Tag Archives: Eva Hamilton

Spiraling Vloggers Seal Their Fate When Face-to-Face with the “Woods Witch” reviewed! (SRS Cinema / DVD)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

“Woods Witch” Available on DVD from SRS Cinema!

Vloggers Jonah and Jocelyn struggle to sustain a healthy dose of followers for their internet channel.  To spice things up and increase follow traffic, the two embark on a 48-hour challenge to stay in the nearby haunted woods of Allensville where a number of people have gone missing, even a fellow, more popular, vlogger named Garrett Gasper after he was self- recording and suddenly vanished when stumbling upon the blood tree, a tree that oozes a blood-like substance from the trunk.  Tagging along are vlogging, ambivalent friends Dacia and Eugene to help capture the spooky essence of what should be an easy, follower-increasing stunt for the impulsive influencers.  They’re also joined, reluctantly I might add, by a local cowboy, two bar patrons, and a father looking for his daughter who don’t know what they’re instore for as what ensues the unorganized, slapdash survey of the woods is far from being simple and safe when they stumble into the area of a seemingly hippie commune that’s actually a sex cult devoted to the woods witch Melora.

If you’re a diehard horror fan, or even just a physical media movie aficionado, you might have heard of the name Shawn C. Phillips.  The eccentric, high-energy, social media personality buys, watches, and reviews the latest and greatest on home video weekly on this Youtube channel under the handle Coolduder.  Aside from being also a movie actor with a range of roles in mostly low-budget, independent, B-to-Z grade horror films, such as “Girls Gone Dead,” “Blood Orgy at Beaver Lake,” and “WTF!,” Phillips’s social media presence further extends to an inspirational weight loss journey, shedding over 235 lbs.  Having been a longtime actor and producer, one of the Baltimore, Maryland native’s newest ventures is directing having shot mostly self-recorded videos to be inserted into other filmmakers’ movies.  Phillips’s latest is “Woods Witch,” a found footage comedy-horror that’s one-part “Blair Witch Project,” two-parts ADHD (Attention Deficit, Hyperactivity Disorder).  He codirects the film with costar and “Amityville Karen” actress Lauren Francesca in her debut directorial and cowrites with Julie Anne Prescott, writer of many more recent “Amityville” inspired budget horrors like “Amityville Karen,” “Amityville Shark House,” and “Amityville Bigfoot.”  DRAX Films (“Bae Wolf,” “Acorn”) is the production company behind feature that provided most of the funding in conjunction with crowdfunded portion.

Obviously infatuated about being in front of the camera, taking a backseat to his own co-directed film wouldn’t be enough for the nearly 40-year-old personality who costars alongside Lauren Francesca as social media influencing boyfriend and girlfriend Jonah and Jocelyn.  Loud and opinionated, the couple struggle with maintaining viewership but, before that, they also they also struggle with the foulmouthed, death-threatening volley between Jonah and Jocelyn’s robbing-the-cradle by robbing-Jonah’s-cameraman mother, played by Sally Kirkland (“Fatal Games,” “Two Evil Eyes”).  And that sort of leads into a couple of themes “Woods Witch” harps on.  One theme is the constant bickering, shouting, and squabbling between anyone and everyone in a free-for-all of one-upping each other or to not take humility very well in front of others.  None of the characters side with one another, steadying a position of satellite attitudes and courses that lead the story into all different types of unhinged and unfocused directions.  The second theme connects with Sally Kirkland and the other in-and-outs of overripe star power for what crowdfunded money could afford and while there are some likeable and decent names in the cast, such as the late Tom Sizemore (“Relic,” “Saving Private Ryan”) in his last role before his death, James Duvall (“May,” “Donnie Darko”), Robert LaSardo (“Strangeland,” “Death Race”), and Lisa Wilcox (“A Nightmare on Elm Street 4:  The Dream Master”), they used to headline the attraction with only minutes to shine in their respective scenes.  The cast fills in with Kelly Lynn Reiter, David Perry, Carl Soloman, Bill Dawes, Lorelei Linklater, Nicole Butler, Ken Davitian, Bryant Smith, Eva Hamilton, G. Larry Butler, Mary Jones, Tom Harold Batchelder, Jake Pearlman, Brian Metcalf and Sadie Katz. 

“Woods Witch” uses multi-media found footage to tell the story where a bunch of egregiously entitled vloggers trek into infamously mysterious woods for hits, likes, subscribers, and e-revenue.  Not an original bone in its narrative body by any means, Antoine Le’s “Followed” comes to mind, but “Woods Witch” doesn’t hit where it should as a heavily improv comedy-horror that lampoons found footage horror in the woods and, instead, has undeniably become massively cacophonous of in all areas.  Going into the feature familiar with some of the cast and the distributing banner, expectations of a Shawn C. Phillips directed film were all fastened at the lower screwball level with horror elements tacked in here and there, aptly fitting the mold the social media influencer has established for himself with the eccentric personality of a physical media farceur who adores horror, but nothing can prepare audiences for how much confused noise is strewn about with the constant yelling, backbiting, and randomizing introduction of characters that turns what should have been an entertainingly crass and witchy film into just being a completely crass and witchy yawner.  Being completely flat and unfunny wouldn’t be a totally fair statement as “Woods Witch” does have its moments, such as the tree blood being rubbed all over Phillips’s naked torso and him, as Jonah, proclaiming naively Dascia’s kinkiness can be found humorous, but these funny bit moments are far and few in between and there’s just not enough new, fresh, or actor-driven comically-inclined wit and materially to feast on to support the lack of horror despite a few morsels of gore that are left in the dust, overshadowed by an immense pre-trip setup of interviews and infighting that ruins the rest of the reel. 

