Enough with the Paranormal Activity clones and parodies already!

Who would have thought that when "Paranormal CRAPtivity"—a low-budget haunted house movie that most people only liked because of buxom beauty Katie Featherston and the original downbeat ending which was changed to a lamer one—came out in 2007, it would lead to so many clones and parodies?

When it comes to clones, the Japanese almost got there first with their "Official Sequel" which came out (on November 20th, 2010) before the true sequel (actually a prequel) in their country but a month later for everyone else. It was a nice try though.

Predictably, we then had two more "Paranormal Activity" cashgrabs which gave us exactly the same jump scares all over again but even less so. Sadly, a fifth movie is rumoured to be on the way next year too.

Back to 2009, and The Asylum just had to make their own mockbuster version called "Paranormal Entity". Bizarrely, it's slightly better than the movie it clones, and it's cheaper to buy. But then they had to go and ruin everything by renaming some of their not very good movies for the UK. "Paranormal Entity 2" is really "8213: Gacy House" (2010), in case you didn't already know.

Keeping their artwork in the same style, The Asylum also delivered "Paranormal Entity 3: The Exorcist Tapes" aka "Anneliese: The Exorcist Tapes" (2011) and "Paranormal Entity 4: The Awakening" aka "100 Ghost Street: The Return of Richard Speck" (2012) to the unsuspecting British public.

While not really the same thing, "Grave Encounters" (2011) and "Grave Encounters 2" (2012) would have earned less condemnation if they'd thought of some more original artwork to use. The sequel, however, is apparently full of YouTubers, which is enough reason to not watch it on its own.

It's this cloning of artwork that's started to get even more annoying than the movies on the DVDs inside the boxes! Shame on you, "Paranormal Incident" (2011) and "Paranormal Asylum" (2013). Who do you think you're fooling?

And then, of course, we had to have the spoofs, since horror has to be all about the comedy for certain Americans, doesn't it? Nyuk nyuk nyuk! No one cares! You may call it comedy, the rest of the Western world doesn't. We call it being jealous haters with no original thoughts of your own.

No, I couldn't find a sleeve for Jason Gerbay's "Abnormal Activity 2". I don't know if such a thing even exists (there's no IMDb page for it), but I don't intend to ever watch any of this no-budget "comedy" crap anyway. Perhaps it might be good, but I don't like comedies.

And then there were more... "Paranormal Calamity" (2010) and "Paranormal Parody" (2011). At least the latter unimaginatively lets you know exactly what it is!

And more... "Supernatural Activity" (2011) and "Paranormal Movie" (2012). Why?

Earlier this year, this nonsense seemed to reach its peak with Marlon Wayans' spoof "A Haunted House" (2013) and an inevitable porn parody. And that should have been the end of it. Really, it should have been.

But no! We also have an even more lacklustre offering in the form of "30 Nights of Paranormal Activity with the Devil Inside the Girl with the Dragon Tattoo" (2013) and the equally abysmal "Paranormal Whacktivity" (2013) only released last night! Aaaargh!

For the love of God! Enough already! Please STOP!


Update: April 30th, 2015

NOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!

Monsters Wanted (2013)

"In early 2011, Rich Teachout quit his lucrative job to focus on creating a one-of-a-kind haunted attraction. He and his partner Janel dedicated every moment, ounce of energy, and dollar to making their 'Scream Park' a reality. 'Monsters Wanted' is the story of their self-proclaimed madness and the industry, culture, and people who share it."

Moving on as quickly as I can from the fictional haunted attraction of "Hallows' Eve", I highly recommend "Monsters Wanted"—a documentary about the Asylum Haunted Scream Park in Louisville, Kentucky—in case you've now got a desire to see the real thing without leaving the comfort of your chair. Nearly everything you've ever wanted to know about the trials and tribulations of setting up a "Scream Park" or "Haunted House" attraction can be found here.

Auditions for actors provide the documentary with its name, but there's obviously more shown in "Monsters Wanted" than hiring a few kids to play dress-up and scream, "Boo!" at the top of their lungs. This is about a group of Hallowe'en obsessives planning, constructing, and running a short-term entertainment business, although enough time is devoted to the actors to see how they're as mad as hatters too.

One masochistic guy who hammers nails into his nostrils and lets people staple playing cards to his face almost deserves a show of his own, while another complete nutter called "Chainsaw Pete" would fit in well with the highly amusing but mentally subnormal reality TV characters that Brits already know and love from Channel Four's documentaries. "Chainsaw Pete" comes across as a dangerously infantilized person who doesn't care if he injures himself or other people with his rambunctious performance, and sure enough, he does indeed manage to injure one of his co-workers before the end of the show.

