Totally put off by the whole movie-going experience anymore. An 8 pm showing for a rated R film and sure as shit... Couple of idiots walk in late. One leading a three year old toddler up the aisle, another toting an infant in a carrier. Seriously, the fucking Lorax is two screens down. Meh, typical date night in Cleveland.

So, I guess this is an American remake. Never saw the original. Elizabeth Olsen and her father are staying at the house they once lived in. Him and his brother are remodeling it. A friend stops by to see Elizabeth who she doesn't remember. Her friend remembers her well, though.

So her dad and her uncle get into a fight. The uncle takes off with the only car. They're left there and it's getting dark. The entire banter between Elizabeth and her father is weird from the get-go. He treats her like she's twelve. Hints at things to come.

Noises upstairs lead them to go investigate. Her father finds some polaroids someone left and quickly hides them from her. Then it kicks off. Daddy goes down and she's all alone. Someone else is in the house...

This was setup to look like one take did the entire movie. The camera angle never changes. Always follows her. I guess this is a cool concept, but it was a novelty that wore off quickly for me. Very shaky hand held camera that make me dizzy in theaters. Very, very shallow depth of field. Anything three feet behind who or what was being focused on, was already a blurr. Didn't work for me.

So Uncle returns. Locks Elizabeth in car and runs into house after grabbing gun. this is one of the two gripping scenes in the film. The "Lift gate Open" light blinks. The back door rises on its own. A man starts to climb in.

I'll admit, Elizabeth did a great job of showing fear and selling her part. I liked her.

Second gripping scene, after uncle gets taken down. All Elizabeth has to navigate her way back out of the house is a polaroid camera with a flash. This part was very well done and gives a couple of jumps.

Major Spoilers

Elizabeth's character is skitzo. She took out her father and her uncle because they used to sexually abuse her when she was a child. The girl she couldn't remember, was her alter ego. The polaroids were kiddy porn of her.

I can see why some critics mildly enjoyed this. I didn't hate it, i just don't like the skitzo scripts anymore because they're being done to death. Its an cheap way to mislead an audience IMO.

End Spoilers

I would wait for this one to come to blue ray. A couple of gripping scenes, but not worth the dough IMO. I would like to see the original now, though.

James

Damn...what a snoozer.

This is now streaming on Netflix, if anyone cares to check it out.

Well, I didn't like it. Too slow, too dark (as in lighting), and too much of a gimmick that probably screwed the movie over.

In case you didn't know, this is a remake of a low budget film that was shot in 1 continuous shot.  It appears that this entire movie is actually one continuous shot, but in reality, it's not - they said they shot basically 10 minute segments at a time then, edited everything together to look like 1 shot.

It's an interesting concept and at times, quite cool, but when it's all said and done, it's the reason this turns into a sleeping potion - we are forced to sit through everything that takes place, and it ain't a whole Hell of alot.

The twist is rather obvious as the film plods along.  It is scary at times if you can really get yourself into it, but that includes keeping yourself awake, and that's not an easy task here.

Elizabeth Olsen did a very good job, however and I was seriously impressed with her acting chops. She was the 1 believable thing in this movie.

So, to the makers of this, I say, good effort and very ambitious attempt at something new and unique, but it didn't succeed because of this.

Replay value here is about ZERO, so, again, tat equals failure in my book.

Movie itself was pretty 'eh'... although I did like Elizabeth Olsen's performance in it. I also enjoyed her in 'Martha Marcy May Marlene' and that was a better movie on the whole I think. She has the makings of a fantastic actress. Hopefully she gets some stellar material in the future.

Quoted from derekr Movie itself was pretty 'eh'... although I did like Elizabeth Olsen's performance in it. I also enjoyed her in 'Martha Marcy May Marlene' and that was a better movie on the whole I think. She has the makings of a fantastic actress. Hopefully she gets some stellar material in the future.

I highlighted that film. Really good indie from last year with John Hawkes (Winter's Bone)  and Hugh Dancy. It was a big deal in Sundance of 2011, scored high with critics. Liz is outshining her sister siblings...and next year we'll see her in the remake of Oldboy.

As for Silent House, it speaks volumes when an actor is still alright in a hokey movie.

Checked out the first 16 minutes. Nothing at all happened. Well, she did hear footsteps or something around the 16 minute mark.

I don't need blood or a car chase in that 16 minutes, but maybe something to keep my interest. Some interesting character with some entertaining lines maybe, some mystery. Anything.

