The Emeryville Experiments (2016) User Reviews

All you can do is laugh

[jtindahouse · 2/10 · 14 June 2017]

There are three types of horror movies. There are the good ones, then there are the bad ones where you could at least see what they were going for, and then finally there are the ones where they are so atrociously bad that all you can do is sit back and laugh at what you are seeing. 'The Emeryville Experiments' is unfortunately the latter. Holy moly this is a terrible film in every way. I can't help but wonder whether at some point they realised just how bad the product they were working with was, and so decided to cheese it up as much as they possibly could in the hope of it becoming a cult classic one day. I'll give them credit (more than they deserve) and assume that happened at least to some degree.

There is nothing positive to say about this film so let's just get into the negatives. The acting is horrendous by the entire cast. There were some roles that would have been very hard to get wrong, ones where over-acting was basically a must, and yet the actors still managed to screw it up. To be fair to the cast though they were dealing with some diabolical dialogue. The writing in this film is some of the worst you'll ever see. Character's decisions are utterly bizarre and make zero sense from start to finish. Then, as if that wasn't bad enough, the things they say while making these incredibly stupid decisions are even more stupid in themselves.

It's very rare I give a film a '2' on IMDb but I've talked myself into it while writing this review. There are an unbelievable amount of bad horror movies out there, so to say that this is near the top of that pile is truly something. I'm sorry I had to sit through this film and I strongly suggest you take on board my warning and steer well clear of it yourself.

Amateurish

[santiagocosme · 4/10 · 10 December 2016]

During a road trip that leads them into a wooded area, four friends near hit a stranger before wrecking their car on a tree. The foursome and the stranger decide to seek help from a nearby village. A village that proves to be dangerous. Everything in this movie feels extremely amateurish. From the mise en scene, to the actors, the script, the shots, and the rubbish set-up. The poor image quality I didn't mind so much. The rest, on the other hand, made for a particular viewing experience. In fact, the movie is so bad that I found myself amused by it. Like when you hear a bad joke, that is so bad that it actually makes you smile a little. By the 20 minute mark I started to think and hope that the surrealist quality was all intentional but was it? I'm not even sure.

Soooo F*****NG Tired of FAKE REVIEWS

[Selena-Kyle · 1/10 · 19 October 2016]

So when did fake reviews become a 'thing'?

In the last two weeks we have seen films that had NO business being in theaters because we simply looked at the score. Trust me when I tell you that you can't do this anymore. READ the reviews, and you will easily see which are FAKE.

First of all, any film that you haven't heard of previously with a 9 or 10 star rating from anyone should put you on-guard. (That's not to say that a 9 or 10-star rating alone is a clear indication of funny business). Secondly, if, as many of the 9 and 10 star reviewers here have done, the reviewer starts extolling the virtues of those involved in the film, by name (i.e., director Miles Doleac is fantastic and has brought his great vision to the screen!) it might be a sign the the reviewer is a shill. One person here talks about how the people involved in making this movie used all their money to do so. Well, I don't mean to be a witch, but what does that have to do with it being a good movie? While I feel badly for the creator for having sunk their life's savings into it, why would that make me or anyone else LIE and say it is good, when it is not? Third, the old closing of: "Watch it!", "Enjoy it!", "Get it on Amazon" ... should immediately raise a red flag, "Don't wait, you need to see it now", "Don't listen to others, listen to ME (or variations) are always dead giveaways. (Several 9 and 10-star reviews here have all of these).

Unfortunately, it seems that we live in an age where people seem to have a very low moral code and don't hesitate to lie at the drop of a hat and where anything (including integrity) can be purchased for pennies for the sake of the mighty dollar.

This movie is CRAP. I can't tell you if the ending redeemed it, because I could not get that far, but what I saw of it is enough to base my opinion on. To those that say, well how do you know if you didn't watch the end, you don't need to scoop out the contents of a diaper to know it is full of poop, and yes, I did, unfortunately, sit through enough of it to know. It is just BAD.

Anyway, if you want to take my word for it, you're welcome. If not, and you choose to watch it, don't say you weren't forewarned.

terrible!

[awheater-47322 · 1/10 · 20 September 2016]

I wish I had looked at the user reviews before the high rating for this excuse for a movie, plot bad acting worse, continuity abysmal.

I cannot begin to understand how it got such a high rating on IMDb, avoid at all costs.

i had a look at the main actresses background and she seems to have done some decent stuff in her back catalogue, but you would think the rest of the motley crew had been dragged in off the street.

