BARE BONES: HONEYMOON (Luna de miel) and SIREN

HONEYMOON (Luna de miel) (2015)

Spanish language horror/thriller finds lonely, odd doctor Jorge (Hector Kotsifakis), kidnapping and holding prisoner his pretty married neighbor Isabel (Paulina Ahmed). The more Jorge tries to convince Isabel they are made for each other, the more his behavior becomes cruel and sadistic towards her.

Awful flick is directed by Diego Cohen from a script by Marco Tarditi Ortega. It is a mean-spirited, cruel and misogynistic movie that quickly degenerates into a torture show…all in the name of love? The more Jorge tries to make Isabel see things his way, the crueler and more uncomfortable to watch this ugly flick gets. As Isabel resists, this demented doctor does increasingly sadistic things to the terrified woman, like spraying acid in her mouth and surgically removing the skin on some of her fingers. Worst part, it’s all directed with a slight tone of whimsy like we’re supposed to be endeared to Jorge’s horrid attempts to woo his tormented captive. It’s not an easy watch nor one that I would recommend anyone attempt. A cruel, heartless and unpleasant movie without a purpose or a point.

-MonsterZero NJ

SIREN (2016)

Siren is a feature film based on the V/H/S/ segment Amateur Night revolving around Hannah Fierman’s “Lily” character from that film’s story. Here she is discovered by a group of annoying bachelor partiers at a remote backwoods brothel, who discover her locked up in the building’s basement. They set her free and escape with her and now the demoness is loosed to commit carnage and murder with her handlers in hot pursuit of demon and dullards alike.

Boring movie is lamely directed by Gregg Bishop from a weak script by Ben Collins and Luke Piotrowski. No surprise original segment director David Bruckner chose not to be involved, as this is simply a really awful movie trying to squeeze a few more bucks out of one of that 2012 horror’s more effective sequences. It’s amateurishly made, badly acted and has basically little more story than the short anthology segment it’s based on. Director Bishop even doesn’t get the disturbing performance and use out of Fierman and her character that the original V/H/S/ utilized so well. The characters are dull and annoying, there are random sequences in slow motion for no reason or effect and the guy playing the villain (Justin Welborn) comes across as someone’s creepy uncle, not the badass he’s supposed to be. Epic fail on all levels.

-MonsterZero NJ

Advertisement