Enter the world wide web and wacky world of Shawn C. Phillips with his co-directed film with Lauren Francesca in “Woods Witch” on an SRS Cinema DVD. The MPEG2 encoded, 480i upscaled to 720p, DVD9 pulls the differing, clashing video qualities together, mostly earlier on and near the finale, for a coherent beginning, middle, and end narrative telling. If only I could say the same about the story, themes, and character roles. Anyway, not a lot of banding as there’s not a lot of dark scenes in what mostly is fill lighting that brightens up what’s in the scene. Details are okay enough when not implementing shaky cam’s in-and-out focusing found footage and lighting doesn’t completely washout the miniscule bits of texture. The coloring also has a naturally graded look as well as the objects’ organic color palette as budget doesn’t allow for too much fancy cinematography to also evoke a sense of realism. The English language PCM 2.0 stereo mix is consistent as it is coherent with the clarity and the dialogue. Even with pandemonium breaks out, which is often with the screaming and snappy conversations between each other, dialogue remains unscathed without audible squashing feedback or other interferences. English closed captioning is optionally available in the extras. Special features include a behind-the-scenes raw footage from fellow Youtuber Kenneth Ramone who has a small part in the film, a handful of cut scenes, theatrical trailer, funny trailer, an audio commentary by director/star Shawn C. Phillips going deep into the casting, locations, backstories, script and improv moments, etc., and there’s a Lisa Wilcox stinger in the post-credits as the mayor for an additional or extended scene with some improv. The SRS Cinema package comes in a standard DVD Amaray case with eye-catching illustrated artwork, disc pressed with the same artwork, and is an unrated, region free release with a 96-minute runtime.

Last Rites: Humor and horror underperform in the film “Woods Witch” that’s sole purpose is to be a comedy-horror. What the film does do is parody other found footage features and their filmmakers under a misguided sense that in-the-woods horror, from a camera lens point of view, is past its prime when in reality, the long-in-the-tooth subgenre is better than this parody by far.

“Woods Witch” Available on DVD from SRS Cinema!

EVIL Ted Bundy is “The Black Mass” reviewed! (Cleopatra Entertainment / Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

“The Black Mass” on Blu-ray Can Be Ordered Here!

Based off a slice of Ted Bundy’s murderous impulse-driven life, the notorious American serial killer’s escapes from the upper West Coast and lands him residence in Tallahassee, Florida in the moderately warm winter of 1978.  As he picks the pockets of those around him, scrounging up what little cash he needs to survive on, Bundy urges grow to kill grow more intense.  He begins to stalk a nearby university sorority house that’s buzzing with potential prey.  As works out a plan to attack, his good looks and impeccable charm make him desirable around women and men alike, offering opportunities that tend to fizzle out before they can begin, and when his need to spill blood agitates him excessively, he starts to creep out those around him by glaring out them and making off-the-cuff shrewd comments.  With his options declining rapidly, Bundy decides to take advantage of the sorority house’s broken backdoor lock and set in motion a night that will forever live in American infamy. 

For her feature length film debut, scream queen actress Devanny Pinn takes on one of the most vile villains ever to walk the Earth in her biographical horror “The Black Mass.”  The “Song of the Shattered” and “Frost” actress and producer brings a headspace perspective to Ted Bundy committed at least 20 confirmed murders between 1974 and 1978.  The true crime thriller named after what one of the victims described Bundy’s attack on her as simply as a black mass before being bludgeoned.  Brandon Slagle (“Song of the Shattered”) and Eric Pereira (“The Locals”) collaborate on penning the script.  Slagle directed Pinn in the 2022 element horror and survival feature “Frost” and now it’s Pinn to take a stab at the director’s chair with a Slagle screenplay, pun intended.  Pinn coproducers her film alongside Michelle Romano (“Night Aboard the Salem”) and Cleopatra Entertainment’s Tim Yasui (“Frost,” “The 27 Club”) under the production banners of Jaguar Motion Pictures (“Dead Sea”) and Roman Media (“Millwood”).

