Walled In - Killer Straight to DVD Thriller

[nugunz]

Like that thread title? Pretty catchy, huh?




By Indigomotion, and Minds Eye Entertainment, Walled In is a great straight to DVD horror/thriller that you might have missed. Released last Tuesday, it's definitely worth your time; at least a rent.

Co-written by Rodolphe Tissot, Olivier Volpi, Sylvian White and Director, Giles Paquet-Brenner. Based on the novel Les Emmures, and an upcoming graphic novel by Serge Brussolo.

Starring the ubercute Mischa Barton (The O.C.) Cameron Bright (X-Men: The Last Stand) Deborah Kara Unger (Silent Hill) Noam Jenkins (Saw IV). And wicked scarey Rob Roy (Rob Roy (I))


From the DVD synopsis:
"In 1993, sixteen bodies were found entombed within the Malestrazza Building, a mysterious apartment building complex built by one of the worlds most renowned, yet eccentric, architects. The Killer was never caught.

Fifteen years later, newly graduated structural engineer Sam Walczak (Barton) arrives to prepare the site for demolition. But this massive concrete crypt is not entirely empty: Its halls are lined with secretes. Its rooms are filled with fear. And behind its walls, the ultimate horror has lay waiting... until now...."


I have to say, this one was a surprise. Mostly because I didn't really have my hopes up going into it. Nine times out of ten, "straight to DVD" means garbage. But Walled in, I have to say, delivered.

From the incredibly disturbing opening scene, and meeting the creepy people who populate the Malestrazza building, to the satisfying, but certainly not happily-ever-after ending, the movie plays on your psyche. This is not a gory, bloody hacker flick. The scare here is in the fine print.

My only complaint has to do with one scene in Malestrazza's maze-like room, where Sam is being chased by a shadowy man, all the while, she is harassed by a ghostly little girl's voice, singing "One... two... He's coming for you... three... four... the cement will pour..." Remind you of anything?

But that's my only gripe, and I can pretty much overlook that. Nothing new under the sun and all. In the special features, Unger (Who plays the weird landlady and mother to Bright's character, Jimmy) describes the movie as "a cross between Edgar Alan Poe and Alfred Hitchcock" I think that's pretty close.

Overall Walled In is a solid, unpretentious but super creepy flick. And you should definately check it out.

[nugunz]

I should mention that Walled in is an Official Selection in both Frightfest Glasgow 2009 and Fantasporto 2009.

[The_Disturbed_One]

Sweetness. I'm going to check this flick out the next time I'm in town. It sounds like it might be the first decent horror film of the year. Thanks, nugunz!

[ken]

Me too but it might be a few days before I have the time.

[nugunz]

I'm not saying it's the Godfather. But it's a fun, creepy flick.

[ken]

Mischa can't act and the young boy can't act but the other main people done a good job. The story is very good. Someone will remake this movie into a block bluster.

[childeroland]

This isn't a torture porn film, is it? I avoided it because it looks a little like Captivity, which I disliked.

[nugunz]

Uhh. Did you read the synsopsis above? No, it isn't.

[childeroland]

Oops, I didn't. Sorry.

[cbardis]

I liked the idea behind the movie but thought the movie itself was just ok.

[The_Disturbed_One]

I waited for Movie Gallery to have it in for about a week, only to find out one of my friends had rented it, so I just ran over to their house and picked it up. As for the film, the idea behind it was greater than the film itself.

The acting was decent at best, I expected more from Barton, but the kid in the film, Cameron Bright, was awful. I mean awful. I didn't even like it when he played Leech in X-Men: The Last Stand. As a matter of fact, he didn't even look like Leech from the comics. Leech from the comics was like a creature-looking kind of thing and in the film, he's just a bald little kid who looks like he's got cancer or something. Nevermind, I'm ranting. Back to the film.

The shots weren't set up bad, but they could have gotten a better DP, even for a film such as this. The music was good for the atmosphere. However, the one thing I hated was something nugunz already stated: The blatant rip-off rhyme from A Nightmare on Elm Street.

Overall, the film was decent, but some parts are pretty bad. For an independent film it was okay, though. I give it a 6.8/10, simply because getting a fresh idea for an independent film is hard to get.

[1300]

Personal belief is that Barton's acting skills leave much to be desired and they draw out any explanation far too much. I'm not one to want a movie to spoon feed you everything you should be able to figure out on your own but good lord, don't wait till the very end and then try to cram everything in at once.

[nugunz]

I thought the way the kid delivered his lines, so literal and deadpan... was kind of unsettling. I guess you could chalk that up to bad acting though Thought it kinda "fit", myself.

There was one scene, the one where he was burrying his dog, that he kinda spazzed out, and it was just really, really annoying.