Carlos Santos is uncomfortable around pretty women.
(2013) Horror Comedy (The Film Arcade) Carlos Santos, J.R. Villarreal, Fernanda Romero, Tony Cavalero, Meghan Falcone, James Babson, Scott MacArthur, Craig Stott, Damien Amey, Felicia Horn, Sarah Chapman. Directed by Scott Rutherford and Ben Peyser
Haunted houses aren’t what they used to be. You never can tell what sort of house will be haunted – from the suburbs to the country to big cities, houses and even apartments and duplexes can be haunted by all sorts of ghosts.
Roommates Brad (Santos), Sergio (Villarreal) and Chuck (Cavalero) are hosting a party in their apartment. All three are young Latino-Americans and while Brad is super-sexed and Chuck super-uptight, Sergio is a bit more of the party animal.
When a drunken Sergio staggers from the party to discover some fornicating going on in his apartment, at first he thinks nothing of it. However when he has an encounter of his own with a ghostly partner, it’s discovered that the apartment building used to be a Chinese brothel and the madam who ran it was apparently not a very nice person.
After inadvertently waking up the madam, Sergio and Brad unwillingly enlist the aid of the gorgeous Fernanda (Romero) with whom both boys quickly and quite decisively fall in love with. Sergio is irked because Brad already has a girlfriend – Rebecca (Falcone) – and Sergio really has it bad for Fernanda.
Their attempts to ghost hunt turns into a mighty crapfest of incompetence, sexuality and paranormal activity. Chuck shows an unexpected side and the boys have to figure out a way to keep the world – or at least their corner of it – from coming to a screeching, bloody halt.
This movie comes off as a bit of a satire of the found footage genre which quite frankly has overstayed its welcome by this point. Not that I mind a bit of good satire but this thing seems to just kind of be non-satirical as satire goes. Sure there are some funny bits – a line about sucking the demon out pretty much made me fall to the floor laughing – but the jokes are mainly of the goofy frat house humor sort. Frankly I thought the film would have been better served to eliminate the found footage trope entirely – and just tell the story as a story.
Some critics – alright one critic that I’m aware of – groused about the portrayal of ethnics here, specifically Latin and Asian playing to stereotypes but I think that especially the Latin roles pretty much ran the gamut of not just the Latin experience but the American experience. If white actors had played the same characters as white characters not a peep would have been heard. This is one of those occasions where the ultra-liberal get their politically correct panties in a bunch over what is really nothing. Frankly, I thought the movie portrayed Hispanics as able to take a joke about themselves. After all, if we can’t laugh at ourselves, who can we laugh at?
That said the chemistry between Santos and Villareal is genuine and carries the movie. You believe instantly that these guys are buddies and have each other’s back. Of course, that sort of thing is always open to interpretation but what is not subject to debate is that Fernanda Romero is smokin’ hot and I truly hope we see a heck of a lot more of her in future movies. The woman is sexy personified.
The movie goes off the rails a little bit in the climactic moments but overall this isn’t all that bad even though critics panned this pretty much universally. I found it to be reasonably entertaining but not breaking any new ground, although I suspect the filmmakers went at this from a different angle than we’re used to. A little too self-referential, possibly a little too self-congratulatory, the film could have used a modicum of humble pie or at least tried a little less hard to take itself too seriously. I liked it more than most of my colleagues did which likely means you will too. Incidentally, the movie played the Florida Film Festival back in 2013. Just sayin’.
WHY RENT THIS: Occasionally really funny in a goofy frat humor way.
WHY RENT SOMETHING ELSE: Would have been better off with a straight story rather than found footage.
FAMILY VALUES: Strong sexual content and graphic nudity, some drug use, a fair amount of profanity and some brief violence.
TRIVIAL PURSUIT: Romero started her career as a member of the Mexican pop group Fryzzby.
NOTABLE DVD EXTRAS: There’s a blooper reel and a video diary.
BOX OFFICE PERFORMANCE: $9,195 on an unknown production budget.
SITES TO SEE: Netflix (DVD Rental only). Amazon, iTunes, Flixster
COMPARISON SHOPPING: A Haunted House
FINAL RATING: 6/10
NEXT: Six Days of Darkness continues!
Cinema365 