Blackstock Boneyard (2021) User Reviews

Great subject

[BandSAboutMovies · 4/10 · 8 June 2021]

Originally called Rightful, this is the story of two black brothers who have come back from the grave to avenge their deaths and reclaim the land that's rightfully theirs.

It's actually based on the true story of Thomas and Meeks Griffin, who were forced to sell their land after being framed for the murder of 75-year-old Confederate veteran John Q. Lewis. The Griffin brothers were convicted based on the accusations of another black man, John "Monk" Stevenson. As he had the murder weapon in his possession, he was given a life sentence, while two other black men, Nelson Brice and John Crosby, were also executed for the same crime.

The truth may have been in Lewis's suspected sexual relationship with 22-year-old Anna Davis, who was black. Davis and her husband were never tried, possibly for fear of the scandal that would arise when it came out that a white older rich man was sleeping with a black woman.

The Griffins were the richest black men in the area and had to sell their farm to pay for the trial. Despite more than a hundred people - including the town's mayor, sheriff, two of the jurors and the grand jury foremen - petitioned Governor Richard Manning to commute their sentence, but they still went to the electric chair.

In 2009, Tom Joyner - a former member of the Commodores before they were famous and the host of The Tom Joyner Show - learned that he was related to the Griffins. He sought their pardons from the Columbia, South Carolina state appeals court and received it, finally setting things right.

Obviously, this is a sensitive subject to base a horror film on.

The tale of the film is about the property itself, which is about to be claimed by Judge Carroll Johnson "CJ" Ramage, who is the grandson of the judge that sentenced the Griffins to die. The farm is still worth plenty of money. However, his lawyer Roger Newbold(Jonathan Fuller, Castle Freak) has discovered that a woman named Lyndsy (Ashley Whelan, The Houses October Built) actually in the true heir to the land. They decide to scare her off, just as the brothers come back The Fog style.

The film really tries to hit so many other hot button topics like police brutality and workplace harassment, but it already has a great story to be inspired by. That said, for the state of horror in 2021, this is pretty interesting and worth checking out.

Wanted to but never was.

[Patient444 · 3/10 · 15 June 2021]

A horror - but do bare in mind, mostly, it didn't succeed because of the very low budget. The idea was overall good, not original or incredible, but I do not think it relied on any racial slur, it had its own little world where it couldn't develop properly so it ended up looking like a cartoon.

There are no special effects, and whatever holds their place looks bad, as in for characters and development, there is some progress here but still, overall, stereotypical and annoying. Easy to predict people and the same with the action. Again, it did have a little spark, that I do believe it would have worked with a better direction and budget, but perhaps this was the most they could achieve.

Overall, definitely not a recommendation for anyone, a horror that perhaps managed to get something right when it came down to the costumes: it had a little bit of Friday the 13th in it but done well.

Cheers!

Well, at least they tried...

[paul_haakonsen · 3/10 · 31 March 2022]

Being a horror aficionado and stumbling upon the 2021 movie "Rightful" (aka "Blackstock Boneyard"), of course I had to sit down and watch it. Sure, I had never even heard about this movie from writer Stephen George and director Andre Alfa, so I didn't have a clue as to what I was in for here.

Turns out that I wasn't in for a particularly outstanding or great horror experience. The storyline and script from writer Stephen George just didn't have any punch or any particular drive really. It was a very monotonous and generic horror movie, without actually being scary in any way.

The storyline in "Rightful" was just too bland and pointless to provide me with much of any entertainment, and it was quite the ordeal to sit through the movie and keep focusing on the events on the screen, especially since there wasn't really much going on to begin with.

I wasn't familiar with the cast ensemble in "Rightful". Normally that is something I tend to enjoy when I sit down to watch movies, as the new and unfamiliar talents and faces are not already associated with other previously portrayed characters in other movies. But I have to say that the cast ensemble in "Rightful" just didn't have a whole lot of proper contents in terms of script, storyline, characters and dialogue to work with.

For a horror movie then "Rightful" just didn't deliver. The only real thing scary about "Rightful" was the absence of proper horror elements.

My rating of director Andre Alfa's 2021 movie "Rightful" lands on a three out of ten stars.

A low budget is no excuse for a poor script and an even poorer directing.

[rezacrom · 1/10 · 17 June 2021]

Many movies are made each year on low budgets, like the Rocky franchise or Evil Dead, but there are ways to steer clear of dumb cinematic mistakes that this movie is filled with.

The movie says that it's based on a true story, and remember, it's a story about 2 dudes who come back from the dead to seek revenge for an injustice that happened to them 100 years ago.

What's wrong with it? Frankly the million dollar question is, what's not wrong about this movie. I will point out some of the dark spots that make this film deserve a 1/10.

1. The acting, To be honest I never blame the actors. An actor is like a socket wrench, and it's solely the director's responsibility to put them in the correct acting path. This movie is a shining example of poor directing that's filled with fake and cringy acting.

People who see bodies and react like they see dead bodies every day and it's no big deal, characters that are closer to cartoon figures than real people with zero backstories and build ups, and huge gaps where you think you are watching a soap opera - romance sitcom.

2. The script, If you are going to use the "based on a true story" thingy in the beginning of a movie, make sure that the film the audience gonna watch, doesn't have zombies or resurrected supernatural dudes in it. You can't just pick a dramatic and true event were 2 innocent people died because of the color of their skin and make it into a stupid paranormal slasher flick.

3. The dialogues, People in real life don't act or talk like this! It made me feel second hand shame throughout the entire movie. I would prefer it if it was silent movie to be honest... Somewhere in the duration of this thing, the blond country girl says the line "I am trying" at least 7 times while being in imminent danger of dying a horrible death.