I just cannot believe I spent a good hour and a half watching this turkey, it seemed to get it's ideas from a mish-mash of horror movies but didn't know where to go with them, and ultimately failing in every respect. I would thoroughly recommend you watch anything but this movie, as this low budget horror, (and I use the term horror very loosely) takes the biscuit when it comes to watch-ability.

Fake review scam AVOID!!!!!

[atwriting · 1/10 · 3 September 2016]

I am not sure how this movie has such a high rating. I guess the filmmakers created a bunch of accounts and wrote fake reviews or paid for them. Even the reviews that say that this is a decent film are ludicrous to give this movie a score of nine or 10. This movie is absolutely awful. Do not watch this movie and give anymore reward to these scam artists who clearly cheated for a high rating on this website. Maybe next time they should put this much effort into making a good movie instead of making this crap and putting all their effort into fake reviews. I am a fan of low-budget horror films, and I can often see past the low quality of the genre. This, however, is not a clever low-budget horror film with a few blemishes. I think the experiment here is let's make an awful film and see how many people will buy it if they see it has a higher rating on IMDb. I unfortunately was one of the victims of the scam.

Possibly one of the worst movies I have seen in years

[Orion182 · 1/10 · 28 August 2016]

** Possible Spoilers**

I watched this with expectations that it wouldn't be too good, but I didn't expect to it to be awful. First of all, the 4 main characters are supposed to be in college, but they look like they could be in their 30's. The acting was laughably awful. Some of the scenes looked like they were just practicing and it accidentally made it into the final cut. This movie seemed like it was something some friends did with their phone on an afternoon, I cannot imagine how it could've had a $1 million budget (according to IMDb). I'm fine with low-budget movies, in fact some are great. But when you have $1 million to work with, it shouldn't look like it was made for $1000. One scene that stands out is when they crash into the tree. The hood is open and they are looking at the engine and they say it is ruined. However, you can clearly see there is not a scratch on the engine, or anything under to hood, and the front of the car is in perfect condition. It was clear they slowly drove the car up to the tree and just parked it there, not making any attempt to make it seem like it had crashed. Another funny thing is when they are walking through the woods toward the town and that random smoke blows by. What is that? Did someone just throw a smoke bomb? I'm guessing it was supposed to be a creepy mist or something but it looks hilarious. Those are just two examples of pure laziness in this movie. The movie itself was extremely boring. I couldn't wait for it to be over, thankfully it wasn't too long.

Probably the Worst Movie I've Ever Seen

[scottproulx-63931 · 1/10 · 25 August 2016]

This movie was so bad that it inspired me to write my first ever review to warn others not to waste their time or money on it.

PROS: 1) Premise. 2) Nothing else

CONS: 1) Acting. This is robotic and forced. 2) Writing. I feel bad for the actors because many of the lines they were forced to say were cringe-worthy. 3) Many inconsistencies 4) Poor execution of the only good thing it had going (premise). Any "twists" were obvious right from the get-go and the reveal is about as exciting as a wet noodle. 5) Poor camera work. I don't blame camera quality, but come on, you need to keep the focus on who's talking at the moment. It actually felt like something a high school student would make for a class project in two weeks. 6) Transitions - the transitions between scenes are often unnatural and choppy. May as well have edited the movie in Windows Movie Maker.

Any good review you see is definitely from somebody who either: A) Worked on the movie B) Was PAID to write a positive review (that's just sad) C) Is a friend of somebody who worked on the movie and was asked to write a positive review (also sad) D) Accidentally went to the wrong page on IMDb when they meant to go write a glowing review for something much better.

Don't get me wrong - I really like indie films, so I didn't expect something of a huge studio-production quality. But even indie films have a certain level of professionalism to them that makes up for the lack of budget.

So go grab some heavy duty garbage bags and put this film on the curb for garbage day. I bet even the garbage men won't take it.

Please do not watch. All positive reviews are fake.

[NotTheDirector · 1/10 · 27 August 2016]

This is the worst movie I have ever watched. Every aspect of this movie is horrible. I beg of you, potential film viewer, to heed the warnings of my predecessors, something I wish I had done. If even one human being does not watch this due to my review, the extra time it took to sign up and write this will not be in vain.

It would be pointless to name every negative thing in this movie as that list would take longer than 83min to read, but I'd like to demonstrate the ridiculous script with 2 examples:

1. Kowolski: "They may be mentally ill, but they are still human. And no amount of electricity will make them human again".

2. Cole: "...making out with the Mckinnie girls, and their dad walked in on us. What was his name again?", to which Justin replies with a straight face "Mr. Mckinnie". Cole: "Right".

