The Ohio Sci-Fi and Horror Marathons

V/H/S. New 'found footage' horror film out in theaters and On Demand on satellite and cable (VOD). The only reasons I saw this was that HDNET showed it for free and, ridiculously, there were some good reviews for it.
The whole 'found footage' thing has gotten so overplayed that it's become almost a whole genre itself. V/H/S purports to be a series of 6 stories on a videocassette that is hidden in some creepy old guy's house. A bunch of punks break into the house to steal the tape. It's a pretty thin premise to say the least.
But, hey, an anthology film is only as strong as the stories that make it up. Unfortunately, none of the stories work. Even the couple that show a tiny bit of promise end up collapsing into crude gross-out effects. Knowing that one of the co-Producing companies involved is the website Bloody Disgusting is a pretty definitive tip-off! Gross-outs can work, but, here they often look like contractual obligations to live up to their core audiences' expectations.
And, that wrap-around story about the Punks and the creepy old guy? It just peters out about 20 minutes before the end. So, you get one more tale and then just when you think there's gonna be a true Finale............ the end credits roll! WTF?!!

A final word:

I know VHS. I've seen a ton of VHS. I've shot on VHS. This movie doesn't look like VHS.

If you're gonna make a movie called "V/H/S" it behooves the filmmakers to make a better effort. There are a handful of OK attempts at making it look like tape, but, anybody who's even heard of videotape can tell that this was a digital production.

* - one star

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Long Live the Orson Welles Cinemas

V/H/S is a great "found footage" film I've seen in a long time. Since the days of Blair Witch and The Last Broadcast. It deserve all the good reviews its getting.

In my opinion if a person shoot a movie on analog VHS videotape I will ignore it. The resolution must be 480i or higher. There is no reason to shoot a movie on one of the worst media formats out there. If a person can't afford 16mm, Digital 8, or Mini DV just wait until the funds are available.

When I watch Paranormal Activity 3 it was supposed to be "filmed" on VHS. It look too clean. Then the videotape was properly stored in its sleeve. Beside that it was one of the better "sequels" in a horror franchise in a long time.

I understand that they weren't likely to shoot on VHS, but, they could have done a much much much better job of making it look so. BLAIR WITCH, CLOVERFIELD and PARANORMAL ACTIVITY all did a superior job of looking like actual "found footage" as opposed to pristine digital photography. And, since 99% of the people who are going to see this will be at home as opposed to a movie theater - why NOT shoot on VHS? It might have been a cool experiment. (at the very least, they could have come up with a mumbo jumbo excuse for why it had digital artifacts, and not videotape ones)

And, just because there were a few good reviews, don't get carried away. On Metacritic and Rotten Tomatoes the scores are 52 and 54 respectively. And, if you just count the Top Critics on Tomatoes it's only a 42. Even on imdB with all the fanboys flooding the vote, it's a paltry 6.2.

And, it's a crappy movie without suspense, logic or technical skill. Other than that......

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Long Live the Orson Welles Cinemas

The reason not to shoot on VHS is because of the 240 or 320 lines of resolution? Betamax I get due to the higher lines of resolution plus Betamax can support PCM audio. VHS doesn't transfer well. I do have an old D Theater DVHS player for recording OTA broadcast if the TWC DVR have two shows schedule in the same timeslot. I've have to find some use for my progressive scan video cables.