 Thanks for checking out this movie review video. This is for the 2020 shutter Exclusive the pale door that is coming to shutter on Thursday December 17th And because it's not on shutter yet when I'm dropping this review and because it's a new film going to shutter No spoilers for this review. I will give it a little small little synopsis And then we'll talk a little bit more. So first of all directed by Aaron be be Coons who did Camera obscura as well as scare package, which by the way, I really like scare package It is available on shutter at the moment if you have not seen it You should definitely see it because it is a quite a good horror comedy in my opinion I like that so much that I actually did a pre-order of the blu-ray So it's back there in my blu-ray slash DVD collection somewhere. So good stuff Written by Coons Cameron Burns and Keith Lansdale Yes, Keith Lansdale the son of Joe R. Lansdale the author who's done some really great stories one of one of my favorite performances of Bruce Campbell Joe our Lansdale's the adaptation of Joe our Lansdale's book for Bubba Hotep Love that love that anyway Lansdale's written scripts for Christmas with the dead and he did the short the companion for Creepshow series which I quite like that one that one was really good Coons called the this film a mix of three ten to Yuma and the descent but with psychological horror thrown into it I think he actually said like doused in psychological horror or something like that and then like Little blades or something it was something very you know over the top But okay, so quick synopsis because I don't want to give a lot away if you want to check this out so basically Western it's a horror Western Mix which I do have to give a lot of credit for attempting something like this because I Really do like horror and Western mixes actually one book I read kind of recent ish that I really loved by Josh Mallerman called unburied Carol is a horror Western mix. It's really good read that book So I have to give them credit on that so it's a horror Western where it's kind of a gang of Gunslingers basically who aren't so great They're kind of on the lamb to a degree and things aren't going well And they run into this little town and there's something going on with the town that is not of this world Really, it's a super natural not normal type thing Good concept. I will say Unfortunately, I cannot recommend this film I did not enjoy it and I'll give you all the reasons why I didn't enjoy it now Another thing is I feel bad saying this but I'm always honest with my reviews And I'm I say I feel bad saying that I didn't like the film and I'm going to say a lot of things I don't like about it because I do think there's a possibility that Aaron be coon be coons will see this review and In the case that he does I loved scare package Like I said, I pre-ordered the Blu-ray and I have watched it twice since it came out and I'll continue to watch it But anyway, I'm not going to lie about reviews like some people I know do So anyway, I'll lay it out here There are a few good things that I did enjoy about the film, but overall I did not enjoy this film I thought there are a lot of problems. I thought it was kind of underdeveloped the story itself Like I said big points for attempting this But there's a lot of stuff lacking and I think a lot of those things lacking come down to the script I think the story needed to be developed a lot more the characters needed to be developed a lot lot more and For the most part the acting is not the best and this is one of those scripts And it's you know kind of slow to a point at times where you need the actors to really sell those characters And for the most part that does not happen, unfortunately So but I'll talk a little bit more It starts with an Edgar Allen Poe quote Which I thought was an awesome start because I love some Edgar Allen Poe I don't live all too far from Baltimore. So I'm a Poe fan down with it We've moved past opening credits though. I do need to say I know some some newer films every now and then We'll still do these opening credits But as a industry film has kind of moved away from that for the most part and I think that's a good thing I really don't think we should be doing Credits in the beginnings of films anymore because it makes people impatient. They don't really like that It's a minor gripe in my opinion, you know, just do the credits at the end. So yeah I do like the opening music though. The opening music was very good. I wrote down that I believed it was simplistic and modern Modernly dark but with a Western kind of tinge to it and in general, this is one of the most amazing things about the film There's something Outstanding about this film and that is Alex Cuervo's score for this film is awesome He did such a good job so much so that I feel like I might want to own the soundtrack for this And I didn't barely ever say that the music is great Like I said, it's this it's this interesting mix that I've not really heard before of like this kind of modern Dark sound with you know, Western mixed into it and it's really really really well done And some of the moments in the film where I was kind of feeling a little bit of something and really engaging a lot Was mainly because of the music driving that the music is excellent So Alex Cuervo big shout out to you excellent job with that So It jumps into action pretty fast with this film. I do like that. That is great It's always good to do that kind of grab the audience quick. The problem is it kind of lets go a little bit after that and then it gets to Another thing that is a little bit attention grabbing But then it gets back to kind of dragging its feet a bunch and going very slow things start to feel very Repetitive especially a lot of the dialogue a lot of the character Interactions are kind of the same throughout the entire film and the same stuff just gets talked at talked about ad nauseam And it's sometimes it's the same characters sometimes It's different characters but talking about the same thing that other characters talked about and there's really nothing new Added to it. So there's a lot of wasted time in this film in my opinion and it really should have been cut down It's like with all the credits and everything. It's like an hour and 36 runtime It definitely needed to be cut down a bunch because it really does drag There are parts of it that don't drag that I found particularly interesting and I'll talk a little bit more about that without spoilers, but yeah, so The acting is rough as I said, it's kind of rough But it does improve a little bit as the film progresses I did notice that so that is good, but still it's just overall lacking and like I said a Script like this you really really needed the actors to be able to sell those characters to pull people in to suck them in the other problem like I was saying is that You don't really understand the characters all that much or have a whole lot of backstory or they don't really develop a whole lot There's one character in particular who's like the main character who you know like you see his journey you see his backstory and everything but everyone else just kind of seems to be there and It just it doesn't create a whole lot of interest one another minor thing that that came up is For films like this you want to kind of try and go for realism With it if you're gonna set it in a setting like Western The people were abnormally clean for a being in a Western in every single scene unless they had you know gotten bloody Which