It is fairly obvious that all positive reviews have been written by 1 (or 2) people, due to consistent spelling and grammatical mistakes ("complains" instead of complaints), curious choices of capitalization ("Director", "Indie"). Two reviewers claim to be married but spell their last name differently (kaminski/keminski). All positive reviewers besides one have registered in the last 6 days and this is their first review. Best of all, they all have a special connection with the director/producer, speaking about his wills, desires and emotions. I am shocked that anyone thinks the director paid for fake reviews, as any paid review would undoubtedly be of higher caliber than those apparently written by himself here.

7.6 for this TRASH?! What?!

[enigma-947-339467 · 1/10 · 1 September 2016]

The acting and script are so BAD I literally lasted 10-15 minutes before shutting it off.

It's literally unwatchable.

I've seriously seen better work from High School video projects, probably even Middle School.

I only tried to watch this because of the super high review score, especially for the horror genre, that rarely scores over a 4-5 here.

Someone involved in this joke of a movie must have made hundreds of fake accounts to pump up the score. Every real review on this page now agrees with me.

I mean, when I say the script is bad, you have no idea. It doesn't even make sense. Who talks like that? Who says things like that? I mean, it's utterly AWFUL. The reactions to situations that the "actors" make are so ridiculous, they're not even funny. They're so dumb, you can't even laugh at it. It's THAT bad.

The Emeryville Experiments

[lanelleblewett · 8/10 · 20 August 2016]

The Emeryville Experiments can be quite an enjoyable film if you don't expect it to be anything new.

The Acting of the protagonists is good, the camera work is great and what the director and the whole crew pulled out of what they had to work with is just showing, that you don't need much but good handicraft to make a good film.

The content though...Is good, not amazing, kind of similar to the Wrong Turn movies.

My recommendation : Watch it and make up your own opinion.

But be warned. You will sigh and moan and yell and laugh. But you probably won't be scared and maybe disappointed, partially because you expected something scary, partially because this is not the regular Hollywood concept film.

No even close to a studio flick

[nicktest · 7/10 · 20 August 2016]

From what I gather from his interviews, Pritesh wanted to tell a compelling story in the vein of a studio flick in terms of technical details including VFX, colors, sound design to name a few. While he may have started with an ambitious plan of retaining talent and exploiting technology to attain that "studio" attributes, it is clear that an Indie film has a long way to go before it can replicate studio talent. It is not my intention to bash the film but to say that it completes with studio is a far stretch. The only reason I gave the film at 7 was for it's ambitions. It does have some qualities, and I appreciate the Indie effort that was given to the making of this film, I just think they could have pushed the ideas further.

Oh dear...

[slatif74 · 1/10 · 21 August 2016]

Let me start by saying *please* do not watch this poor excuse for a movie. As clichéd as it sounds, you genuinely will want that hour and a half of your life back. I actually had to write a review for the first time just to warn others.

To say this film is bad, is an insult to bad; absolutely everything about this 'production' sucks to the nth degree. The story is a mish-mash of utter nonsense. The acting is actually worse than anything that's come from the Asylum guys, and that's some mean feat. And then there's the camera work - it looks like it was filmed by a blind one armed man on a poor quality JVC camera from the 80's. No concept of framing, and on more than one occasion, foreground scenery completely obscures the actor that's talking.

I think the continuity guy must have been hungover during the night scene in the cabin, as the curtains appeared to be letting in daylight. Foley work is just as bad, with outright strange noises used for everyday things. Like, WTF???

About half way in, I thought this might be so bad that it's good, but that feeling passed. Very quickly. The annoying this is, the premise is really good, but unfortunately the execution is dire.

Please, please for the sake of all that is good and holy, keep away from this. It literally is cinematic diarrhoea.

So so so bad. not even funny bad, just avoid

[djsalvador · 1/10 · 17 September 2016]

If I could give this film a minus 5 I would. We decided to watch it as we always try & give low budget indie films a go… But this film is just utter b0ll0cks.

We turned off after the scene when one of the 4 cardboard leads - whilst in a strange town - full of supposedly weird/menacing people - decides to go for a 'cut throat razor' shave!!!! Unfortunately the barber does not kill him, he just delivers possibly the worse acting performance I have ever seen (and in this film there is a lot of competition). We just had to stop watching.

Budget estimated $1, 000,000?!?!?!?! On what?????????? Definitely not on actors, script writers, director, sets or effects. The positive reviews are obviously fakes. If not the reviewers have never seen any other film or television program before and were just amazed to see moving images projected.

Not even funny bad, just totally awful. Do not spend 1 single penny on this pile of crap.

