The V/H/S movie series has been going for over a decade now. There are now seven main movies in the main series, plus one or two spin-offs. Considering that it seemed destined to end back in 2014, when V/H/S: Viral seemed to garner little more than shrugs from many viewers, it's an enduring anthology format that I am happy to see endure. Maybe now is the right time to bring it to a close though.
I'm not going to run through the cast this time around, nor am I going to provide a summary of each main tale. Suffice to say that we get six stories given an oddly polished wraparound structure, with most of the individual segments revolving around dangerous encounters with alien creatures. One tale allows Kate Siegel to direct work written by her husband, Mike Flanagan. Another tale is written and directed by brothers Christian and Justin Long, the latter clearly taking inspiration from his 2014 horror collaboration with Kevin Smith.
Clocking in at just under 2 hours, the second-longest film in the series after the first, the biggest problem here is a pervading air of laziness, as well as a lack of imagination. What was once a fun aesthetic choice, using the retro feel to provide a twist on a number of well-worn horror genre tropes, now feels like it's just the result of people filming things with a filter you could find on a multitude of apps. And that's before we get to the special effects, that often feel like AI clip art, clumsily inserted into sequences that are akin to bits of silliness people could knock together with a basic bit of tech savviness and their smart phones.
As a brand name, for better or worse, the V/H/S series was a fairly easy way to allow film-makers to have some fun while perhaps pushing against the restrictions of the found-footage form. This still allows film-makers to have some fun, but there are no longer any restrictions, which leaves viewers saddled with inferior content that is supposed to be excused by the specific stylistic choice. The first main segment in this has a score pulsating beneath the visuals, for Chrissakes (something that I guess we're just supposed to acceopt because of the framing device, which just isn't good enough). Past V/H/S segments may have had the same mis-steps, whether in the audio department or in how the camera footage is edited together, but I cannot say for sure. All I can tell you is that things feel much worse here, and if we all just sit back and accept this, because it's better than nothing, then we'll be endorsing it, and encouraging them to keep making more.
Most anthology horror movies have at least one segment that works. This has one dud after another. If more care had been taken with the first main "tape" (Stork) then I would have at least mentioned that as a highlight, but it is all undone by the extra editing and soundtrack choices that undermine it.
Not one I can recommend, in case you were in any doubt, and the absolute nadir of the series . . . so far.
3/10
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