Encounter (2016) Reviews

• Encounter

  jpq-893322016-08-21

  I have actually never rated a horror movie lower than 5 on here due to the infallible rating system that IMDb relies on. However, in this case I could not actually sit still to watch this movie. As an avid lover of horror movies, I believe that the "Hollywood" part of the genre has taken what the indie type films have managed to salvage. Rarely, has Hollywood taken a premise and made it better; unfortunately, for this film this is one of those rare occasions. Encounter starts off with the usual trope of newlywed couple, dedicated spouse (usually groom) to filming or capturing some paranormal activity, a dedicated, but skeptical spouse and some sort of paranormal entity. As the movie progresses, it's likening to Paranormal Activity becomes very obvious (even with the found footage type of film). What makes the film unwatchable, to me, is the lack of depth in character development. The landlord is creepy and weird enough and while he has some spotlight, not enough information went into his development. The couple becomes annoying after the first half and the plot takes waaaaaaaaaaay too long to progress. The movie is less than 90 minutes, but it could be completed in 50 and would've been a far better project. Recommendation: watch on Netflix or some other movie website but don't pay for this. Prepare your patience in advance and don't get your hopes up. Good Luck!

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• Do NOT Encounter this movie!!!!

  toyman19672017-02-22

  What a HUGE waste of time this was!!! First off, I HATE found footage movies and when I found out that this was one, I should have NOT watched it. It is slow, boring and NOTHING happens!!! Then just when I thought it was about supernatural happenings, it turns into an alien flick. This is by far the WORST movie I have EVER watched and I have watched A lot of BAD movies. I kept falling asleep and having to rewind to see if I missed anything...............I didn't and you wont either if you skip this ROTTEN movie!!!

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• I GOT NO WHERE TO HIDE

  nogodnomasters2018-04-22

  Quick plot spoiler review. Found Footage. San Luis Obispo farm house. Study Orbs. Suicide. Seance. Aliens. Crop circles. Don Scribner- good. Justin Arnold- bad. Andrea Nelson- eye candy. . Don't bother. Guide: F-word. No sex or nudity on their honeymoon.

• Spoilers follow ...

  parry_na2016-06-20

  Possibly the least welcoming landlord ever, Jim (Don Scribner), shows a likable newlywed couple Lauren (Andrea Nelson) and Ted (Justin Arnold), around his spacious house. They are renting a room from him, he tells them they look like good kids and that his family is dead. To him. In the way of such things, the couple are not tempted to take back their deposit and find somewhere - anywhere - else, and Ted's studies into 'orbs' necessitate he decks the area out with cameras, Paranormal Activity-style. When the inevitable strange sounds keep the couple awake at night, Ted has a word with Jim, who is sitting in silence in the kitchen, cleaning a shotgun. Still the newlyweds are disinclined to leave, even after Jim's later suicide attempt. The acting here is exemplary. Nelson (who bears a marked resemblance to Elsa Lanchester in certain scenes) and Arnold display a believable chemistry, with Ted's usually placid personality stretched to the limit. Lauren is more pragmatic. She suggests a séance, which appears merely to exacerbate the hauntings. Only when both of them have been marked with the same sign that afflicted the departed Jim does Ted look up the residence on the internet to find strange things have long since been happening – cattle stripped of their reproductive organs, tongues etc. We then appear to come full circle, with Lauren waking up in darkness, in a field, in a scene which opened the film (the rest happening in flashback). A weird dislocated scene in which shadowed aliens appear to be delivering Lauren's child aside, there are no special effects here. Illogical events like their decision not to leave, and the impossibility of some climactic scenes being filmed (when until that point, the film is very much of the found-footage school) never fail to rankle, yet much else about 'Encounter' is extremely good – the claustrophobic setting, the performances, the gentle ramping up of strange happenings. The ending, which is open-ended in the extreme, is either exasperating, or highly powerful, depending on your point of view. In a reversal of 'The Blair Witch Project (1999)', interviews with residents, shedding possible light on events, appear at the close, rather than at the beginning, providing a retrospective assessment of Lovecraftian possibilities. Very enjoyable.

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