Newlyweds take off on a honeymoon to Europe, get a little
wasted and wind up pregnant with Satan spawn.
At least I think that’s what happened in “Devil’s Due” directed by
Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett.
This Satanic, possession tale is familiar territory for
Bettinelli-Olpin and Gillett who co-directed the “V/H/S” finale “10/31/98,”
arguably the best segment of the first V/H/S anthology. Samantha McCall, played by adorable actress
Allison Miller, and Zach McCall, played Zach Gilford, return from their
honeymoon and soon find out that Samantha is pregnant—a shock to both
considering she religiously takes birth control. They share the news with friends and family
and everyone is happy and excited except Samantha who slowly realizes something
isn’t quite right with her pregnancy.
Long story short, she starts eating raw meat at the supermarket and
killing wild animals with her barehands.
I know pregnant women get weird cravings but this lady goes overboard!
Much of the film is shot by her husband who bought a video
camera and documents the entire ordeal which starts with joy and slowly
degrades to satanic mayhem. Don’t throw this
one away as yet another found footage film because this movie also utilizes
other peoples cameras and surveillance video to help push the story along
much like the movie “Chronicle.” The
story is told by using all cameras within the world of the couple, not just the
handheld camera used by the husband. I don’t
mind this device, frankly I don’t really think it’s that noticeable unless you’re
writing a movie review or picking it apart because you think you’re a film
conossieur because you know how to illegally download movies on the internet (we
will get to that later.) What I really didn’t
like is how we were the only one actually watching this footage; the husband
never once took a look at what he was shooting. There was tons of weird stuff going on that
he would've seen if he just uploaded his footage and tried to edit it—if youre
not going to edit or even watch your footage what the hell is the point of filming
at all?
I'll tell you why, because we have to suspend our disbelief and it’s scary, plain and simple. I think society has gotten use to the herky
jerky camera style made famous by the “Blair Witch Project” and no one is
getting motion sickness anymore but everyone seems to pan these movies
immediately when they are released. As a
film watcher we become accustomed to certain things like someone looking in a
mirror on a medicine cabinet, opening the medicine cabinet, grabbing something
and then closing it, revealing a killer or something spooky in the reflection behind them. We have all seen it a million times and we begin
to anticipate these kinds of things when we see them developing in a film. The documentary style coupled with a demonic
possession tale means that, at any time, some wild stuff could happen and you could
be scared out of your wits. I found this
happening to me many times—“oh boy, when he walks in the room with that camera
she’s going to be eating the dog or something!”
These parts were excellent and kept even Gory Gary on the edge of his
seat (or bed, I watched it in bed.)
Let’s move onto the acting: as I did research I read through a lot of other reviews and message boards and found that
a lot of people think they are experts on acting. How?
What exactly does a person who does not act, and has no experience with
acting or filmmaking know about a very, very difficult skill? “Oh, the acting was terrible….the acting
sucked…blah blah blah.” You know nothing
about acting and you’re just trying to fill your dumb review with more words
and that’s the obvious thing for you to talk about because expounding on
anything else or even having an educated thought would make your head explode! Everyone is entitled to their opinion but
take it from me, if there is a big budget film being made, the directors and
actors are top-notch talent and they will get it right, just like they did in
this film. The husband and wife do an
excellent job and practically carry the entire movie dealing with some pretty
difficult subject matter. It’s not like
they’re in a comedy where they are just some funny girl or dude in a
relationship that just doesn’t seem to work out….awww SHUCKS!! They are newlyweds having to act like they
are in love, having to act like they are having their first child and dealing
with the god damn ANTICHRIST! Please,
Stinky Kubrick, sitting at your computer in your underwear, looking through
torrent downloads while you recuperate from your last masturbation session—tell
me how they should have acted. I have a post coming up in a few weeks about acting and why it is such a difficult thing to judge, so stay tuned for more vitriol aimed at these armchair actors and film directors.
“Devil’s Due” is Rated R, has a run time of 89 minutes
and gets a 2.5 stars on the gore score.
This film didn't take us anywhere we haven’t already been but did its
best to be inventive and definitely delivered some scary moments. It did leave us wondering, however, about the title....what exactly is the Devil Due? Is it a play on words? Like "due" date? I dunno, definitely give this one a watch, fright fiends, and be weary of other reviewers; the only thing many of them got correct is they liked this movie better the first time when it was called "Rosemary's Baby."
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