is very unrealistic for this and that's not something that you needed to spend a lot of money on Literally, you could just have people roll around in the dirt after they put their costumes on which by the way the Costuming was pretty well done in my opinion people looked at the part They definitely did and I appreciate that about it, but once again, they're all very clean It looked like they were showering daily Maybe even two times a day that is how clean they looked and for like I said for a film like this a lot of those kind of small Details it matters, so they needed to be dirty I know it's kind of a dumb small thing the other thing is a lot of the there's no Consistency of accents with anyone it was kind of like it seemed like it was like a Do an accent if you feel like it don't do one if you don't feel like it and pick your own accent and That that's another one of those kind of like attention to detail things where you're kind of Breaking people out of the Illusion of it being in that time period and being a Western in that area Just like you are with you know people just being abnormally clean for that time So another one of those small things that kind of irked me about it The camera work in this is very unstable A lot a lot of movement going on not intentional It's you know kind of shaky not intentional It does get more stable as the film goes on and I really did appreciate that and I felt like as the film went on The camera work in general seemed to get like I said more stable But also there were more inspired shots that started to pop up It's kind of like the cameraman was a little bit nervous not really sure of themselves early on and then as the film Goes on they started to kind of settle into things and it's kind of started to come up with some cool visual ideas So towards the you know later middle and the end of the film there are some really cool camera Movements that come in some camera shots that come in the other thing especially early on that they do do a better job Of getting away from later is Very close-up shots like really hugging people in the frame That is very uncomfortable. It's hard. It's it's like back up, dude Like give this some space like it's good to kind of give space to the characters give a space so that the audience can really look at the setting because Where they were shooting, you know their locations looked good They looked appropriate for what they were going for so you know just bring it back a bunch But like I said that did get better as the film went on No Consistency accent I already talked about that There's more dialogue in this than there really needs to be and I think that kind of goes hand-in-hand with my comment about Cutting it down for runtime because it drags a lot a lot a lot a lot of dragging in this There's a lot of reputation in what gets our I'm sorry repetition Have not a correct repetition in what gets talked about like I was saying and When that happens you really get bored as an audience member when you just keep hearing the same thing talked about again and again And again, and it's not really progressing the story. It's not going anywhere The other thing is when you finally do talk about that thing again or have the characters talk about that thing again And there is something new added the audience may have kind of checked out already on that so You need to be more selective with the dialogue that you're that you're using Just saying There is a nice creepy visual surprise In this and I'll tell you I'll give you an idea of when it is in the film So you'll know when it happens that this is what I was referring to but it doesn't spoil anything There's a camera shot where it pans upward inside of a building to look at the ceiling So now you'll know what I'm talking about very good shot looked really creepy Really nice really enjoyed that There's some there's quite some solid fun that gets injected into the film around the 50-minute mark so I Wasn't having that much fun until about the 50-minute mark It does get much better after that in my opinion because that's when kind of the Western ends and the horror begins so It's much better but still You know the camera works settled down like I said and there were actually some really good visuals at that point a lot of them Driven by practical effects the practical effects were handled pretty well in this I will say that that aspect of it was pretty good. I was impressed with that Like I said again, I do have Reiterate I do have to give credit for attempting this but unfortunately, I just have to call them an attempt I don't think it was very successful The story is not very compelling past the overall idea of the film That's one of those issues I was talking about with the script. It just needed more time It needed more depth to it the characters as well Good idea good concept It just wasn't really developed a whole lot unfortunately In order to really sell it like I said You needed the cast to really really sell it with their performances and that didn't really happen either a few of the characters actually I felt were Miscast as well Not gonna you know name names or anything like that because there were a few actors and actresses who did handle their roles pretty well And I was like, oh, that's a that's a solid performance, but overall Yeah, to not so good The runtime again the runtime the runtime the runtime for what it was and how much it it dragged and Another thing that I definitely definitely want to say again, even though I already said it Alex Cuervo that soundtrack is Amazing so good. I loved it. I loved it. It's my favorite thing about this movie. I Could probably just put the movie on again and only listen to the music The last thing I want to I want to stop with here is I have a Feeling that one of the influences for this film was from dust held on by Quentin Tarantino I'm it's just a just a hunch. I have based off a feeling I got from watching the film But anyway, obviously, I wasn't a big fan of this one But I have said this many many many times in my reviews. This is my personal opinion. This is how I personally feel about these films So I still encourage people to go ahead and watch the movies to make up your own mind There have been plenty of times that I have had good reviews of a film and people come back and comment on that review and say You know, I hated that or I didn't really dig on it Or I've had bad reviews on films like this one and people have watched it come back and said, you know what? I love that actually and that's good That's great because this is just my personal opinion and no matter what film I'm reviewing They're gonna be people who hate it people who love it and people in the middle and that's what's important So the other thing I always say is every film is worth watching at least once Just to make up your own mind. So do that. I would say but for me personally, I don't really recommend this film I didn't like it Which was sad because I really wanted to so out of five stars with half stars in play I am giving it one and a half stars Sorry Aaron if you see this like I said, I bought scare package, man I bought it might even watch it again soon just because I feel bad about this But anyway, I'm gonna be honest about these things. So anyway when people do see the film if people do watch the film We can talk down spoilers in the comments. We can do that Let's talk it out. Did you really like it? Did you not like it like me? We're in the middle Let's talk. 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