Aside from that, the real fun happens when communications break down and the financial problems take their toll. Stress often brings out the worst in some people! Thus, the little bit of contrived drama which comes from a surprise visit by a building inspector, who could close the attraction down for not having the right permits, is easily eclipsed by the violent arguments between the event organisers. Due to what must have been embarassment after the fact, the most volatile organiser refused to allow his image to be used in this documentary and is pixellated/voice-changed (but not censored in other ways) as a result. His tantrum is hilarious!

While the focus is mainly on the stresses and strains that Rich and his girlfriend Janel go through as they try to turn their expensive hobby into a money-making business, there are shopping trips galore for things which you probably didn't know existed even in America. A trip to a "Hallowe'en Props" convention where the sky's the limit when it comes to how much you could spend on animatronics and other effects is one of the best parts, since due to the darkness, you don't really see much of the finished "Asylum Haunted Scream Park" in action.

Apart from the night scenes, the camerawork is adequate for a documentary, and there are some clever "Fringe"-style 3D captions which count down the days remaining. Some of these computer-generated captions look like they are embedded in buildings or the ground instead of floating in mid-air, which is an indication of the attention to detail that went into the editing.

Some people have noted that a five minute section devoted to other Hallowe'en attractions in the area feels out of place, but I didn't have a problem with it. My only gripe is that it would have been nicer if "Monsters Wanted" had finished with a walkthrough of the whole attraction using a handheld camera to give a first-person perspective, but perhaps it was technically too difficult or there were rights issues which prevented that from happening. Maybe, just maybe, the organisers would prefer it if you experienced their attraction in person.

If you want to visit the "Asylum Haunted Scream Park", check out their website at http://www.asylumhaunts.com for details.

Hallows' Eve (2013)

"Years after a tragic accident leaves a young child scarred for life, the people responsible pay - with their lives."

When I saw that Danielle Harris had top billing, and then noticed the huge similarity between the little girl (Isobel Rose Costello) who gets run over by a tractor in the opening scene and Danielle Harris at the same age, I expected something a lot different than the horrible mess that "Hallows' Eve" turned out to be. It may sound too predictable, but I honestly thought that Danielle Harris would be all disfigured like she was in Rob Zombie's "Halloween II" and be revealed as the psycho killing the now grown-up bullies in revenge for her face.

Maybe that's one of the red herrings which is designed to sell the mystery element of this feeble attempt at a slasher movie, and I've probably already spoiled the ending for you by telling you that it isn't how things play out, but I don't care. "Hallows' Eve" is so bad that it doesn't deserve to be watched by anyone, and is certainly not worth renting or buying. Unless you've recently become the recipient of a brain transplant operation involving a drunken chimpanzee, the lack of a cohesive story is excrutiating to get through. Even my cats who have brains the size of walnuts couldn't cope with this and left me to it.

There are too many characters to keep track of, and as usual, there's not one of the "teenagers" who isn't such a nasty piece of work that you don't just want him or her to die horribly, but the story jumps all over the place and is completely unsatisfying. Lots of boobs and blood, and an incongruous dream sequence half-way through which adds more gratuitous nudity, is nice but doesn't help matters. It's almost impossible to follow what's going on until the very end, and by that point, you'll be unlikely to care.

Don't worry, babe, you can still get a job in indie horror movies.

Among the cheap gore effects, uncreative kills, and bad camerawork lurk several horror c-listers including Ashley C. Williams and Tiffany Shepis, plus a bunch of male "actors" who are harder to recognise. Apparently, one of them was in "Pumpkinhead" (1988), but the rest vary from being hangers-on in the "indie scene" to fully-fledged TV actors who have some actual talent. Who's who or and who plays who, I couldn't possibly tell you even with the cast list in front of me. They all have generic character names like Nick, Todd, Dave, Brad, and whatever the female equivalents might be. I may be wrong about this because I was bored out of my mind, but I don't think that any of them call each other by name other than the disfigured girl being Eve.

How and why known genre actors get involved in half-arsed projects like this which can do them no good is the biggest mystery. There may be a very small financial reward, but no big-wig is going to look at their work in "Hallows' Eve" and think, "Oh, I really must hire that one for my next muti-million dollar blockbuster!" In fact, it's more likely to be the opposite. Movies like this kill careers, they don't make them! The only excuse anyone can use is that you could put Oscar award-winning actors in this low-budget trash and they would still come away from it reeking of shit because of the script. Having said that, Tiffany Shepis gets the best of the bad lines, and Danielle Harris doesn't have enough screen time to disgrace herself.