The proof of fake votes jacking up a score

[jackmeat · 1/10 · 28 October 2016]

My quick rating - 0,7/10. The idea was alright, at best. But this is one of the worst movies I have seen in a long time. As a rule for IMDb I typically give no weight to a movies score until over 500 people have voted. That tends to give all the cast and crew members time to get their 10/10 nonsense scores in. But this movie has taken abusing this system to a whole new level. Currently as of writing this, 2,319 votes and a 6.0/10. There is no possible way a movie with the worst acting documented, ever along with dialogue that was scripted by a complete moron just to insult the actors/actresses even further. No wonder the acting was so bad, they probably read the lines for a scene in disbelief. The camera work may have been done by a partially blind person since I tend to occasionally like to see the person speaking the lines as opposed to random shots of who knows what. The sound editing is just bizarre leading to normal ambient sounds being louder than a bass drum for no apparent reason and then a spot with some tension? Naw, don't amplify that whatsoever. All of this, and I haven't even started nitpicking this horrid display of film making (or boredom with a budget as I am calling this). I would suggest other movies that use a similar idea to the "forgotten village/town" type of flick, but I don't want to insult any other film by comparing this. If you make it to the end, don't expect a nice wrap up since even with the idea presented, they couldn't get an ending right as well. Enjoy the outtakes during the credits since you get to see the actors look just as stiff as they are in the movie, so maybe the crew somehow found the most personality lacking people in town and cast each and every one of them. This hour and 22 minutes is seriously lost and I feel I am now a lesser film critic (not paid, but still) just for it.

Huh???

[browsevee · 1/10 · 21 August 2016]

I love movies of all genre and sorts. This is the one of the most if not the most awful one I have seen. We've been here before. It's like a combo of Wrong Turn and Hills Have Eyes. Bad script, bad directing and just bad everything.

Yes, it is a village trapped in time, an experiment.... it's not probable. And then you have the token ethnic actor, this time it's not a African American but an Indian American. It is so stereotypical at first, I thought it was a spoof film, making fun of the Wrong Turn series or Hills Have Eyes, and the title mimics that of the Amityville Horror. I don't understand it at all. It's just a mishmash especially with flashback scenes which aim to introduce the back story. However, it only makes the movie confusing. A lot of the scenes do not flow. If you have someone going crazy at the dinner table, and he's a stranger to you, wouldn't you all just leave or at least react?! Not just sit there quietly as if everything is OK. That was why I thought, it must be a spoof. But I think it's not.

Kudos to Mr Chheda who made the film. However, I would strongly suggest perhaps he should return to civil engineering. If he has too much money to waste, give it to charity. This movie is such a waste that it's bordering on being sinful!

Worst movie ever

[retofa-84223 · 1/10 · 22 September 2016]

1 Star is even too much, should be zero stars! This movie is worse then "Plan 9 from Outer Space"! Don't watch this crab, it's a waste of time except you like to see how low movies can go. It's really the worst movie if ever seen so far. I can't understand why there are reviews with more than one star, probably corrupted critics. The movie should be a "ramake of the 80s"? But, as said, there's no movie so bad as this one, let me know if you know a bigger crab than this. I'm really curious about what could be worse! I watched the movie till the end, this movie is so bad you have to have seen it! This tomato is more than rotten! Let me know what you think about it!

Seriously???

[africe · 1/10 · 23 June 2019]

This is a terrible movie. I barely made it half way through before I turned it off. The concept is fine but the acting, directing, and screenplay are horrible. This movie is an insult to the intelligence of anyone that enjoys horror/paranormal

absolutely atrocious---all good reviews are fake

[jmc1969 · 1/10 · 31 January 2017]

I don't know where to begin, i actually had to pause the movie and go onto my IMDb account just to post. It was THAT awful. The acting is horrible, starts out with a car crashing into a tree, but you don't actually see if crash, just parked 'near' the tree , and it looks like they lit off a smoke bomb in the front of the car to make it look like a --radiator leak maybe? Then the poor acting chump that they hit with the car, they walk over to after hitting him, and as he's lying there unconscious someone yells out "get him some water'?....WTF........seriously, if your burning in a fire, or suffering dehydration from being afloat at sea for a month, or on survivor island being rescued, then YES, by all means "get him some water"....When you hit someone with your car , on a rainy day, in a damp forest, you Don't yell "get him some water".....Look folks, the movies goes even more downhill from there, please don't watch this garbage, and i encourage all who read this to post a negative review about this POS movie that should have not only never made it to DVD, but should have never even made it my TV screen...I'm sorry it did, and you will be too.

