Premise: Police raiding a warehouse find a series of disturbing VHS tapes.
It's hard for me to express my delight at finding out about this movie. I had no idea it was being made. I randomly stumbled onto it looking for something else the day after it was released and I practically squealed. V/H/S and V/H/S/2 are my two favorite horror movies. They are a mix of found footage style (which I'm a sucker for), horror filmmakers of talent, and incredible ambition that work so wonderfully. The anthology structure gives them variety and doesn't wear out any of the ideas. It's frustrating how much people dismiss them because of gripes about the found footage style, gimmicky structure, or lack of polish.
After the third movie, V/H/S Viral, was a complete whiff (not enough shorts and an awful bridging story) I thought the franchise was dead. It's hard to convince enough filmmakers to put time and effort into a low budget anthology. But I think the basic premise is malleable. There's a collective of people who basically collect and share tapes of people getting killed by malevolent forces. That's it. There's so much room to work in this. The main thing they need to avoid is overexplaining this collective idea.
(As I like to do with anthologies, let's break this down by each short)
Holy Hell
This short is the bridge between the other segments. I think it's also the weakest. It's the main time when the production values really hurt. And I'm just not a fan of when they try to develop the story behind this collective. As much as I adore the first two movies, I never have a desire to know more.
Storm Drain
This one also feels a little cheap. Found footage should avoid mimicking news programs. Local news feels cheap, but because it's produced daily over years, it's actually pretty hard to fake it convincingly. Trying to do a news program is a nice slant they haven't tried before though. Creativity of the footage source is the biggest problem as this series progresses, so I appreciate any attempt to find a new reason for this footage to exist. The Raatma stuff is fun. I don't care for the very end though. I don't like when they get jokey. The V/H/S tone works better when the segments are uniform in vision and leave out the camp.
The Empty Wake
This is one of the stronger segments due to its simplicity. No surprise it comes from prolific horror writer Simon Barrett who has been involved in previous V/H/S movies and has written some of the best horror of the last decade. He's a better writer than director though. I imagine he came back for the chance to direct, so I'll take too much Barrett over none. I think this does play a little fast and loose with the camera angles that are possible.
The Subject
Oh my. This was a treat. It came from Timo Tjahjanto, who codirected the insane death cult segment from V/H/S/2. This is a crazier idea but without the intensity. That makes sense. I think Gareth Evans brought most of that in the V/H/S/2 segment. This was still good though. Some really messed up visuals.
Terror
This was overall my favorite segment. Some of the white nationalist stuff was over the top, but the mix of elements in this is wholly unique. Exploding blood. What an idea.
The first three V/H/S movies were indie features that screened at Sundance. The group behind them had a lot of developing talent, eager to show off their skills. V/H/S/94 is a Shudder exclusive with a more modest budget and emerging talents don't have the same incentive to sign on. Expectedly, my response is a little more muted. Still, it was so damn refreshing to have one of the favorite franchises back and in good form. I'm hoping Shudder can keep these coming.
Verdict: Strongly Recommend
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