The only good thing I can say about "Hallows' Eve" is that setting it in one of the "Haunted Attractions" which a lot of farmers tend to set up every year in America is an original touch. I've been to a few of these Hallowe'en events, so the location felt real to me, and I liked it. Sadly, that's all I enjoyed about this movie other than what you can see in the image below and the bath scene which preceded it.

Definitely a long-leggedy beastie!

Three more weeks to Hallowe'en, Hallowe'en, Hallowe'en. Three more weeks to Hallowe'en. This film sucks ass.

My Top Ten Hallowe'en Horror Films

In previous years, I've gone through just about everything I like to watch during October, but I'm bored with doing that. Every day is Hallowe'en for me to some extent, and there's nothing special about one day compared to any other. Such is the life of a horror movie reviewer.

For the sake of making a definitive list of "must see" horror movies for Hallowe'en, however, here's my top ten. Click the pics to see what I had to say about them before.


1. The Amityville Horror (1979)

As a child of the '70s, I read all the books about Amityville in the years before the movie was made. It's a pity that none of it was true, but "The Amityville Horror" still holds up well. Margot Kidder was gorgeous back in the day.


2. Dracula (1958)

Hammer's best horror movie. Simple as that. Christopher Lee and lots of hot bloofer ladies. Ignore the rubber bats on strings, this is class!


3. The Wicker Man (1973)

You can't have Hallowe'en without recognising its pagan origin, and "The Wicker Man" is my "go to" movie for all things British and pagan. Britt Ekland topless is a bonus.


4. The Legend of Hell House (1973)

I prefer this to "The Haunting" because of Roddy McDowell. He steals the show despite a valiant effort from Pamela Franklin and horny Gayle Hunnicutt. There's a lovely black cat in it too.


5. The Haunting (1963)

A little bit dated now but still creepy. It's the definitive haunted house movie and a certified classic. I would never have known about it if it hadn't been for the late James Herbert talking about it on a Hallowe'en TV show.


6. The Changeling (1980)

This would be higher up the list if it wasn't for the mystery element. I've found that I can only watch it every couple of years because I know the ending too well.


7. The Others (2001)

The twist dooms this movie to being another that's hard to watch more than once, but it's all about Nicole Kidman as perfect eyecandy for me. As a remake of "Voices" (1973), it's a successful upgrade.


8. Lady in White (1988)

It's a supernatural murder-mystery set during Hallowe'en, and that's more than enough to justify it. It's also very well done. Easily Frank LaLoggia's best movie and full of nostalgia for those who like that sort of thing.


9. The Fog (1980)

The prologue with the old captain telling the ghost story by a campfire makes this movie a lot better than it should have been. Sexy Adrienne Barbeau in her lighthouse radio station is the other good reason to watch it. I always fast-forward through the cringeworthy bits with Tom Atkins and Jamie Lee Curtis.


10. Carnival of Souls (1962)

It's really a rip-off of "The Hitch Hiker" episode from "The Twilight Zone", but it's a little bit more adult. Eerie stuff and very accessible since it's in the Public Domain.


What are your Hallowe'en favourites?

Dark Touch (2013)

"In a remote town in Ireland, eleven-year-old Neve [sic] finds herself the sole survivor of a bloody massacre that killed her parents and younger brother. Suspecting a gang of homicidal vandals, the police ignore Neve's [sic] explanation that the house is the culprit."

If you're silly enough to read any other horror blog except mine, you'll probably see a lot of people praising how cerebral "Dark Touch' is and how it's meant to have a big message about the trauma caused by child abuse or some such unhappy horseshit at the heart of it. What a load of crap! I wanted it to be a ghost story, especially as the official IFC Films synopsis suggests a haunted house, so let the hate commence!

For those of us who can see through the fluff and arty-farty edits, "Dark Touch" is nothing more than a slow-paced clone of Stephen King's "Carrie" and "Firestarter", but it's set in the Irish countryside to make it look better. Give or take a few more disturbed children, it's kind of like how "Wake Wood" (2011) was a rip-off of "Pet Sematary" (1989) in a similar location, and it sucks just as much.

