Every V/H/S series segment ranked from worst to best
There have been sixteen different short films in the three V/H/S anthology movies so far. With the announcement of a fourth instalment, V/H/S 94, it's time to find out which segment were mini horror classics and which were misfiring duds.
The rapid release of V/H/S films from 2012 to 2014 provided a platform for the foremost horror directors of the day to take creative risks within the found footage subgenre.
All the short films had a rough-and-ready quality, yet some seemed to capture lightning in a bottle while others failed to impress.
Were the segments in V/H/S 2 really superior to those in the original? Can V/H/S Viral actually be as bad as you remember?
Wonder no more - here are all sixteen short films from the V/H/S anthology series ranked from worst to best.
There are no spoilers for any segments from V/H/S, V/H/S 2 or V/H/S Viral in this article
16/ Gorgerous Vortex
Director: Todd Lincoln
Known for: The Apparition
Plot in a sentence: A woman murders an older man, before somehow getting involved with a monster.
Verdict: This plotless yet visually striking short was excised from the final cut of V/H/S Viral, primarily for not being a found footage film. Honestly, it's not great.
15/ Vicious Circles
Director: Marcel Sarmiento
Known for: D is for Dogfight in The ABCs of Death
Plot in a sentence: A police chase attracts wannabe citizen journalists and their handheld cameras, but something sinister is afoot.
Verdict: The desire to shake up the 'abandoned house full of VHS tapes' set-up of the first two movies is understandable, yet this framing narrative falls well short of its ambitions with its simplistic take on the desire for viral fame.
14/ Dante the Great
Film: V/H/S Viral (2014)
Director: Gregg Bishop
Known for: SiREN, Dance of the Dead
Plot in a sentence: A magician makes a mephistophelean pact with a sentient cape, promising it human victims in exchange for superhero-like powers.
Verdict: It's not really found footage, its fairytale-like premise is silly and it's bereft of mystery and tension. The visual effects look pretty good though.
13/ The Sick Thing That Happened to Emily When She Was Younger
Director: Joe Swanberg
Known for: Screenwriter for Dave Franco's horror debut The Rental; actor who played Sam in the Second Honeymoon segment of V/H/S
Plot in a sentence: Emily (Holly Rogers) enlists the help of her long-distance boyfriend over Skype when she begins to suspect her apartment is haunted.
Verdict: There's the germ of an interesting idea in this proto desktop horror, but it's hampered by story elements that never really gel and jump scares that fail to deliver.
12/ Bonestorm
Directors: Aaron Moorhead and Justin Benson
Known for: Spring, The Endless
Plot in a sentence: A group of skater bros face off against hordes of murderous skeletons in Mexico.
Verdict: Fans of Moorhead and Benson's cerebral, emotionally complex output may be slightly baffled by this occasionally entertaining yet ineffectively executed stretch of non-stop Go Pro action.
11/ Tuesday 17th
Director: Glenn McQuaid
Known for: Visual effects on Stake Land; additional crew on Ti West's The Innkeepers
Plot in a sentence: Four teens head for the woods for the usual combo of skinny dipping and drug taking, but one of their number has a sinister secret.
Verdict: A weirdly straight take on the slasher subgenre that has great gore, but vanilla characters and a half-baked high concept villain.
10/ Slumber Party Alien Abduction
Director: Jason Eisener
Known for: Hobo with a Shotgun
Plot in a sentence: A series of pranks at a teenage sleepover are interrupted by the arrival of extraterrestrials.
Verdict: A chaotic yet creatively pedestrian story enlivened by some great alien designs and part of the action being captured by a dog with a Go Pro.
9/ Tape 56
Director: Adam Wingard
Known for: You're Next, The Guest, Blair Witch
Plot in a sentence: A group of misogynist thugs break into a house to steal a VHS tape for a client, only to discover a dead man in a chair watching some very disturbing videos.
