The Lurker (2019) User Reviews

I like slashers, I like Scout Taylor-Compton, I did not like this movie.

[Kolobos51 · 3/10 · 5 February 2020]

I like slashers and I wanted to give this the benefit of the doubt because I like the lead actress. Scout Taylor-Compton (Rob Zombie's Halloween movies, Cynthia, Feral) stars as a high school student and yes, she is very, very clearly too old for her part. But I was willing to let that slide because I like the actress and let's face it, this is a movie set at Crystal Lake High. You shouldn't expect much, just some dumb slasher fun. Unfortunately, it doesn't even deliver on that.

Taylor-Compton is good in her role and it's actually one of her better parts. She's starring in the school production of Romeo and Juliet and is popular but has some problems. Her play's director hates her, she has a weird relationship with her mom's boyfriend (and honestly she only looks about four years younger than either of them), and she has a dark secret the movie is constantly alluding to. And she's pregnant, which is given away in the trailer.

That's all well and good. What sucks is how incredibly slow this movie is. It's really structured more like a high school melodrama with the kills few and far between. The movie is just dull and by the third act when things actually start happening, I was already pretty checked out. Considering how short this movie is, it's incredible that it still feels so boring and drawn out. I only recommend it for Scout Taylor-Compton's most die hard fans.

Murder is in the janitor's skill set

[nogodnomasters · 2/10 · 26 February 2020]

The film centers on Taylor (Scout Taylor-Compton) a high school student in drama. It appears she is being shamed by her peers. There is an early murder, followed by a series of murders and the film makes it look like the janitor (Eddie Huchro who looks like the fat Val Kilmer). One by one the students are bumped off and we get a flashback as to why this is happening.

This is a high school slasher film. It takes place at Crystal Lake High School so we suspect Jason. Scout Taylor-Compton is 31 and playing a teen. And through all the heavy make-up she still has bags under her eyes and minor crow's feet. The plot didn't gel that well. The editing or script was incoherent in a bad way until the end.

Guide: F-word. No sex or nudity.

pass on this one

[natcalgary · 3/10 · 17 February 2020]

Good lead actress but after that not much to write home about. story made very little sense. and the very last kill was pointless and stupi the way it came about

2.9

Legitimately amateur production

[KingOfHungary · 1/10 · 18 April 2020]

This movie does not even deserve a review, because it's on the level of a high school project, where all of the "actors" and "actresses" were cast off the street and randomly given roles, some of them deciding to ham it up like an absurd comedy. The lead actress looks to be the age of the mother of the classmates, there's an entire generation gap between her and the rest of the students. The acting is tone deaf, amateurish, emotionally devoid, and on the verge of character breaking. Scenes just suddenly lurch forward with every cut, with no regard to tone, setting, or logic. The dialogue is either banal, on the nose, pointless, or senseless (in the case where the lead refers to a clearly normal human killer as "something") To top it off, the audio is quickly slapped together, with several places where ambient audio is simply missing, as characters are speaking with no sound, sentences are cut off between scenes a couple times, some voices are omnipresent, while sometimes a person's voice audio will be louder than the others. It's movies like these that IMDB should have a 0 rating, because this isn't a legitimate feature film, it's a group project where even the people involved will be embarrassed to see again.

Quite simply the worst casting ever!

[rooneykoh · 1/10 · 10 February 2020]

I like Scout Taylor-Compton I think she is a good actress but I mean she is quite clearly not young enough to play a high school student and doesnt even look close, to the point where it's impossible to look past that and actually even try review any other part of this movie, I cant believe she would even agree to the part.

It justs bad beyond belief and for that it deserves nothing more than 1 star.

The main girl is distrupting...

[beyzakarpat · 3/10 · 16 February 2020]

Scout Taylor was born in 1989...means she is 30 years old in 2019 . Did you really really have to choose a 30 year old girl to play a high school girl? Who belives that anyway? It's cool you put an 80s sound and desaturate the colors and give some sense of nostalgy...we say "oh what a cool movie", then we see the 30 year old girl who is probably using anti-aging treatment prentending to be a high school girl. Her parents look younger than her.

And with her hair style and her wrinkles...I just couldn't belive the main character. It was just distrupting my concentration.

Good idea for a story but everything else was rubish

[stephenramkissoon · 3/10 · 13 February 2020]

Lets be real here , the acting was rubbish , including Taylor - Compton , most of the cast wouldn't even be suited to act as extras in a zombie movie. Secondly who wrote this movie , it was ok ish until the part where they went to the party at Romeo house , the writing just went down hill from there , I mean seriously who leaves the safety of all there friends in the living room to go snooping through the house of the boy she hates . And who decides to split up in the woods at night on a stupid treasure hunt . Its like whoever produced this movie did everything in there power to make sure it sucked . I gave it 3 stars because the story itself was ok ish.

