Review by
Eric Hillis
Directed by: Jordan Downey, Christian Long, Justin Long, Justin Martinez, Virat Pal,
Kate Siegel, Jay Cheel
Starring: Dane DiLiegro, Alanah Pearce, Phillip Andre Botello, Jolene Anderson, Mike Ferguson, Thom Hallum,
Dominique Star, Mitch Horowitz Bix Krieger
Following a seven year gap between its
third
and fourth instalments, the V/H/S/ franchise seems to have
settled into an annual release pattern on its current home of horror
streaming service Shudder. The last three instalments have been centred on
specific years - 1994, '99' and
'85
- but this seventh film in the series drops this idea in favour of a new
direction. V/H/S/Beyond ventures away from traditional horror
and into the realm of sci-fi, with all but one of its six segments featuring
extra-terrestrial antagonists.
Jay Cheel, director of Shudder's great
Cursed Films documentary series, handles this instalment's
wraparound, a fake episode of an Alien Encounters type show
that actually features that show's host Mitch Horowitz among its
talking heads. The episode builds up to revealing the contents of a pair of
VHS tapes that purport to contain footage of an alien encounter in the
bedroom of a Canadian home (I initially thought the two tapes hosted the
shorts that follow, but that's not the case). Between each of the individual
segments we cut back to this framing story as it builds to a climax that
ultimately proves underwhelming.
The first of the shorts is Jordan Downey's 'Stork'. This one
involves a group of police officers who have seemingly formed a vigilante
group under the acronym W.A.R.D.E.N. A rookie has been assigned the task of
carrying a camera to document their raid on a house where they believe
several recently abducted infants are being held. Once there they find
themselves battling what appears to be zombies that have had their brains
removed. Taking inspiration from video games, Downey makes heavy use of the
cops' bodycam footage (which makes you wonder why one of them is carrying a
bulky video camera) as they make their way through the house's "levels" to
the attic, where a surprise awaits. This one is essentially 20 minutes of
bloody carnage with a goofy final twist. No new ground is broken but it's
enjoyable and swiftly paced.
It's off to India next for Virat Pal's 'Dream Girl', which follows a
pair of paparazzi as they attempt to get some invasive footage of Tara (Namrata Sheth), Bollywood's latest megastar. Hiding in her trailer's closet with a video
camera, one of the paparazzi discovers Tara's chilling secret. Initially
teasing an intriguing examination of the connection between India's class
divide and its obsession with Bollywood stars, Dream Girl descends into
bloody but bland chaos.
The most technically impressive segment, not just of this instalment but
arguably of the series as a whole, is Radio Silence member
Justin Martinez's 'Dive'. The short opens in a plane in mid-air as
our protagonists prepare for a skydive, with one member of the team equipped
with a GoPro-like body camera. Chaos ensues when some sort of alien craft
appears in the sky, followed by airforce jet fighters. When the plane takes
a hit, the skydivers are forced to bail out earlier than they expected,
followed to the ground by some very unfriendly ETs. The effects on display
here are remarkable for such a low budget, with a skydiving sequence to
rival
Mission: Impossible - Fallout
and convincing physical interactions between the CG aliens and their
unfortunate human victims. It's an adrenalin rush that's eventually let down
by an unsatisfying ending.
Christian Long and Justin Long clearly didn't get the memo
regarding Beyond's sci-fi theme as their segment, 'Fur Babies', is essentially a compressed
reimagining of Kevin Smith's Tusk, which of course starred none other than Justin Long. Here two animal
rights activists enter the home of a dog carer whom they believe is
responsible for animal abuse, only to find her abuse is directed at those of
a two-legged variety. Smith couldn't stretch this idea to feature length but
it just abut fills the 20 or so minutes of the Longs' segment.
The final segment, 'Stowaway', is helmed by actress Kate Siegel,
making her directing debut with a script by her husband
Mike Flanagan. With its early '90s setting and low quality VHS
presentation, it's the segment of Beyond that most fits the
series' established aesthetic. Alanah Pearce plays Halle, a proto
"citizen journalist" who heads into the Nevada desert seeking evidence of
reported alien activity. Interviewing some yokels who express bemusement at
the idea of a documentarian being unaffiliated with a TV channel in this
pre-YouTube era, Halle seems to be hitting a dead end until she's woken late
at night by lights in the sky. Siegel cleverly fills in some of her
protagonist's backstory via the footage of her young daughter's birthday
party that she's unwittingly taping over, and Pearce (who is apparently a
celeb in the world of video games with little acting experience) delivers
what might be the best performance to feature in this series' seven
instalments. In just 20 minutes Siegel, Flanagan and Pearce manage to flesh
out this woman in a way that makes us feel like we're watching the climax of
a feature film rather than a standalone short. I look forward to seeing more
from Siegel and Pearce.
As always, this latest chapter in the found footage anthology is a mixed
bag. Some segments look great but lack substance, some tease intriguing
ideas but fail to flesh them out, and only Stowaway would threaten to make
it onto a greatest hits of V/H/S/ compilation. While I
appreciate the series trying something different, I do hope it returns to
its horror comfort zone next time out. Some of the segments here play like
half-formed ideas that might have benefitted from more time in development,
which suggest the series may be hampering itself with its current annual
schedule.
V/H/S/Beyond is on Shudder from
October 4th.
