Hanging out with her family and boyfriend, a teen comes to find the next-door neighbor who's staying with them to be acting strange around her younger brother and tries to videotape their exploits, eventually coming upon a far more deadly secret then she ever imaging that puts the whole family in danger.
Overall, this one was a decent enough entry. One of the more impressive features here is the wholly impressive and fun build-up throughout the first half of the film. Getting a full-on view of the family dynamic as well as the interaction with her boyfriend, that early work gives this a fantastic counterpoint to the burgeoning horror scenes later on. The seeming innocence of it all, especially being neighborly and helping shelter the friend while his mother is away has quite a lot to like as the seemingly normal way he comes into their lives and begins to act menacingly towards her prompting the need to document everything from that point on is incredibly fun. That leads into the seemingly endless supernatural antics which make for a lot to enjoy here. The early part that plays more in league with realistic endeavors, hearing voices in the night downstairs, secretive behavior between the two or just popping out of nowhere despite incessant name-calling seem like fine starts to things as they're all fine clues to greater events while being seemingly innocuous. Once it goes for more deadly and dangerous fare from the falling chandelier or the attack in the garage, the pacing and intensity pick up considerably as the scares become creepier and more shocking. These lead nicely into the finale where the full extent of their plans come together to provide stellar attacks on the family, some strong suspense-filled chases and several fantastic jump-scares that have some life to this part of the film. These here are what hold this one up overall. That said, there are some rather large flaws here. The main factor to be had is the ridiculous storyline for how everything plays out. As there's no real motive to have the son stay over in the first place, the fact that they're setting up cameras to record everything with no proper motivation to do so or the outright failure to explain what the trick involving the night-vision attached to the video-game console is supposed to mean when it is brought up for an intriguing idea yet goes nowhere as the film never makes any mention of what that does to ghost hunting. The fact that the finale, which supposedly to going to tie everything together as for what the kid was doing or why that house instead just ends on a lame jump-scare that doesn't do anything hurts this one. That is a rather large problem in the film as well since the vast majority of the film's scares go nowhere or just plain don't work. A gag with the falling knife is generally ignored, much like the other scares here involving anything going on. From the slow-build of the devil marks on the son and his subsequent withdrawal in personality to the other scenes here involving her being attacked in the garage or a truly chilling sequence involving her being levitated off her bed while she sleeps unaware of everything despite having all the video evidence there at their disposal and not giving it a watch to show something's wrong. Since there's far more of a focus on the traditional scares featuring things crashing in the distance, something jumping out at people with provocation and shadows flashing suddenly on the wall behind them, that's quite disheartening and lowers this one overall.
Rated R: Graphic Language and Violence.
Overall, this one was a decent enough entry. One of the more impressive features here is the wholly impressive and fun build-up throughout the first half of the film. Getting a full-on view of the family dynamic as well as the interaction with her boyfriend, that early work gives this a fantastic counterpoint to the burgeoning horror scenes later on. The seeming innocence of it all, especially being neighborly and helping shelter the friend while his mother is away has quite a lot to like as the seemingly normal way he comes into their lives and begins to act menacingly towards her prompting the need to document everything from that point on is incredibly fun. That leads into the seemingly endless supernatural antics which make for a lot to enjoy here. The early part that plays more in league with realistic endeavors, hearing voices in the night downstairs, secretive behavior between the two or just popping out of nowhere despite incessant name-calling seem like fine starts to things as they're all fine clues to greater events while being seemingly innocuous. Once it goes for more deadly and dangerous fare from the falling chandelier or the attack in the garage, the pacing and intensity pick up considerably as the scares become creepier and more shocking. These lead nicely into the finale where the full extent of their plans come together to provide stellar attacks on the family, some strong suspense-filled chases and several fantastic jump-scares that have some life to this part of the film. These here are what hold this one up overall. That said, there are some rather large flaws here. The main factor to be had is the ridiculous storyline for how everything plays out. As there's no real motive to have the son stay over in the first place, the fact that they're setting up cameras to record everything with no proper motivation to do so or the outright failure to explain what the trick involving the night-vision attached to the video-game console is supposed to mean when it is brought up for an intriguing idea yet goes nowhere as the film never makes any mention of what that does to ghost hunting. The fact that the finale, which supposedly to going to tie everything together as for what the kid was doing or why that house instead just ends on a lame jump-scare that doesn't do anything hurts this one. That is a rather large problem in the film as well since the vast majority of the film's scares go nowhere or just plain don't work. A gag with the falling knife is generally ignored, much like the other scares here involving anything going on. From the slow-build of the devil marks on the son and his subsequent withdrawal in personality to the other scenes here involving her being attacked in the garage or a truly chilling sequence involving her being levitated off her bed while she sleeps unaware of everything despite having all the video evidence there at their disposal and not giving it a watch to show something's wrong. Since there's far more of a focus on the traditional scares featuring things crashing in the distance, something jumping out at people with provocation and shadows flashing suddenly on the wall behind them, that's quite disheartening and lowers this one overall.
Rated R: Graphic Language and Violence.