Awful

[slhma · 1/10 · 22 August 2016]

Again with the paid reviews. The movie could have been watchable if the acting had been even b grade.But alas,the acting is so horrendous

It seemed like the actors kept forgetting their lines and all the unnatural pauses during the dialogue screams severely amateur.Its just not watchable. Scene after scene of them just standing around looking like their waiting for the director to cue them or a prompter to tell them their lines.

Why release a movie when its this bad?Why all the paid reviews?I swear the movie's budget was spent solely on the paid reviews.I couldn't bear to watch more than 30 minutes of this garbage.

Great low budget movie, think of the hills of eyes

[backlinkchimp · 9/10 · 21 August 2016]

Watched this last night with a few of my friends, yes it's not perfect, but not bad at all. Just an easy to watch horror film.

Car crash on an abandoned road with a bunch of teens, they end up in a weird town called Emeryville, everything is old school, looks like a wild west town. They soon find that all the people there are part of some kind of experiment by an also deranged doctor who thinks he's doing good.

Things turn a bit grizzly when the "crazies" start hunting the teens while there just hanging out waiting for a mechanic.

The stories nothing groundbreaking and It's low budget, its easy on the eye, I'd watch it again.

Ignore the negativity. An entertaining movie!

[donquixoteagain · 7/10 · 28 August 2016]

I have no idea where the extremes in reviews are coming from. Looks like there are a lot of people who either HATE it or LOVE it!. Below are my 2 cents for whatever they are worth.

Before I started watching this film, my expectations were in the basement. Reading these mixed, extreme reviews, I wasn't sure what to expect. Let me take a stab at summarizing:

The story is very generic. Chheda does not break any new grounds here. It follows the journey of a few young kids who end up in this strange town seeking help. Only one of them escapes in the end. There are a few surprises along the way, but nothing that will make your jaw drop.

Acting is okay. Unlike other posters who found acting unbearable, that is not the case. Dr. Kowolski, I think, has done a darn good job. Smith and Barber have also delivered. Ethan's character evokes empathy. It is clear that several folks are probably acting for the first time, please keep in mind that this is a low-budget, Indie.

Production. If you go in expecting a studio flick or a high-budget production value, you WILL be disappointed. If you watch the movie with aligned expectations, you will be pleasantly surprised.

At the end, this flick does a decent job when stacked against similar Indie movies that have recently come out. Give it a shot!

--DQ

Avoid this film, fake reviews everywhere

[xonsuns · 1/10 · 25 January 2018]

This is one of the worst movie ever.

You know there are , in general thos kind of movies:

Masterpiece Good movie Meh movie Bad movie So bad its funny movie then (10 times the distance from alpha centaury to earth) below that level is this turd of a movie... seriously

Avoid

[cameron115115 · 1/10 · 29 September 2019]

I'm not gonna get into why you should avoid this garbage...please just don't waste your time on it. I made a promise to myself at the start of 2019 to watch as many movies as possible this year... This is one of the worst YES it's that bad.

Awful movie!!!

[Wikkid_Gamez · 1/10 · 23 January 2019]

I have seen some pretty bad movies and this one is right up there with the worst of them ... As others have said,don't waste your time!!! I only made it 10-15 mins in and had to turn it off. I completely agree that all high rating reviews are completely fake! I even went so far as to click on them to see how many reviews each had done.... No surprise at all that every single good review of 8-10stars are all one time reviewers... Meaning that the only review those accounts have ever made were for this movie.... That confirmed my suspensions that they are indeed all fake to boost a false rating to trick people into wasting their time trying to watch it. Follow everyone else's advice and don't bother lol... Or at least don't pay anything to see it and have a backup plan because I guarantee you will need it! I think everyone else has already covered the reasons why it is so bad so I won't bother going into details. I'm just here casting my vote like the others to try and level down the false rating.

Glad I didn't pay to see this

[steeleronaldr · 1/10 · 10 March 2020]

Not sure where they wanted to go with this thing but they definitely didn't get there. This whole movie in fact went no where and took 90 minutes to get there. It did start out good but then after about 10-15 minutes it went flat and didn't try to redeem itself. You figure right off the bat who the main antagonist is. You don't however see anything that would even hint this being a horror movie. After 90 minutes you are left with one huge question, what was the horror part. The word "experiment" is a tag line to lure you in but all you get is crazies walking around. Four college kids that prove mommy and daddy's money is being wasted because they were pretty dumb. The one main character (the antagonist) is performing shock treatment to unsuspecting people causing them to act poorly. The end is totally a let down to the max. One of the worst movies I've ever seen.