Nice cinematography using every method of filming from handheld camerawork to tripod-mounted long shots doesn't make up for the story being boring as buggery apart from two lush moments of goriness. Once you've seen them, it's not worth waiting for more unless clichés such as exploding windows, treading in broken glass with bare feet, or laconic little girls with Asperger's Syndrome float your boat. Even if they do, the cheap CGI fire effects will probably sink it.

Among the lameness, adults being pinned to walls by kitchen tables or chests of drawers against their thighs is a recurring theme in this movie which has very little to do with anything other than being another cheap and easy effect. I think it happens three or four times, but it may be more. What the significance of these repetitive scenes is, I have no idea. It can join the list of questions I have such as why does the hotter-looking mother suffer from bouts of tinnitus every time little Niamh throws a tantrum? And what kind of dyslexia causes the name Niamh to be pronounced "Neeve"?

"I'm a firestarter, twisted firestarter."

As Irish horror movies go, "Dark Touch" isn't the worst I've ever seen, but it's not even close to being up to the same high standard as "Dorothy Mills" (2008). The creepy atmosphere promises more than it delivers, and the eclectic mixture of regional Irish accents (which range from mild to harsh and unintelligible) cause it to be only a donkey or two short of another "Rawhead Rex" (1986). Having said that, I do quite like "Rawhead Rex" in spite of Clive Barker disowning it, and I'm not even sure if it has any donkeys in it anyway. If it didn't, it should have done. But I've digressed.

The acting in "Dark Touch" is fine given that character development is almost non-existent, and Swedish import Charlotte Flyvholm has a filler part as a heavily pregnant school counsellor to justify the Swedish financial investment. Out of all the characters, she stood out most for me by being the third pregnant blonde that I've seen in a movie this week, the other two being Detective Inspector Sarah Clayton (Joanne Froggatt) in "uwantme2killhim?" and Barb's mother also called Sarah (played by Chantal Quesnelle) in "Curse of Chucky".

Since there's unlikely to be a theatrical release of "Dark Touch" near you, it's available for half the price of a cinema ticket through the various VOD services. At $6.99, I think it's still way too much for a pre-pubuscent "Carrie" clone, and you'd be better off saving your money for the official "Carrie" remake in a few weeks.

An American Ghost Story (2012)

"When Paul, an unemployed writer, decides to rent and live in a house that's rumoured to be haunted, he puts his life and his relationships in grave danger as he obsessively attempts to get the story that will finally make his career."

Whenever a yet to be released horror movie which was made for under $10,000 achieves a 7.5 out of 10 rating on the IMDb, I smell shenanigans. Either not enough non-shills have found it and voted, or the "critics" who received screeners really did find it outstanding. The chances of the latter being true are invariably slim to none though.

Thus, as much as I didn't want to backtrack to another one of last year's movies—especially not one with a title change designed to cash-in on the success of FX's "American Horror Story" TV series—curiosity meant that I had no choice but to check out the ghost story formerly known as "Revenant". I'm pleased to say that I wasn't disappointed by my discoveries either. Although very little has improved since Derek Cole and Stephen Twardokus made "Human Behavior" (2006), at least this movie is in colour like something created in the 21st century should be.

Unfortunately, with annoying, atmosphere-killing background music throughout, "An American Ghost Story" fails to generate an ambience conducive to scares. Things improve enormously when silence reigns, but at its worst, the music sounds like a cat walking up and down a piano keyboard while a tone-deaf 5-year-old child practices chords next to it. Occasionally, it even overpowers the dialogue, and that's a real shame because the acting is fairly decent.

Stephen Twardokus is very good as Paul the obsessive ghost hunter who bites off more than he can chew, and natural beauty Liesel Kopp is ideal as his girlfriend Stella. Liesel Kopp has a lovely, expressive face with big, watery eyes that exude genuine fear in her nighttime scenes. It's a pity that Stella disappears from the movie after 30 minutes, but she's really only in it to represent the sane action which most people would choose when faced with living in a haunted house.

Even Paul's best friend Sam (Cain Clifton) is likeable, so I have to give credit where it's due for the casting choices and characterisation. Wendy Haines is a bit over the top as former resident Sue, and Jon Gale isn't quite so hot as Skip the house-owner, but they only have very small roles which don't add much to the story anyway. Both provide minimal exposition/confirmations about details which have already been said rather than falling into the "idiot lecture" trap.

So where does it all go wrong? Well, apart from the aforementioned awful background music which is only used properly in two action-packed places, "An American Ghost Story" is a very slow burn, and it's full of clichés and homages instead of originality.

