A much loved film by many, it's unfortunately also
a very uneven film as well and how much you forgive its poor qualities will greatly influence your enjoyment of it's strong points.
Not exact matches
This
film could have been
very compelling, but in the long run, there's a certain superficiality that really shouldn't be here, and inconsistencies which further dilute kick, until the final product falls as formulaic, cheesy,
uneven and all around underwhelming.
I realise that at the
very start of the
film we are told that the accounts being shown are completely contradictory and that they are one side of the story but for me, that
uneven story - telling left me with more questions than answers but no desire to watch any more that might have shed light.
If the horror anthology
film has a weakness, the equivalent of a wooden stake or an overbearing (and decapitated) mother, it's that they are almost always, by their
very nature,
uneven.
But he gives this
film an oddly muted tone and
uneven cast, which leaves it enjoyably silly even though it's never
very funny.
Instead, Nicholas Stoller («Forgetting Sarah Marshall») and first - time feature
film writers Andrew J. Cohen and Brendan O'Brien are behind this
very uneven effort.
Bava's choice of music (and composer) has sometimes been
very uneven: Carlo Rustichelli's romanticized and treacly music for Whip and the Body detracted from the
film's pinched, sadistic sequences; Libra's prog - rock score for Shock felt at times like an effects - ridden mimic of Goblin's supernatural score for Dario Argento's Suspiria; and Stelvio Cipriani's muzak for the original Italian version of Baron Blood deserved to be replaced by Les Baxter's more eerie, orchestral score when AIP initially released that
film in North America.
Though the fantasy
film sounds great in theory, the trailers don't look
very promising, particularly in regards to its
uneven tone (is it for children, adults or the whole family?)
Flawed and
uneven, with a conclusion that simply doesn't convince, but if you're able to sidestep these faults then there's still a
very good
film at it's core.