With You

NOVEMBER 6, 2007

GENRE: GHOST, HAUNTED HOUSE, INDEPENDENT
SOURCE: DVD (ONLINE RENTAL)

Today’s movie, With You, is another I have no recollection of adding to my queue. The Blockbuster page doesn’t even have a synopsis (nor did the little sleeve the disc arrived in). Having no idea what I was in for, I put it on, and discovered it was a no-budget, shot on video, largely amateurish ghost/haunted house movie. Complete with a DVD that has no menu other than "Play Movie" (yep, another disc without a damn scene selection menu – something I have never seen in my life and now I’ve seen it twice in the past 3 days).

Actually, it’s a haunted “other house” movie. Because, for whatever reason, the main character is harassed by ghosts not because he lives in a haunted house, but because his home is the only one that OVERLOOKS a haunted house. What the hell kind of half-assed backstory is that? It’s the first movie in which planting a few trees on a hill could have saved someone’s life.

Anyway, the film is fairly boring and not very original, but there’s a strong sense of earnestness that endeared itself to me, enough to give this one a pass. Obviously they had no money, but they made the best of it, and on a technical level, despite some pretty brutal breaking of the 180 rule, the film is made with some actual effort (i.e. no glaring continuity errors, no boom mikes, etc).

Also, it begins with the main character
making this pitiful little doodle.

There’s some puzzling screenwriting choices throughout the film though. Why is the main guy’s friend so friendly to old people? He acts like a surrogate son to what seems like half the town. Why does the town’s one cop invite a total stranger to check out a crime scene? What’s with all the talk about the lead character drinking? Why does his landlord assume that he’s “not the type of person who bathes”? And what the HELL is up with the totally homoerotic ending, which features a guy buried alive with a zombie who keeps gently biting him on the back? Yikes.

I dunno, it’s not a particularly good movie, but A for effort and all that. For a reported 30k, they made a movie that doesn’t give fellow indie filmmakers a bad name. Like yesterday’s Kaw, it’s a lot better than you’d expect considering the circumstances, so I laud their efforts.

What say you?