There's absolutely nothing here that you haven't seen before, especially if you're a fan of haunted house movies. In particular, "An American Ghost Story" owes a lot to the "Paranormal Activity" series. You could even describe it as a conflation of all the jump scares from the "Paranormal Activity" movies without the camcorders and home security surveillance contrivances.

As much as I would love to praise the "old school" use of tripods and zooms to provide an easy film to watch, there are flaws with the cinematography. Some of the long shots never zoom in enough, and several others are poorly framed. One of this story's biggest contrivances is to have Paul investigating the house at night using a flashlight, which leads to scenes that are too dark to see properly. The intention may have been to cover-up a multitude of effects sins by using the darkness for cover, but it also makes Paul's actions moronic in a house with fully functional electric lights and no power outages!

The house itself is very modern, and amazingly neat and tidy inside. It may have a lot of mismatched wood going on—a mahogany dining table among light oak cupboards is the worst culprit—but it's not a sinister looking house at all. Apart from one of those Crosley Companion radios which is designed to look like an antique one, there's nothing creepy to see. The characters may keep saying how oppressive the atmosphere is, but the "Emperor's new clothes" technique doesn't work when the reality is so painfully obvious.

Even with its flaws, all but two of the jump scares work, but so they should since they've been done to death in other movies! Without spoiling things too much for you, I'll just mention that doors and cupboards open on their own, a basketball is predictably rolled towards Paul by an invisible being, the scary-looking radio switches itself on, and there's a chair-stacking homage to "Poltergeist" (1982) which made me groan. There are a lot of excessively loud bangs to catch you out, and one computer-based moment which I should have known better than to fall for (because I leaned in close to the screen) really works! All I'll say about it, after nearly soiling myself, is that I'm surprised that anyone still uses AOL mail... and you can't animate a jpg image! Well played, Derek Cole, you ass!

As you can see in the trailer, the big thing in "An American Ghost Story" is the use of "sheet ghosts" which, of course, also appear briefly in "Paranormal Activity 3" (2011). The last time I saw sheet ghosts before that was in The Avalanches' "Frontier Psychiatrist" music video. Sheet ghosts are traditionally used for comic effect as in "Beetlejuice" (1988) rather than being terrifying for anyone other than small children, but they work very well here. In its favour, "An American Ghost Story" seriously attempts to make sheet ghosts scary again!

What's my verdict then? All things considered, and with the wind blowing in the right direction, I don't think "An American Ghost Story" deserves its 7.5 out of 10 rating on the IMDb (note: it's now dropped to 6.2 and still falling), but I'm willing to give it a pass mark of 4.5 out of 10 simply because I was entertained. If "An American Ghost Story" was due to be released without any background music, it would be much stronger. It still wouldn't be more than a clone of other haunted house movies, but the sad truth is that the chances of ever seeing any groundbreaking originality in this subgenre is unlikely anyway.

"An American Ghost Story" is definitely worth a rental. If you aren't so enamoured by Katie Featherston that you've vowed never to watch another haunted house movie unless she's in it, you'll probably enjoy this a lot more.

The Conjuring (2013)

"Paranormal investigators Ed and Lorraine Warren work to help a family terrorized by a dark presence in their farmhouse. Forced to confront a powerful entity, the Warrens find themselves caught in the most terrifying case of their lives."

I've finally done it! I may be two weeks behind everyone else in the world, but I've now seen "The Conjuring"! I even managed to avoid all the spoilers on Twitter and Facebook beforehand, which wasn't easy considering how overhyped this movie has been.

Supposedly based on a previously unpublished case file from paranormal investigators Ed and Lorraine Warren, who I've never actually heard of before, "The Conjuring" starts off like an episode of "Friday the 13th: The Series", turns into a clone of "The Amityville Horror" for an hour, and ends up as a twenty minute version of "The Exorcist". As you can imagine, I was not impressed.

In fact, I was so disappointed with "The Conjuring" that I was tempted to only write the following for my review:

BORING CRAP!

If someone perusing the aisles next to me in a DVD store were to ask me what I thought of "The Conjuring", those two words would be the most honest initial reaction I could come up with other than adding whichever choice expletive I might deem appropriate to the situation. I'm not saying that this has happened, although it certainly has done with other James Wan movies in the past, and the response of the person asking has also been equally negative. I'm sure that similar conversations have transpired between other people in various locations.

Maybe I live in my own sheltered little bubble where everyone shares the same good taste, but I've never known of a director other than James Wan whose movies are so consistently underwhelming apart from Christopher Nolan. Even Zack Snyder has double the amount of good movies on his résumé. I'm not going to acknowledge Dario Argento, Uwe Boll, Lloyd Kaufman, or Ulli Lommel because, let's face it, all their movies are guaranteed to be crap from the get-go.

