Directed by Rob Savage.
Starring Haley Bishop, Jemma Moore, Emma Louise Webb
SYNOPSIS:
Six buddies get collectively throughout lockdown for his or her weekly zoom name. Their regular group chat turns darkish when a seance goes unsuitable.
For anybody experiencing life in the previous couple of months, everyone knows Zoom calls can really feel like a horror story. However what occurs when somebody really turns this idea into an actual horror movie? That’s what clearly impressed the creators behind Host, a brand new horror movie completely on Shudder. This quarantine-era horror deal with is an ideal encapsulation of this time in our society, but in addition works past that: Host is significantly a terrifying expertise.
The movie follows a bunch of buddies as they meet up for his or her weekly Zoom session. That is pretty widespread with teams of buddies as many wish to follow social distancing however nonetheless spend time with their family members. Although, not many individuals are internet hosting full-on seances over the video chat service like our gang in Host. Whereas making an attempt to determine what to do that week, Haley suggests this concept, and her good friend goes together with it. Although not everyone seems to be taking it significantly and that results in them opening the door to one thing far darker than they’d ever imagined.
Proper off the bat, this movie does one thing I completely love for a horror movie to do; it takes a premise we really feel snug and secure with, and it twists it into one thing horrifying. This concept labored effectively for movies like Jaws or Last Vacation spot 2, taking seashores and the freeway and giving us one thing to concern. If you permit your viewers to see one thing they as soon as cherished in a special gentle, you already received half the battle. Shudder’s Host does a incredible job of creating Zoom scary and bringing terror into what many individuals use as a secure house throughout this time.
Like discovered footage earlier than it, this new model of filmmaking – the pc display movie – doesn’t work for everybody. It’s not a totally new idea as Unfriended and Looking have earlier than performed it earlier than Host, however none have gone the Zoom route but. The concept of watching folks work together via a video dialog isn’t what folks usually consider on the subject of movie. Nonetheless, within the period of Twitch and fixed dwell movies, it’s additionally not a totally international kind of leisure. I feel director Rob Savage and different filmmakers who use this model of filmmaking are very good and providing up a enjoyable evolution of the favored discovered footage or “shaky cam” style.
One thing I loved about Host was watching it on my laptop computer in mattress; it virtually made me really feel like I used to be proper there with the folks within the film. That stage of immersion is difficult to search out on the planet of large blockbusters and high-brow horror. When all the pieces desires to really feel bigger than life, Host gleefully invades your house and private house.
It additionally helps to have a bunch of gifted actors and a director who is aware of learn how to craft the precise scare. The entire actors do an exquisite job of feeling like actual folks, furthering including the immersion. You are feeling like everybody within the name; there’s an individual that fills each trope in a buddies group, they bicker like long-time buddies, and so they look after them simply the identical. If I needed to highlight one actor, Jemma Moore was my go-to for the very best moments of performing.
However none of this reward for the model and performing might be attainable with out incredible course from Rob Savage and a screenplay from Savage, Gemma Hurley, and Jed Shepherd. The movie shines with how tight and fluid it feels from a story sense, and it’s accented with highly effective scares and great moments of terror. Whereas there are a bit extra leap scares than I usually like in a horror movie, every of them is constructed to good stress and never simply thrown out frivolously. With what these filmmakers did in a small period of time and restricted sources, it’s actually scary to consider what they’ll prepare dinner up with extra.
There’s little doubt in my thoughts that Host is without doubt one of the scariest movies of the yr. Horror streamer Shudder affords up tons of nice horror content material, and that is rapidly climbing the ranks to the very prime. There’s one thing right here that makes it really feel like extra than simply low-cost thrills; there’s an unnerving high quality that will get below your pores and skin. Seize your headphones, cover below your blankets, and see this glorious movie as quickly as attainable.
Flickering Delusion Score – Movie: ★ ★ ★ ★ / Film: ★ ★ ★ ★
EJ Moreno
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=videoseries
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