V/H/S
(2012) 116 min.
Rated: R (Nudity, Sex, Gory violence, drug use)
Country: USA
Director: Adam Wingard, David Bruckner, Ti West, Glenn McQuaid, Joe Swanberg, Radio Silence
Starring: Joe Swanberg, Matt Bettinelli-Olpin, Chad Villella
Links: IMDB | Wikipedia
Rating: ★★★★☆
A found footage anthology framed around the playing of VHS tapes.
Synopsis:
The movie is present in a found footage state. There are no indications of the title or actors. It begins with the word “play” on a blue background, much like a VCR would display before playing a VHS tape.
“Tape 56” (the story that becomes the framework through which the other stories are told. Directed by Adam Wingard.)
A group of thugs are contacted for a job to steal a video tape for their contact. They are promised a lot of money as compensation for their trouble so they decide to take advantage of the offer. Under the cover of night they quietly unlock the door of a darkened house. They sneak around in a house as they search for the video tape. The house is mostly empty.
They go up to the second story of the house and inside one of the rooms they find the body of a man in a chair in front of a stack of TVs displaying static. The ground in littered with a few VHS tapes. One of the criminals is set to watch the tapes in the room while the others move on to look for more tapes.
The others wander into the basement where there is more furniture. They finally reach a corner in the back where there is a large number of VHS tapes. One criminal instructs another to get a bag and they proceed to collect the tapes.
Meanwhile, the tape that is being watched in the room plays. This is where the next stories are intercut with this main story.
“Amateur Night” (Directed by David Bruckner):
Three men put glasses with a hidden camera on one of their group, named Clint, with the plan to bring back girls from a bar and record sex. Clint is unsure, but agrees to do this anyway.
While at the bar Clint and his friends Shane and Patrick talk to girls and drink. One girl seems interested in Clint. She is large eyed and quite shy. Her only words to him are “I like you”. They bring back the girl along with a drunk girl and they go into a hotel room. Shane tries to make out with the drunk girl but she passes out.
The shy girl, Lily, tries to initiate conversations with Clint and hisses at Patrick. Shane decides to have sex with Lily and pulls off her clothes. They start to intiate sex with Lily on top. She tries to pull Clint to it. Patrick removes his clothing. Clint moves away and hides in a bathroom. Patrick also enters the bathroom with a large bleedy bite mark on his hand. Lily bit him.
Soon they peer out to see that Lily is attacking Shane. She kills him and Patrick removes a shower curtain rod to defend himself. Lily deftly takes away the rod and starts to attack Patrick.
Clint tries to wake up the drunk girl, but she is passed out. He manages to escape as Lily is eating the others. Clint runs down some stairs, falls and breaks his wrist.
As he’s lying on the floor he sees Lily has followed him. She comes towards him and tries to initiate fellatio. He doesn’t respond and she takes this as rejection. She begins to cry and he makes an escape outside.
Clint tries to get the attention of the hotel staff. He runs toward a group of people standing by a truck but he his picked up off the ground. He is being carried by Lily who now has huge bat-like wings. The glasses/camera falls to the ground and that is the end of this segment.
“Second Honeymoon” (Directed by Ti West):
Sam and Stephanie are a married couple who are driving out west for a second honeymoon. They stop at a few spots and ultimately stay at a motel. During their trip Stephanie receives a prediction that she will be reunited with a loved one.
During the night someone knocks at their motel door. Sam answers it. He later tells Stephanie that it was a girl with a menacing aura who was asking Sam if they could give her a ride the next day.
During the night while they are asleep the camera turns on. Someone has broken into the room. The person carresses Stephanie’s butt with a switchblade. The person then removes $100 from Sam’s wallet. They also stick Sam’s toothbrush in the toilet.
The next day, Sam discovers his money is missing and accuses Stephanie of stealing it. He also brushes it off saying that he knows she likes to indulge herself.
That night the person enters their room again while they sleep. She stabs Sam in the throat until he dies. She quickly washes her hands in the bathroom sink. Stephanie is there and she and the female murderer kiss.
It cuts into a car ride where Stephanie asks the murder “Did you erase it?” The segment ends.
“Tuesday the 17th” (Directed by Glenn McQuaid):
Joey, Spider and Samantha go on a camping trip with Wendy. She takes them deep into the woods near a lake that she says she used to go to as a tradition. As they trek their way through the woods Wendy tells Joey that “you’re all gonna fucking die.”
As they finally reach the lake, Joey decides to skinny dip. He sheds his clothes and jumps into the lake. The girls and Spider stay out of the lake.
Spider follows Samantha who appears from behind a tree and is about to show him a cheerleading move but is struck in the head with a knife. She dies. Spider runs off but trips. The camera falls aside but captures the muderer stabbing Spider in the head. The murderer appears as a distortion of video and cannot be clearly seen.