Underwhelming and unappealing slasher effort

[kannibalcorpsegrinder · 3/10 · 4 June 2020]

Following the death of a faculty member, the students of a local high school play decide to carry on in their honor, but when the lead actress becomes convinced that she's in danger for a cruel prank she and her friends pulled years earlier they find the performance targeted by a masked killer out for revenge.

On the whole, this was a disappointing slasher. One of the better aspects here is the rather fun setup and layout of the school's performances that are shown here. The performances pieces are quite high-end for a high-school quality production, especially the opening which goes alongside the fine stalking of the victim throughout the school as it's ongoing. Likewise, the latter part of the film where it goes away from the school to a series of enjoyable stalking at the house part gets another fun addition of some brutal kills to the mix with bashings by a bat, drowning in a sink and numerous grisly impalements which is all that is likable here, unfortunately. There are some big problems on display. Among the biggest drawbacks is an utterly bland, cliche and unimpressive high-school drama setup that takes place at the school. The entire setup about the backstabbing and jealousy that arises when dealing with the club-members, from secretly trying to sabotage the other actors to get their turn in the spotlight or the clique of mean girls trying to get through the year together with a secret intact, are nowhere near interesting at all and are just absolute cliches that have no point in being included here. All their inclusion seems to offer up is eye-rolling and boredom throughout the first half here with the inclusion of these insipid and useless elements present. The other problem is the terrible and completely out-of-left-field finale that undermines what happened beforehand here. The true revelation of the killer makes no sense as there's nothing about their intentions mentioned as a motivation for getting involved that requires them to engage in this slaughter as all of it just comes off as stupid. That reveal also changes around a leads' likability by switching around their entire setup to have it make sense, and the entire outcome in the hospital makes no sense either if the entire point is undermined by performing what happens in full view of everyone. It's not shocking, intriguing and just makes this more of a mess than it should.

Rated Unrated/R: Graphic Language and Graphic Violence.

Good and great slasher movie

[dy38493 · 3/10 · 23 February 2020]

Good movie to watch for especially the slasher point in the movie good cast and a simple story make the movie a worth watch.

I wanted to like it...

[hellbilly-61944 · 2/10 · 24 June 2020]

I saw the bad reviews about the casting but thought I could ignore it if it had enough of an "80's slasher" feel to it because none of those actors were teenagers either but it really was too hard to get past. I actually burst out laughing when Taylor-Compton referred to herself as "underage" to a man who looked like her husband...if not, son.

But again, I could have forgave it if the plot was substantial but it wasn't. It was uneventful and by-the-numbers. I guess if you're a big Horror fan it might be worth a watch if you have some time to kill. But I wouldn't spend money on it.

A strong female lead, a fun and surprising story!

[x-85038 · 10/10 · 12 February 2020]

After watching the entire movie, I have decided to write a review since I saw some back-lashing against the casting of film. Actually, I found it quite enjoyable. The film did spend enough time (descend acting) and efforts on the leading lady Taylor and her personal problems as well as her interactions with her various classmates, which I think is a useful plot decision for it helped me as an audience to build an emotional connection with these characters. I strongly disagree with some of the reviewers who used this against the film. On the contrary, I think this is what makes The Lurker stands out. Unlike a typical "obnoxious teens get slaughtered constantly' slasher, this film has made the efforts to make each character interesting and has offered the audiences a real opportunity to get to know them. Besides Taylor, audiences also get to meet Tory, Hannah, Lily, Chole, etc. Each of these ladies has a unique personality. Each "type" could remind us of someone we actually know in our high school days.

Scout Taylor- Compton did a fantastic job! She brought to life a real strong, smart and spiky female lead who refused to give in to everyone who is pushing her around. For those reviewers who are probably old and complained about the ages of the cast, I hope they are not too "old" to forget some of "their friends" were exactly like that in high school. Well, maybe high school was a century ago for them that they couldn't remember anymore. We live in such an exciting time of diversity and representation flourishing in Hollywood than ever before. In my opinion, it is WONDERFUL to have female actresses been given roles that allow them to use their artistic craft and to be cinematic and creative. Unfortunately, it is so sad to see some people trying to put such a so-called age limitation on actors, especially on females. Furthermore, another reason I think the casting decision was not bad is that most of the cast seems to somehow come from the honor genre background. For example, Naomi Grossman "American Horror Story", Ari Lehman "Friday the 13th", etc. I feel like we can tell the hard work that has been put into this film by the cast and crew.