A metaphor just waiting to happen.

The reasons why "The Conjuring" is such boring crap are very easy to list. For a start, the story is unoriginal and clichéd, and it's a messy fusion of far better films that came out over 30 to 40 years ago. We've seen it all before ad nauseum. "The Conjuring" brings nothing new to the table and doesn't even present what it has got in an entertaining manner for adults.

Thus, the second huge problem with "The Conjuring" is that it might as well be a PG-13. How and why it got an R-rating is beyond my comprehension. There's no nudity, no swearing, no sex scenes, no gore, and it's not scary in any way. So how the Hell did it get rated as an R? "R for Rubbish" is my assessment although I'm betting on failed bait and switch shenanigans behind the scenes with the MPAA just to get asses on seats in the movie theatres.

The big giveaway that the target audience was initially meant to be braindead teenagers is the amount of grammatical errors in the script. Both Lorraine and Ed get away with saying "hung" instead of "hanged" without anyone correcting them, and if that's not bad enough, there's Ed's immortal triple-negative, "We ain't never seen nothing like this!" which you can see in the trailer along with all the other "good bits". The terrible dialogue is almost as bad as the "I'm gonna do what I'm gonna do" line in the shitty "Evil Dead" remake. No wonder the mumble-mouthed younger generation are the way they are!

Thirdly, there's no characterisation whatsoever. I couldn't tell you the names of any of the characters even though they were given, what they might be interested in other than ghost hunting or being the victims of a demonic haunting, or any details that would make them more than two-dimensional. The best I can come up with is that "The Conjuring" stars Patrick Wilson with sideburns, Vera Farmiga looking far more beautiful than I've ever seen her look before, the Peter guy from "Office Space", the plain-looking girl who played Nell in "The Haunting" remake whose name I always forget, and a bunch of other people who I've never heard of poncing about in a badly maintained American house. If you think I'm joking, try telling me the names of the family members without looking them up on the IMDb. While you are at it, what are the names of the cop or the Warren's assistant? No idea? Case proven.

Without characterisation, what's the point of a horror movie? If you can't identify with the protagonists, empathising with their situation and feeling the catharsis when it's resolved is completely lost, isn't it? Or is this something that kids today just don't care about? As much as anyone born after 1989 is likely to be a complete moron in my estimation anyway, there are exceptions who must have left the cinema as disappointed as us older guys. Even the ones who only went to see some scary effects must have felt cheated of their $10.

Vera Farmiga is so hot in her granny clothes!

I wish I could find something good to say about "The Conjuring", but it's a typical James Wan movie. There are a couple of overloud jump scares which don't work, the usual creepy dolls which aren't creepy at all, some guy in a latex witch mask which is supposed to be scary, horrible shaky camerawork (but with lots of zooming this time just to be very '70s!), irritating child actors, poor CGI effects, plotholes everywhere, no atmosphere, no tension, total chaos at the end with a lame resolution, and nothing original whatsoever. The tongue-in-cheek acknowledgement of Blumhouse Productions' formulaic style of composition when the family mentions birds hitting their house (as in "Dark Skies") is realised when the birds repeat their kamikaze attack near the end, but you can't make in-jokes like that when you do the same damned thing yourself!!!

I suppose the period setting in 1970s America is well done, but that's not exactly a difficult thing to achieve. Apart from the cars, America looks much the same as it has done since the 1920s when it comes to the crappy wooden sheds which people jokingly refer to as houses. Every house in my town looks like the one in "The Conjuring" only in an even worse state of disrepair! Forget nostalgia, these firetraps need to be knocked down and replaced with some proper bricks and mortar! I'm sure that I've mentioned that several time before on this blog though.

I'm not happy about James Wan using a cover version of "Sleepwalk" with lyrics either. The original Santo & Johnny instrumental from 1959 which is such a signature feature of Stephen King's "Sleepwalkers" (1992) just doesn't belong anywhere else! The guitars in "Sleepwalk" even sound like cats meowing for God's sake! But, in spite of having a witch in the story, there are no cats in "The Conjuring"! There's a collie dog called Sadie who meets her maker off camera, but no cats! Oh, that makes me so angry!

The word on the street is that James Wan is giving up horror movies now to make the next homoerotic installment in "The Fast and the Furious" franchise. I wish him the best of luck, but after "The Conjuring", I can't say that he will be missed.