Grave Encounters was a film that I now use as a marker of
which to compare these found footage films and so it was no real surprise that
there would be a sequel. The problem is that with anything that goes down well
with an audience is just how is the sequel going to go down. The film starts
with people reviewing Grave Encounters as a film and this reminds me of the
Blair Witch Project 2 when they basically admit that first one was a film and
it went downhill because of it so I was worried that we would be going down the
same road. The first fifteen minutes are totally pointless as we are forced to
sit through party where the lead guy Alex is throwing up and the rest of the
characters come across as totally annoying.
The film tries to show that the first Grave Encounters is a film by referring
to other found footage films such as Blair Witch Project, Paranormal Activity
and most recently Apollo 18.
There was a nice moment where Alex is talking on the web cam
and his mouth starts to open up like it did in the first film. After spending
what seems like an age with a stupid fake horror film they find evidence that
the film was in fact real and they decide to go to Canada to where it was
flmed. It takes 36 mind numbing minutes to get to this moment but when the
action does move to the hospital then it really picks up. I found the Ouija
board bit to be a bit cliché and thought that it was a bit of a dud moment and
thought that Alex was an idiot from start to finish.
The deaths in this film are impressive. It’s clear that this
film has a bigger budget compared to the first one and its been used to good
effect. Something that got carried over
from the first one but done better was the exit not being what we think it is.
When they exit the hotel and enter the lift it seems like something is up when the
maid we see the cast walk past is acting strangley but when they exit the lift
they find themselves back in the hospital which is slightly similar to the
first film but I didn’t see it coming to be fair. It seemed odd that they got
out in the first place so I suppose a smarter person would have seen it coming
but I didn’t and thought that it was well achived.
The big surprise was the return of Sean Rogerson who was
last seen lobotomised at the end of the first film. He thinks that he has been
living in that hospital for nine months but has infact been there for nine
years and is trying to get out. There is a strange door that appears in the
basement and the drama centres around this and I found as I found the new
characters to be annoying that I really wanted Sean to get out and he does but
its like something out of the twilight zone where a massive portal opens up in
the wall and he gets sucked through. No idea what was going on or whether he
survives but I guess that its some sort of closure for the character. Alex’s
murdering of the blonde girl was possibly the most gruesome of all the deaths in
the film as it was very graphic and it doesn’t hide from that. The final scene where Alex is sitting with the bloke who was ‘responsible’ for the first film and I thought that it was a bit of subdued ending and not quite the one that I would have gone for but to be honest it’s not the worst ending that a found footage film has come up with and I enjoyed the film enough to forgive them for it. Had it not been for the first 36 minutes that we got I would easily say that this was better than the first one but sadly because of what we got I have to say its just short of Grave Encounters 1. That said there was plenty in this film that I liked and found it to be bonkers, brilliant and scary.
Rating - 7/10
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