This is a leisurely enjoyable film with a good story flow. The plot twist in the end is so well done. Absolutely deserves a good review! For those who love the genre and a fun film, the Lurker definitely worth checking out!

Surprisingly decent

[kyleallencole9 · 6/10 · 10 February 2020]

I checked this one out since I'm a fan of Scout Taylor Compton and found it to be pretty good. She plays a high school senior about to graduate and is mixed up in a vicious scandal during a theatre play that she is a part of. At the same time, a masked serial killer is murdering people connected to the play and the viewer isn't aware of a much bigger picture until the twisted end. There are a few murders in the beginning and then the film switches to an after party at one of the student's homes and there are a few more killings there. Being that the party house is behind the high school, a handful of remaining teens make it to the school and are locked in and also begin to be killed off one at a time. A few of the killings in this are pretty gory, but most kills are done relatively quick. The film had an overall weirdness to it, but definitely played a part in the film's twisted and unexpected ending. Now that I've seen the film and the conclusion, it foreshadowed in flashbacks on who the real culprit of the killing spree is. Available to rent on Amazon Prime.

Weird one

[bangel3322 · 1/10 · 27 August 2020]

Not sure how to describe this film other than odd. The way it's filmed is quite strange. I was so confused by timeline in the beginning. Took me a while to ease into it. For me this was quite predictable. I wasn't shocked by ending. Dialogue was terrible, acting wasn't much better. It was just a bit all over the place.

Do not waste ur time on this

[hanadi-university · 1/10 · 11 May 2021]

I don't like the story, I don't like how the actress act, I don't like the whole thing! I definitely do not recommend it.

I'm a sucker for a slasher

[couponthyme · 10/10 · 12 February 2020]

I liked the movie .... I'm a big fan of slashers, especially the classic high school slashers.

I personally had the opinion that scouts character was maybe supposed to be older and went back to high school to make her college acting dreams come true but was posing as a student? That makes more sense to me, especially with the high school teacher relationship and being so secretive about the pregnancy.

Either way, this was a fun watch

Loved the movie!!!

[reynolds-42326 · 10/10 · 5 February 2020]

Although there were some weirder aspects of the movie, such as the main character seeming a bit too old for the part. I absolutely loved the entire movie and I thought that the plot twist at the end was amazing and it totally got me! definitely will be watching again soon! I wish there was a theatrical release for this..

A very good suspense! We are hooked!

[yyn-78007 · 10/10 · 12 February 2020]

I LOVE LOVE LOVE the movie. It was fun to watch. Me and my friends enjoyed seeing a powerful female lead in the movie! We are hooked throughout the entire movie. A very good suspense! Wish we could see it on big screens in theaters!

what is wrong with allowing a female actress her freedom to choose her role

[wynlaca · 10/10 · 13 February 2020]

Honestly, I am glad that I did not allow the controversial comments stopping me from seeing the film. In this day and age, it should make us sad if we fail to leave room for actors to be artistic in choosing their cinematic roles. In some ways, Taylor reminds me of a younger version of Sharon Stone in the classic Basic Instinct. Indeed, I enjoyed seeing powerful female characters on the screens. I would applaud Scout Taylor- Compton for taking the courage to do this. She did well in a decent film. Don't be fooled by the haters.

Not too scary, but fun to watch

[h-36572 · 9/10 · 13 February 2020]

I watched the film last night with my BF. We quite enjoyed it. The story was fine. I did like the Taylor girl. She actually had some pretty believable acting. We loved the Romeo and Juliet scenes. Overall, the film is not too scary, but fun to watch. We will probably watch it again with friends at our party this weekend.

Very confusing, Billy easily the best character

[ashfox-36741 · 10/10 · 8 March 2020]

This movie was pretty awful, but I really laughed at some of the scenes. Scout -Taylor looked like 40 year old trying to be a tween and it was really bothering. However, Billy, played by Josh Morris was a real phenomenon and saved this movie. That scene when he threw up after drinking dishwashing detergent had me on my seat! I loved his sword fighting skills, interesting smolders, and the way he survived! Thank you for this wonderful experience!

Extra Extra Read All About It

[mypupjake112 · 10/10 · 5 December 2021]

Extra actor Josh Funk is absolutely astonishing in this film! That hat and jacket rock! Later the bald head sway being drunk was amazing! Get this man in more films!