elicopperman
In recent years, horror movies have come with critical and financial revenue, such as Insidious, Get Out, Don't Breathe, and A Quiet Place. Unfortunately, for every gem there's always a rough spot, and this film falls into that category. The found footage genre seems to be looked down upon in this day in age for how cheap and low quality they're seen to be, and after seeing this film, I don't think that sentiment will be changed anytime soon.Set twenty years after an accident during a high-school play called "The Gallows", some students try to recreate the play again. Soon after, students Reese, Pfeifer, Ryan and Cassidy get trapped in the auditorium whilst facing the wrath of the vengeful spirit of the kid who died on that fateful night. I'm ok with simple plots, but the story just isn't engaging enough to warrant an hour and a half of viewing. As such, the film becomes tedious as we merely subject ourselves to a lot of running, yelling, obnoxious acting, and a highly predictable payoff. This probably wouldn't be much better as a short film, but at least it would've been over quicker.Adding into that, you'd think the cast would at least be interesting, but there is not one likable character in this whole affair. Reese has little charisma or unique qualities to make him stand out, Pfeiffer's bossiness and demand to finish the play presents her as rather moody, and Cassidy.......uh......I got nothing about her. However, the worst offender is Ryan. I'm sure the filmmakers intended to make him snarky and arrogant, but he becomes obnoxious very fast since all he does is film stuff and annoy people for nearly thirty minutes. Also, it's funny how one of the students can't act in the play when the actor himself can't act in the movie either. When not even the acting is convincing enough, there's lots to be desired with these bland and unlikable characters.It's obvious this film was made on a low budget with the setting mostly consisting of a school, but that's where the film's cinematography also becomes problematic. Given that this is found footage, it becomes annoying and gimmicky to a fault, and the usage of filming everything in front, even during chase scenes, becomes old quick. Even the props range from a rope and a ladder and not much else, making the experience more lackluster than scary. There isn't even any reason for this to be found footage; they could have shot this any other way and nothing would change at all.Now I don't think jump scares are inherently weak, as they can work well if given the proper buildup and tension. In this case though, the jump scares just happen on a wham, making them feel unwarranted and tiresome. Even one scene with Cassidy sobbing by a stairway (which can be seen on the poster) that is built up with surprisingly slow and subtle atmosphere gets ruined by a cheap jump scare from the spirit. Considering that this film is supposed to be set up as pasted together clips of the story from the police department, one would expect even they would get bored of this drowsy experience.Did this film have potential? Kind of, as it does paint itself as a revenge tale of a high schooler named Charlie who accidentally died during the 1993 performance and is determined to have the play finished with one of the students, being Pfeiffer. There is a way to make a story like that work, maybe if Pfeiffer was the daughter of a girl Charlie got pregnant in high school and maybe just wanted to complete a father daughter play. Sadly, all that potential is squandered away for a cheap production set, a boring story, hollow and despicable characters, and nothing else to stand out in the horror genre. There are great horror films out there in the world worth cherishing for eons, but this film will forever be locked in purgatory with all the forgettable horror flicks that favor cheapness over quality.
Michael O'Keefe
Observing the 20th anniversary of a student's accidental death during a high school play; the current group of drama students want to honor the flawed production by reproducing it. Superstitions abound and too foolish to face any real fear, these amateur thespians proceed with even more disastrous consequences.No real horror to deal with. No disturbing scenes you haven't seen before. But THE GALLOWS is well done, well paced...just nothing to keep you at the edge of your seat. You may even wonder how it earned an R rating. Not to say this flick won't sustain your attention.Featured in the cast: Pfeifer Brown, Reese Mishler, Cassidy Gifford, David Herrara, Mackie Burt, John Hales, Ryan Shoos, Jordan Rheane Murphy and Travis Cluff, the director and co-writer.
lorcan-61881
The gallows follows a bunch of teenagers who are doing school play of The Gallows which happened in 1994 in a old school but weirdly a child was killed during the play. These teens then break into the school one night and soon they find out the ghost of Charlie Grimille hasn't left and soon each teenager starts to disappear. When the movie came out on DVD,I bought it cause I thought the film would be so so so cool and brilliant and scary but what I got was a pile of crap,this movie like most found footage but this had so much shaky camera in it,all the characters ever did was just cry and moan and start screaming'HELP,WERE TRAPPED,WERE GONNA DIE,WHY ARE YOU DOING THIS!!' And all that begging. The acting in the film was honestly terrible,this was the biggest issue of the film the acting was like just crap. They could've thrown in Selena Gomez,Justin Bieber and Miley Cyrus there would've been no difference..zero. The gallows is like most horror films these days horrible,don't watch this and if you do hopefully Charlie Grimille will kill you while your watching this.
