Dark Feed (2013)

The list of interesting horror flicks seems to continually dwindle. What makes it worse is the fact that films that often look like they have potential are nothing more than typical fare. One flick that seemed interesting on the surface was the 2013 horror flick Dark Feed. The big question is, what category did this fall into.

Plot/ When a film crew moves into an abandoned psychiatric hospital with a shadowy past to shoot a low budget horror film, they get more than they bargained for. The late nights and lack of sleep begin to take a toll, and the longer this crew works, the more the leaky, wet building seems to be coming back to life, feeding off its new inhabitants.

When I saw that this was written by the writers of The Ward, I was excited. Unfortunately, this is no where near The Ward. Yes, there is a lot of potential with this one and some interesting parts with the scenery, lighting and scripting. The problem was everything stopped right there. The storyline as a whole is tired and played out, the acting was all over the place and there was really no payoff as an ending. In the end, this movie fell short of what it could have been and became just another low budget horror flick in the landscape of movies that fell flat. 

The Ward (2010)

One of the things that I have learned over the years is that if you want to truly watch and enjoy (and possibly review) a film, it is better to look past all of the packages and histories of the project, writers or directors. To me, often movies are unfairly graded and reviewed due to who starred in it, or who directed it. By looking past that data and watching the flick (regardless of who worked on it) you should be able to truly get a better read than if you let that info cloud judgment. Look at the movie My Soul To Take by Wes Craven, it was terrible with or without his name on it, but did it get bashed even more because it did not live up to his previous masterpieces? Probably… With that in mind, I am watching and reviewing The Ward, who cares if it was done by the great John Carpenter.

Plot/ a young institutionalized woman is haunted by a mysterious and deadly ghost. As danger creeps closer, she comes to realize that this ghost might be darker than anything she ever could have imagined

Honestly, I had heard very little about this flick, and if I saw something, I pretty much ignored it, as I had no idea what to expect. What I found when I finally put it on was an interesting and entertaining movie. Yes, there were a lot of cliché moments with the characterization and storyline, but that was not much of a deal breaker. For the most part the acting was solid, the effects decent and the soundtrack was decently creepy (although, it was no way a classic Carpenteresque soundtrack).  Yes it has its flaws as this movie was nothing new, the pacing seemed a bit off and there was really no gore. However, in the end, I found it a creepy and enjoyable semi-supernatural, semi-slasher, complete with some decently tense moments (even if the ending was a bit blah). Sure it is not Carpenter’s best work, but if you watch it without thinking about previous John Carpenter works, you should at least enjoy it for what it is.