The main focus in the feature is of the titular character, “The Black Mass,” that is Ted Bundy, almost seeing what he sees through his eyes of skulking and morbid fantasy.  Played by British actor Andrew Sykes, the centrically focused character is experienced not directly through his eyes but over his shoulder, peering from behind as if audiences are accomplices to his murderous wake.  Sykes performs well in a nearly voiceless role that does more lurking than talking but Sykes’s worked up frustration clearly surfaces and erupts out of Bundy when strapped for cash and has a tremendous itch that needs to be scratched as his wishy-washy path to do good crumbles from under his footing.  As the main focal point, no other character really comes close to a lead principal.  The sorority girls are introduced in mass and jump from sister-to-sister individually conversating routine and tales of the day-to-day within the college student context with roles from but not limited to Lara Jean Mummert-Sullivan (“2 Jennifer”), Brittney Ayona Clemons (“Twisted Date”), and Alex Paige Fream (“Into the Arms of Danger”).  Yet, Pinn’s storytelling purpose is paradoxical with the whole story flowing through the perspective of Ted Bundy with his prey hanging mostly in the peripheral and not emanating the warm and fuzzies of sympathetic, relatable characters, but at the end of the film, there’s an acknowledging tribute for the victims who we really know nothing about from the narrative, creating an acute pivot from the killer’s personal bubble.  “The Black Mass” rounds out it’s relatively large passing-through cast with Chelsea Gilson, Susan Lanier, Eva Hamilton, Sarah Nicklin, Elisabeth Montanaro, Mikaylee Mina, Jennifer Wenger, Grace Newton, Devanny Pinn, and with cameos from Lew Temple (“The Devil’s Rejects”), Jeremy London (“Alien Opponent”), Lisa Wilcox (“A Nightmare on Elm Street 4:  The Dream Warriors”), Kathleen Kinmont (“Halloween 4:  The Return of Michael Myers”), and schlock movie veteran Mike Ferguson.

“The Black Mass” is the perfect example of style over substance.  While the story is formatted around Bundy’s outlook, there’s not a significant amount of edification for his warped mindset.  Some backstory leaks through his beseeching phone conversations with ex- or current girlfriend Liv, a phone voiceover presumingly based off the real Bundy girlfriend Elizabeth Kendall, that teeters the appearance of his humanity side as he talks about his addictive struggles and trying to walk a straight line, but any kind of sympathy is quickly tabled without an ounce of provision, likely for his inclination to lie for advantage and exploitation’s sake.  Pinn only teases the inexplicable morose and ghastly gears that rotate inside Bundy’s head, spurring a single blood-drenched daydream of a girl pulling off her skin in the shower, and erotically enjoying it immensely.  The scene feels sorely out of place amongst the rest of reality-grounded narrative that resorts to a cut-rate version of Bundy’s devolving surrounding is fleeting patience and feign niceties.  What’s appreciated mostly about “The Black Mass” is Pinn’s ability to work the camera in not revealing too much of a modern-day society by maintaining that closeup distance behind Bundy and only really showing what needs to be seen for a late 70’s biopic.  Costuming, production design, and vernacular are appropriate for the era as well.  Coming back to the proximity around Bundy, there’s a purposefulness in not showing his full face or looking at him from the front that keeps the particulars of his image in an effective, if not slightly scary, enigma albeit the other characters’ brief descriptions of him in conversation do provide a rough picture of him. 

MVD Visual distributes the newest cinematic Bundy biopic from Cleopatra Entertainment. The AVC encoded, high-definition 1080p, BD25, presented in a widescreen 2.39:1, has welcoming veneer, splashed with a 70’s color scheme saturation, and is graded with a middle-of-the-road or slightly darker color palette. Sufficient capacity and compression encoding offers a clean, sleek digital image without artifacts and with the ample attention to minor era details where possible and Noah Luke’s fill and back-lit cinematography when things get really dark, as in sinister, that snappy image presentation is key. The English language options are a lossy Dolby Digital 5.1 and a PCM 2.0 stereo renders a clean, balanced mix between dialogue, ambience, and dialogue with less suppression on the PCM audio if you’re looking for a lossless option. The setting sounds are nicely immersive compared to the limited and concise framing, opening up the world audibly rather than visually. No technical issues with the digital audio on neither front; however, depth and reality checks are missed marks as all the dialogue doesn’t abide by spatial awareness; when the sorority sisters are talking indoors or from afar while Bundy lurks outside the house, or from a distance, spying on them, all the dialogue is unobstructed and too prominently clear for natural conventions. Bonus features include an image slideshow and the feature trailer. Ancillary content includes other trailers for Cleopatra films with “Frost,” “The Ghosts of Monday,” “The Long Dark Trail,” “What the Waters Left Behind: Scars,” and “Lion-Girl.” Released in a traditional Amaray Blu-ray case, “The Black Mass” sports a Dimension-like front cover, dark and full of characters. No insert or tangible content inside and the disc art mirrors the front cover. Cleopatra’s region free Blu-ray comes unrated and has a runtime 82 minutes.

Last Rites: Devanny Pinn quarterbacking her first feature film with an à la mode Ted Bundy portion, an interpretative taste of his absolute madness, doesn’t faze the long-time scream queen actress and producer who takes on the subject head on, but the overall concept does need tweaking in the area of purpose that can be easily conquered with more practice.

“The Black Mass” on Blu-ray Can Be Ordered Here!