Dark Summer
Dark Summer
| 09 January 2015 (USA)
Dark Summer Trailers

Follows the tale of a 17-year-old on house arrest for the summer. When his mother is away on business, a horrifying incident occurs, followed by an even more terrifying presence in the house.

Reviews
Greenes Please don't spend money on this.
Keeley Coleman The thing I enjoyed most about the film is the fact that it doesn't shy away from being a super-sized-cliche;
Kamila Bell This is a coming of age storyline that you've seen in one form or another for decades. It takes a truly unique voice to make yet another one worth watching.
Bob This is one of the best movies I’ve seen in a very long time. You have to go and see this on the big screen.
thelastblogontheleft Keir Gilchrist, who I typically love (he was great in It Follows and United States of Tara, where I was first introduced to him), plays Daniel in this supernatural horror/thriller, a bit of a hacker who is under house arrest for cyberstalking his classmate and love interest, Mona (played by Grace Phipps). Things start to get spooky after he watches her commit suicide and his friends Abby (Stella Maeve) and Kevin (Maestro Harrell) are worried about his safety — and his sanity — as he spirals into a pretty dangerous mental state and fears for his own life.Honestly… meh. This movie didn't offer much. It occasionally had some interesting atmosphere but ultimately it was just boring. I thought the premise — Daniel being stuck in his home while one might normally run the hell away — was interesting initially, but the scares were just too cheesy and predictable to really have any serious effect.I may have audibly yawned when it's revealed early on that his friend Abby has this unrequited love for him. It winds up being crucial to the storyline in the surprise ending, but it was just predictable. His either complete obliviousness to the painfully obvious or inability to voice his emotions just fits right into the whole stereotype of the teenager who is textbook smart (able to hack into computers, etc) but emotionally stunted.I thought the dream that Daniel had of him and Abby in the pool was cool, and sort of fit into the atmosphere that I WISH this movie had. It was like a weird offspring of hazy, dreamlike indie movie and cheap teen thriller. There were a couple good, creepy moments — his phone going blank and playing "When" by Elysian Fields, for example — but largely the scares fell flat, especially any time they showed Mona. I would have much rather she be kept more vague and shadowy, or not physically appearing at all.But then suddenly we descend inexplicably into the world of witchcraft and spells and while there's a decent surprise ending, it was too far gone for me at that point. Even Peter Stormare couldn't save this one with his painfully stereotypical parole officer role. Booo.
morrison-dylan-fan Coming up to the final days of the IMDb boards October Horror Challenge,I decide to look for an easy going title that I could view for the challenge on Netflix.Taking a look at the titles on Netflix,I spotted a movie which had a short and sweet running time,which led to me getting ready to see the sun go down on Summer.The plot:Caught attempting to hack into the online accounts of Mona Wilson whilst his mum is on holiday, Daniel is caught,and quickly put under house arrest.Banned from owning a computer, Daniel gets his friends Abby and Kevin to bring a laptop round,whilst welfare officer Stokes keeps a close eye on Daniel. Logging on,Daniel gets a surprise invite from Wilson for a video chat. Accepting the offer,Daniel is met by the sight of Wilson killing herself with a shotgun.Shaken by the "on air" suicide,Daniel soon discovers to his horror that he has not left Wilson's sight.View on the film:For the screenplay of the film, Mike Le attempts to blend Supernatural Horror with Teen Drama.Whilst Le allows Wilson to hit out with some ghostly shocks,Le is disappointingly unable to build any dramatic tension in the battle between the trio and Wilson,due to keeping the events which led to Daniel and Wilson crossing paths rather vague.Despite the pretty teen cast giving rather flat performances, Peter Stormare gives the title a much needed slice of gristle as Stokes,with Stormare giving Stokes a real snappy nature in catching Daniel out.Covering Daniel's house in reflected mirrors,director Paul Solet & cinematographer Zoran Popovic give the film an elegant, stylised appearance,as sharp shots of light dart across the screen making Wilson's presence known. Backed by a humming Industrial score from Austin Wintory,Solet cleverly uses the mirrors to deliver reflecting tracking shots on the corners of the house,as Daniel tires to stop his Summer from ending.
a_baron Daniel is 17 years old and a self-recognised creep. After hacking into a girl's on-line accounts she commits suicide in front of his eyes. This would be enough to freak anybody out, but it also lands him under house arrest, alone while his parents are away. The conditions include no on-line activity, period. And of course this edict is immediately ignored. He has a couple of friends who hook up with him, but the dead girl, Mona Wilson, returns to haunt him big time. Any suggestion this haunting is all in his head is dispelled by the exorcism the three hold in which supernatural happenings are on the menu. Now what? The two others investigate the apartment where Mona committed suicide, while Daniel stays put and does some research. This film ends very badly, and very suddenly, which is a pity because it promised a lot more, even though it was made with a small cast and an even smaller budget.
DreamBliss I checked the spoiler box but I will still attempt to be as vague as possible. I will start by saying that movie not only suffers from a bad ending, it is unnecessarily bad. Very much like the ending of Jeeper's Creepers where we end up looking through the poor kid's freshly hollowed out head.There are no ghosts here and little of anything scary. IFC midnight has completely, utterly failed. It is all about possession with a twist that nobody cares about. If you have seen any one of the last few thousand possession movies released in the last few decades, movies with trailers that lead you to believe there are ghosts or a haunting involved, then you already know what this one is all about.I will never recommend staying away from a movie unless it is so utterly bad that it has absolutely no redeeming qualities. This movie, I am sorry to say, is one of those movies. Even Jeeper's Creepers had something going for it, making it worth the ride. This one has a few unique things, but ultimately, it is not worth watching at all.You should only watch this if you like possession type movies with excessively bad endings. You have been warned!