4. The CGI (?) So, you have a low budget, is it absolutely necessary to use CGI when it's gonna look fake as f? Really guys, it's 2021, there are literally millions of ways to show a gory scene with a good make up team, fake blood and guts, props, and some smart directing. But no, let's hire little Timmy, the director's nephew to make some utterly fake CGI on his smartphone, that looks worse than special effects used in movies from the 80s.

5. The.... action(???) I think I cried a little when the final act started. You are closed up in a building with 2 dudes that rose from the dead and who are trying to kill you... Let's just run in stupid circles, let's try and open doors that are locked without having a key, let's kill ourselves (yep, a girl just kills herself by cutting her own throat for no reason at all), let's yell, let's check a dead girls body that has a huge hole in the stomach for signs of life, let's just sit around and share the true story about how the 2 dudes where innocent and didn't deserve to be executed, and my personal favorite, the magic musket (old pistol that took gunpowder in the barrel and a single spherical bullet), that can shoot not once, nor twice, but 6 times in total without reloading, and my second favorite, the same musket that blew a hole the size of a fist in a girl's stomach, when the judge shots the pretty boy in the end from point blank, it just doesn't do the trick, and he is healthy and happy in the next scene with a little tummy ache like he ate a bad burrito or something.

6. The ending, My 3 friends just die, but I am gonna live in the big ol white house with my newfound hubby, because what's a movie without a good old fashioned happy end?

The short review, Don't watch it.

i wanted to like it..

[diegoerwin · 4/10 · 19 April 2022]

Okay sooooo, i watched this movie last year when it came out because i knew somebody in it. And i decided to re-watch it today. Well. Hmm. It isn't the best. In the beginning where they are in the electric chairs.. i kinda sorta liked that scene. I just hated how fake the country accent from the judge sounded... it was kind of embarrassing. And the girls...... oh my god their acting is so cheesy. Like it had potential. And yes it is based on true events but no there never were two males who came back to life like that and took revenge lmao. Also the bloody effects... it was really bad. I wish they could've spent less money using a blood bag or something other than that cgi because it makes it worse. Also how in the heck is a person still alive after having a hole wound the size of a pizza still alive. Whatever long story short it's an okay movie but not the greatest.

Really should've been better but has some problems

[kannibalcorpsegrinder · 4/10 · 10 June 2021]

After learning that she's inherited some land, a woman and her friends travel to a small southern town to look into everything and soon find that she's involved in a shady incident from the past involving a pair of wrongly convicted black men who have no risen from the grave seeking revenge for these actions.

This one really could've been better but is still enjoyable enough. This one really works when focusing on the revenge-based rampage that's told in the finale. That features the exploits of the curse coming true as the killers rise from their graves and set out to seek revenge on the ones whose ancestors wronged them enables some enjoyable enough slashing scenes. Getting the group into the courthouse at the end allows for some entertaining scenes of the group being chased through the building and being killed off in rather graphic and brutal ways, this isn't revolutionary or truly impressive but still features a reasonably exciting part of the film featuring creepy-looking killers offering the bloodshed. These aspects are what make this one rather tolerable for the most part. There are a few problems with this one. One of the main problems here is the film's sluggish pace that, even at a considerably shorter run-time, makes this feel a lot longer than it really is. The first half to this one really struggles to get going, mired in a string of racist outbursts from the locals, a series of intimidation tactics disguised as goading her to sell her share of the land, and a really shoehorned and unnatural romance angle that really struggles to make it feel like a genre effort. These scenes would've been fine had they done something special to build on the revenge that's taking place, but these scenes end up holding back that revenge part until so late in the film that it comes off dull and overlong at times based on the setup. As well, there's also the rather curious notion of the film being comically over-the-top with its characterizations to prove points about social issues. The overt racism on display towards the black characters, with their language and immediate physical violence merely at their existence, is so far removed from realistic behavior that there's no connection to any kind of commentary it's trying to prove. Likewise, a further attempt at criticizing sexual intimidation and conspiracies in the workplace comes off so utterly lazily and then forgotten about highlights the futility of including it as it's such a backhanded addition that it doesn't need to be there. It goes hand-in-hand with the other drawbacks here to really lower this one from what it could've been.

Rated Unrated/R: Graphic and racist Language and Graphic Violence.

repent ...

[ops-52535 · 4/10 · 8 June 2021]

Or you will die in expectation... a low budget, bad acted, but with a glimmer of hope of an idea, gory southern horror, with digital bloodspatter, and cgi wounds made by the reaperman and his whippet.

Its a c movie for sure x2, but not for the common and squemish horror lover, the idea could easily have gone home on a larger budget thinks the grumpy old man.

Another Owner of the Land

[nogodnomasters · 5/10 · 24 June 2021]

In 1913 two African-American brothers were accused of robbery, rape, and murder base on the testimony of Anna Davis (Brittany Lucio). They sold they farm for their defense and subsequently sentenced to death. It was a scam to get the land. A store wishes to purchase the land and in a search for heirs to the three owners after that, Lyndsy (Ashley Whelan) is told she is related to Anna Davis and is in for a cut. She travels to Blackstock, SC with three friends billed as both the final girl and the one most likely to be killed. As the land grab grows near, the brothers rise up from the grave to enact revenge (The part not based on a true story.)

A lot of pretty girls. Stereotypes. Plot that wasn't that exciting. The hooded killers need some theme music, like Jason. They were just big hooded killers who came back to life.

Guide: F-word. Sex/rape. No nudity.