My double feature began with 2018's Followed, a found footage horror about a controversial vlogger who decides to spend Halloween night at a hotel with a dark history of paranormal activity, disappearances and strange deaths.
Mike hosts DropTheMike, a vlog where he regularly uploads wild adventures and silliness. In an effort to increase his subscribers and get a much desired sponsorship, he decides to do a Halloween special, where he will stay at the Lennox Hotel in downtown LA for a few nights. This place has an infamous history of strange deaths, internet rumors, and was also the place where a notorious serial killer once lived at the height of his murder spree. Mike, along with his spunky editor Nic, director of photography Chris, and sound and camera expert Dani, check into the hotel, posing as guests, and plan on filming as much footage as possible, including a livestream. As Halloween night approaches, they begin to encounter increasingly odd phenomena that suggests that there may be some truth to the hotel's paranormal rumors.
The first thing that stands out is how fucking irritating the lead Mike is. He's one of those over-enthustiastic bros who practically screams everything that comes out of his mouth. Thankfully, he chilled out as the movie progressed, otherwise, I might've turned this shit off at the halfway mark. The other 3 actors are fine and give decent, believable performances. The other thing that's noticeable is that the movie is based on the real-life lore of the Cecil Hotel in LA, a place that gained fame due to the elevator video capturing the last known footage of student Elisa Lam's bizarre behavior, before she disappeared and was later found dead in the water tank. They even had a similar copycat video showing a young character named Meghan Kim, who was also recorded behaving strangely before disappearing and being found dead. I honestly found this a bit exploitative and insensitive, given Lam's tragic real death. Serial killer Richard Ramirez (The Night Stalker) had also stayed at the Cecil in the 80's. Anyway, the movie wasn't anything special, filled with lame CGI ghouls, camera glitches and mysterious noises to convey suspense. There were a few decent touches, including an incident from Mike's past tied to the hotel, but the filmmakers chose to focus heavily on cheap, predictable scares instead of leaning into slowly building the mystery with creepy, less-is-more suggestions. Ultimately, the movie ends up being just average and forgettable. It's available to stream on Tubi if you're so inclined, but it's nothing special.
The next one was a 1980 sci-fi horror about alien creatures terrorizing a small town.
A group of teenagers drive up to the mountains to hang out at a lake. Unbeknownst to them, these weird, flying starfish-like creatures are attacking and feeding on the people they come across. After escaping, two of them (Sandy & Greg) go up to the town bar to warn the people about the alien creatures they saw. While there, they encounter Fred ‘Sarge’ (Martin Laundau), a paranoid war veteran who claims to know about the alien invasion that’s coming, and Joe Taylor (Jack Palance), a gas station owner who is also aware of the aliens’ presence and wants to hunt and kill them. The main characters eventually head into the night to confront the alien creatures, for a final showdown between man and extraterrestrial.
The movie had some good gore effects, with the flying starfish things digging their tentacles into people’s bodies, complete with oozing blood and puss. Those attacks were a lot of fun, and the highlight of this creature feature. The main alien looked like a tall dude in a cheap costume, and was mostly seen in the dark or in shadows, to disguise the obvious plastic mask being worn by the actor. Still, those scenes managed to still be quite entertaining.
The rest of the movie was filled with bad acting, with Laundau and Palance competing for who can chew up the most scenery and outcamp the other. Their over the top schtick grew old pretty fast, which the majority of the film’s runtime spend the most time on. Their scenes caused the movie to drag to a screeching halt. Cameron Mitchell also appeared at the beginning, and while he’s another actor who hams it up, he always manages to be amusing and watchable. I would have preferred his character to have more screen time and just delete Laundau’s bad acting. Though I must say, on a side note, that I’ve enjoyed his acting elsewhere, especially his fantastic, Oscar winning turn as Bela Lugosi in Tim Burton’s Ed Wood. This flick is most enjoyable when it focused on the alien attacks. If you can tolerate some cheesy performances, then the monster shenanigans are fun and worth it. This movie is also available to watch on Tubi.
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