a house wherein is a tape that they are being paid to retrieve. They end up finding many tapes and watch some to try to find the right one and find very bizarre things on them. In a nutshell, there ya go.

Overall, the pieces were quite well done, original, and told solid scary stories. Some are better than others, but none are really terrible or anything. The one that really stuck with me deals with 3 bros bringing home a couple "chicks" only to find that one is not what she seems... DUN DUN DUN!!!!! But really, it's genuinely fucking creepy and is still bouncing around in my skull. That said, though it may be because this is the third "found footage" film I've watched in about a week, the handheld cam felt a little much at points but was never too sickening. I do think I need a bit of a shaky cam break though... Other than that, everything looks good and despite some not as good shorts the movie was a very solid anthology flick.

One note though as well, I think one thing I've found in my horror movie months is the kind of horror I like and some of these stories are not it. I am fascinated by supernatural horror but the slasher/murder/porn-y/rape-y horror is just not my bag. There is one scene in here that really bothered me (and I know it was supposed to) was where the gang of crooks sneak up behind a woman and force her shirt up to flash her breasts to the camera. I know it's to be shocking, but the rape-y horror stuff just really gets me. What really bothered me most though was how the scene was shown again in an almost "cool" way during the credits in which the scene played on repeat for about 10 seconds with a dance-y song playing over it. It almost glorified it, and that point, is it really necessary and what does it say about you as a filmmaker?

With that said, I enjoyed the movie for the most part and it's definitely worth a watch.

7.5/10