Verdict: Starting the first V/H/S movie which such despicable characters was a brave if slightly misguided choice. Still, it maintains the tension inbetween the other short films, which is pretty tricky to pull off in an anthology movie.
8/ Tape 49
Director: Simon Barrett
Known for: Writer of You're Next, The Guest and Blair Witch; writer of V/H/S segments The Sick Thing That Happened to Emily When She Was Younger, Tape 56 and Phase 1 Clinical Trials
Plot in a sentence: Two private investigators are sent to a student's house after his mother claims he's disappeared, where they find - you guessed it - piles of VHS tapes.
Verdict: The framing narrative of V/H/S 2 subtly builds on the mythology of the first film, giving the series a central enigma which later instalments should have probably chosen to develop further, but didn't.
7/ Second Honeymoon
Director: Ti West
Known for: The House of the Devil, The Innkeepers, The Sacrament
Plot in a sentence: A couple find themselves stalked by a menacing stranger on their roadtrip.
Verdict: It features the mumblecore dialogue and sense of atmosphere and place that Ti West fans know and love, with some nice unexpected twists thrown in.
6/ Safe Haven
Directors: Timo Tjahjanto and Gareth Evans
Known for: Tjahjanto primarily for May The Devil Take You; Evans for The Raid
Plot in a sentence: A documentary crew get more than they bargain for when they're granted exclusive access to a mysterious cult.
Verdict: Though plot and character development is thin on the ground here, this is still perhaps the most disturbing V/H/S segment, making the wise decision to separate the protagonists as the chaos begins to unfold before subjecting them to some truly horrific sights.
5/ Parallel Monsters
Director: Nacho Vigalondo
Known for: Colossal
Plot in a sentence: Mad scientist Alfonso manages to open a portal to a parallel universe where he meets a mirror image of himself - but the two universes are more different than either Alfonso imagines.
Verdict: This hilarious short is far and away the highlight of V/H/S Viral, expertly balancing its comedy, tension and sci-fi weirdness.
4/ 10/31/98
Directors: Radio Silence
Known for: Ready or Not, Scream 5
Plot in a sentence: A group of teens get the wrong address for a Halloween party and end up gatecrashing an exorcism.
Verdict: The first V/H/S segment with a sense of humour, it's thoroughly entertaining, with the creepy design of the house an early taste of the attention to detail on full display in Ready or Not.
3/ Phase 1 Clinical Trials
Director: Adam Wingard
Known for: You're Next, The Guest, Blair Witch
Plot in a sentence: Herman (played by Wingard himself) discovers that his new high-tech robotic eye has the unpleasant side effect of making legions of murderous ghosts visible to him.
Verdict: The great premise could have done with a longer runtime to explore, but there are some fantastic scares here and excellent camerawork (the whole thing is seen through Herman's robotic eye).
2/ A Ride in the Woods
Directors: Eduardo Sanchez, Gregg Hale
Known for: The Blair Witch Project
Plot in a sentence: A cyclist is bitten by a zombie and promptly turns into one himself, with the zombie's eye view of the ensuing carnage captured through his Go Pro camera.
Verdict: It was something of a coup getting the team behind The Blair Witch Project onboard for the V/H/S sequel, and they don't disappoint with this inventive and hilarious take on the zombie subgenre.
1/ Amateur Night
Film: V/H/S (2012)
Director: David Bruckner
Known for: The Ritual
Plot in a sentence: Three lads attempt to shoot an amateur porno with hidden cameras, but get their commupence when one of the girls they bring home is not all she appears.
Verdict: It's one of the most perfect examples of found footage. Having the video captured by a hidden camera in the protagonist's glasses is inspired and the bloody violence of the climax is nail-biting. Hannah Fierman brings an unexpected complexity to Lily, and it's no surprise this segment soon got a feature length spinoff in SiREN.
Looking for more found footage content? Here's a short history of the subgenre, from Cannibal Holocaust to Host.
Comments
Post a Comment