June (2015) Reviews

• Poor script, good cinematography

  equazcion2015-10-06

  An infant named June is imbued with a powerful spirit by her parents' cult of Satan worshipers. She bounces around the foster care system as the evil periodically overtakes her to mysteriously hurt people around her. June is a risky mix of classic horror and slow artsy cinematography. The shots are often quite beautiful, and the acting is passable. The flick is nevertheless ruined by a pedestrian and predominately unoriginal script, with cheesy and obvious borrowed elements from Carrie and The Omen (among others), while falling short of providing any true scares. Dollar-store music and visual effects also clash hard with its otherwise artsy ambitions.

• It's not bad but it's not good either.

  iam_theeridan2018-04-26

  June isn't terrible, but it's also not anything special. Decent acting, overused plot, and subpar effects. A lot of what happens in the movie doesn't even seem relavent to the main story. It's all just glossed over, and never really goes in depth about anything which leads up to the climax being pretty anticlimactic and rushed. It makes for decent background noise at the very least.

• Not Even Remotely Science Fiction

  in19842015-11-25

  2.9 of 10. Whoever at IMDb is responsible for classifying this as science fiction should be fired and permanently banned from the site. This is little more than the typical satanic cult, possessed child horror film, neither of which are scary and have not been remotely scary or horror-like for decades. Just variations on the same stupid crap so that it's not even original. The basic FX and filming manages to make the stereotypical eyes going black/red seem realistic enough. Part of the story involving the orphaned child having difficulty finding stable adopted parents and family is interesting and keeps it from being completely valueless, but there's no science or extrapolated future going on here other than the cult planning for the end-times and the child being the demon possessed bringer of them telling she/it doesn't like what will happen. The film doesn't do much other than maybe provide scares and drama for very, very simple minds and serve to setup a sequel/series, which hopefully never happens.

• "Firestarter" mixed with "Carrie" and a bit of "The Exorcist". The result is this not so original movie.

  peterp-450-2987162016-01-06

  "Stop it, Aery. Why are you doing this? You are a vessel. Before people, before machines, there is only us." Mix the ingredients from several successful films and you get as end result something like "June". It's not terribly bad, but it isn't very original and exciting either. Even the biggest coward can effortlessly watch this film with all the lights off. "June" is the least creepy horror I've ever seen. Do you remember Drew Barrymore as Charlie in "Firestarter", the sweet girl who could cause a fire just by thinking of it? Or Carrie in the eponymous film who sow the seeds of death and destruction when she was p*ssed off? June (Kennedy Brice) has similar, telekinetic powers when she gets angry. Or is there a demonic force at work making her as possessed as Regan in "The Exorcist"? Eventually, it all has to do with a primal force called "Aer", which took possession of June during an occult rite. A rite that wasn't finalized perfectly. During that ceremony June was taken away by one of the participants at the last minute. Lets start with the positive remarks. Although it clearly is a low-budget film, there are still some successful fragments. First there's the changing appearance of June. In particular her eyes. Not that it's innovative, but it reinforced her demonic character. As well as the limited number of scenes where we can witness June's strength. Like for example at the barbecue. But above all, I had great admiration for the young actress Brice. There wasn't much dialogue for her. Probably because of her rather timid and introverted personality. But in general she looked really natural as a young, fragile girl who has to deal with her inner demon. An everyday struggle, attempting to maintain control. What remains is simply doom and gloom. The shown ritual at the beginning looks really kitschy and when the cult members call upon Aer to take possession of June and this power descends, it just looks as if the wisps of smoke are pasted on the image. Terrible special effects in other words. And there were a few situations that really annoyed me. Firstly, apparently the conditions to be suitable as adoptive family, are abominably bad when you look at the first family. An asocial family with a fat guy resembling Onslow (from Keeping Up Appearances) and a cigarette smoking bimbo who probably works as a prostitute. Compared to them, Lily Anderson (Victoria Pratt) and Dave Anderson (Casper van Dien) are outright saints who radiate comprehensive affection. They're impatient to take on the task of caring father and mother. Perhaps a little overdone because already the first night they start asking June the pertinent question whether or not she wants to call Lily her "Mommy". With disappointed looks as a result of course. This was totally implausible and totally stupid. But especially the storyline is a huge disappointment. Nothing spectacular happens so to speak. The end of the film is so trivial, I can't even remember what it was anyway (perhaps I fell asleep). So if you never saw "Carrie", "Firestarter", "The Exorcist" or any other film whatsoever with a possessed, demonic character who has control over psychic powers, then you should definitely give this one a chance. More reviews here : http://bit.ly/1KIdQMT

• Not bad, but could have been better.

  emberstonepierce2015-10-25

  To be fair, I've seen a lot worse films. This is a supernatural thriller which takes its influences from films such as 'Carrie', 'Bless the Child' and 'The Omen' so don't expect to see much originality. The acting's not bad but the script leaves a lot to be desired - I guess you can only work with what you're given. The narrative is rather simple and brings nothing new to the genre, however the cinematography is superb and a joy to watch. It's entertaining enough as movies go, but I can't help feeling that it could have been so much better. You're never going to make a film as beloved as the classics (The Omen, Rosemary's Baby etc) but with a more interesting plot, that stands up on its own, things could have been greatly improved.