Wendy picks up the fallen camera. She walks over to Joey who has put on some shorts and dried off by the side of the lake. Wendy teases him and asks him to have sex with her. He shies away. He remembers reading about murders that happened in the area. Wendy tells him that she brought him and the others as bait.
The killer walks up behind Joey and slits his throat.
Wendy runs away trying to lure the murderer into a few traps laid out. The murderer gets caught in a few but still escapes them and chases her.
Joey returns, bleeding heavily and in a daze and collapses near Wendy. The murderer tries to sneak up, but gets caught in a trap. Wendy, seeing this, starts to gloat about her victory. Nearby the murderer appears in a tree and pounces on Wendy, hitting her in the head until she is dead, then cutting her open and pulling her entrails out.
The segment ends.
“The Sick Thing That Happened to Emily When She Was Younger” (Directed by Joe Swanberg):
Emily and her boyfriend, James, video chat. He is studying to become a doctor and she has just moved into a new place. She also complains about a small lump that has appeared in her arm.
She also mentions how she has heard strange footsteps in the night and starts to investigate. It seems like a small child is haunting her apartment, though the landlady says that no children have lived there.
Emily also begins digging into her arm where the bump is and James tells her to stop.
She tries to make contact once again, but the creatures knock her unconscious. James then appears from another room, cuts an incision in her side and takes out a strange fetus creature. James talks to an off-camera creature and inquires how many more they will need and wonders if the tracking devise inserted in her will harm her.
Emily appears in chat again with a bruised eye and a bandaged arm. She went to a doctor who diagnosed her as schizoaffective. She cries a bit and tells James that he could find a better, more “normal” girlfriend than herself.
The scene then switches to another girlfriend at another location with whom James talks to. She also has a bump in her arm. This ends the segment.
“Tape 56” Continued.
The leader of the group goes to the TV room to find that no one is there. He searches around the house and sees the decapitated body of one of the men. The head is rolled towards his feet and in the doorway walking towards him is the dead man from the TV room.
The criminal runs away as quickly as he can but trips and falls down the stairs. As he looks up he sees the old man lumbering towards him slowly. Quickly, a creature’s face appears and attacks the criminal. His camera drops aside. In the TV room the next (and final) tape can be heard playing.
“10/31/98” (Directed by Matt Bettinelli-Olpin, Tyler Gillett, Justin Martinez, Radio Silence, & Chad Villella ):
Tyler gets his costume prepared and wears it out to meet his buddies Chad, Matt and Paul. It’s Halloween and they’re meeting up at a location for a fun Halloween party.
The group have difficulty remembering the address and finally find a house that they believe is the location for the party. It looks brightly lit inside but all of the rooms are empty, except for furniture.
They wander around the house and see a few unsettling things, like flickering lights, a girl appear in a mirror, an over turned chair. They then hear muffled chanting upstairs in the attic.
They find their way into the attic where a group of men have a woman tied by her wrists and feet. They are shouting a chant. Tyler and his friends, thinking it’s a show, repeat the words.
The men try to attack the intruders but are they themselves attacked by unseen forces. Eventually the boys decide to rescue the girl and cut her loose. She is bleeding, but they carry her through the house.
The house, now seemingly possessed by ghosts, starts to have furniture flying, hands coming out of the walls and windows shifting size.
Ultimately the boys escape with the girl and get into their car. They drive for a way, but then the car stops. Suddenly the girl is gone from the car. She’s on the outside of the car screaming at them. They struggle to open the doors, but they’re locked.
Their car is on train tracks and a train starts to come down the tracks headed toward them. They frantically try to get out of the car, but the tape ends at impact.
Review:
I think this film took “found footage” and was able to frame a few stories within it and still make it work. There have been a lot of films lately that use a shaky cam and are horrible. I’d have to say that this is one of the few films that I’ve seen that uses it effectively.
Now, I wouldn’t go on to say that this is the best horror film ever, but it’s definitely a pretty good horror film for what it is.
Upon multiple viewings the flaws will start to show and it isn’t as scary since it’s more predictable the second go-round. I saw the film without any information about it. I only knew it was a “found footage” film and I guess because of that I was very impressed.
I also liked how some of the smaller films seemed to play like urban legends. And I think, despite the very thin character development, that the characters are somewhat identifiable. I think it’s easy to imagine yourself on a trip that goes horribly wrong or finding yourself alone when strange noises happen and there’s nothing to do but call (or cam) with a friend.
I think that sort of thing resonates with this generation and that helps makes this film successful.
Bonus:
Music Video for the end theme “They Come to Get Us” by The Death Set can be found here. It’s actually really amusing.