Stereotypical coincidences and bland scare tactics are what make horror movies less and less interesting to watch. Take Halloween for example. A killer walks around in the dark, with the scary tiptoe music, using a knife to carefully stab and kill all the main characters in the storyline before being brought down by the most extravagant of ways.
I feel that countless directors/writers use this same sequence in a horror flick just to see if people will spend money on something that may seem totally different until the credits are rolling and you are asking for your money back. ‘House at the End of the Street,’ directed by Mark Tonderai, does just that.
Like every scary movie today, most start out with a little opening scene usually explaining the main thesis and what the audience has to look forward to throughout the tale. Someone is killed, the killer goes missing, new characters are introduced, dark secrets are blabbed, the plot thickens, characters are kidnapped, people die, end of story. It’s the same thing over and over again.
Jennifer Lawrence, who plays a strong female role in “The Hunger Games,” plays the typical “survivor girl.” Moving into a new town with a new school is hard on anybody. She finds passion in music and opens up to people who share the same interest.
Having a bad experience with the first boy she meets in town, she’s floundered into a connection with her next door neighbor, Ryan (Max Thieriot), who opens up to her about what its like to live in a house that your parents were murdered in. As their relationship progresses, her mother (Elisabeth Shue) begins to question why Max is living in the house and why he’s talking to her daughter.
Lawrence, who thinks her mother is being way too paranoid (aren’t all mothers) decides to ignore her opinion and continue to see him. Like I said earlier, this follows every scary movie sequence.
The movie has a hard way of explaining itself. As the story progresses, your opinion changes because of how many different twists come into play. I don’t want to give away too much, but if the story is based on a house where two people were killed by a little girl and all of sudden you’re lead to believe that the girl shouldn’t even exist anymore, then you’re going to lose interest.
Take the movie “The Uninvited,” for example. A girl comes home from being away at a mental institution for quite some time. Her father has met someone new and she plans on trying to forget the past. You’re introduced to her sister right from the beginning and are doomed into believing that she actually exists.
Well guess what, she doesn’t. All the times she shows up on screen, it’s indicated she’s there but in reality she isn’t. It’s all psychological, and what you’re meant to believe in is already out the door. Then to top it all off, when the movie ends, you’re given the answers you were looking for throughout the whole movie with no explanation.
Sometimes this is okay, but when it is, it’s usually pretty obvious. Either way, it’s nothing new or more exciting than what you may have already seen.