There is the girl that she seemed to know but can't remember. A little mystery with that, but not compelling. Unless a shower love scene between the two of them is coming. Someone let me know if that happens, I'll finish the film.

This is not found footage, but it's shot like that, and it shows why FF has so much appeal to producers. It reduces a movie from, what, 40 or 50 shots?...to a series of long shots, in this case I guess weaved together to look like one. So the films cost next to nothing to make, guaranteeing they make money.

So I can respect what the producers are doing. And if these things are made basically for Netflix, then that's fine. It's not really my thing, but I can see the value in it.

Quoted from leitskev It reduces a movie from, what, 40 or 50 shots?...to a series of long shots, in this case I guess weaved together to look like one. So the films cost next to nothing to make, guaranteeing they make money. So I can respect what the producers are doing. And if these things are made basically for Netflix, then that's fine. It's not really my thing, but I can see the value in it.

Kev, I hear what you're saying, but you need to understand 2 important things here.

1)  Most movies have thousands of shots...or at least what appears to be thousands of shots, due to editing.

2)  Filming in very long shots or just downright continuous shots is not an easy task. Think about how many times shots are cut and reshot  due to this or that.  In these long 10 minute shots, you could be going along flawlessly and at 9 minutes 30 seconds, Elizabeth's left breast pops out into view, and you have to start from the very beginning again and reshoot the entire thing.

This was actually theatrically released.

If her breast pops out, I suggest they don't cut it. That would keep me watching.

Not sure if shot was the word I should use, but it's not scene either. Because a scene can be broken into shots.

When I say shots, I am not talking about every camera angle or insert. By shot I mean like, 'ok, this scene involves a shot in the lot where the drug exchange takes place'. There are not thousands of those.

But each on of those "shots" has to be set up with lights and sound, etc. There are usually 40 or 50 I believe( If there is someone here who has been on a feature film, maybe they can jump in here).

However, in a found footage, longer "shoots" means there are less of these shots to set up. And as setting up each shoot is very time consuming, this saves a ton of money. That's why FF is in such demand.

These are not my personal opinions, Jeff. I did a fair amount of research last year on FF, as you know. No one is saying it's easy, and in the case of this film, it took some labor intensive editing no doubt.

But it IS comparatively easy. Very much so. That's why it's done.

If I were trying to put together a film like this, I would aim for a theatrical release, knowing that if it failed to achieve that, you would still make money on DVD and Netflix because the cost was low. The guy who wanted to shoot my script last year was from distribution. That was his plan. He knew that you can't really lose money is it's low budget and you can get that kind of distribution.

I make no special claim to knowledge, this was all stuff that's available online. If there's anyone here who's been involved with shooting a feature, they might enlighten us.

Both of her breasts should have been exposed much of the movie, IMO.

Kev, I promise you, bro, I'm not trying to have a go or start anything here.  Serious!

I'm not really even arguing anythign you've said. but this has nothing to do with found footage...other than I guess the amount of hand held camera shots.

But, you also have to keep in mind that this "single all encompassing shot" is very difficult to pull off.  It's easier in a small, contained movie like this, obviously, but again, it ain't easy.

Even long tracking shots in bigger budget flicks are very difficult to pull off, as there's so much planning for each one and everything has to go right, or you start over again.

You can even take into account a scene of 2 peeps talking in which the camera never leaves.  Not easy to competently do, as every time 1 person makes a mistake, you have to start it up again.

Editing allows you to shoot all sorts shots, etc, and pick and choose which to use and how to edit them in.

I'm not saying editing is easy or cheap, but it allows you fix lots of things that can't be fixed without editing.

This is a remake of a Urugyuan film that was made in a single day for about $6000 and was shot on a DSLR camera.

It tried the old "continuous take" trick, but it was really like Hitchcock's Rope in that in was ten shots, with the edits hidden in darkness.

It got distribution after people liked the trailer they uploaded to the internet so much.

They said it was more of a test for the camera than an attempt to make a feature film...it's just fate had other ideas.

Judging on the same level as any other film, it was pretty damn weak (I've only seen the original). The vast majority is just a girl holding a lantern, looking at everything in the house in intimate detail.

It's strange that it was remade, I think. That being said the name of it is really intriguing and really puts you in the mind of watching a haunted house movie.

On an island with this one. Whilst I'd agree the ending felt a little tacked on, the slow burn horror is something that scores with me. That tension and feeling of limbo really intrigued me throughout. The film was three long shots that felt natural, as opposed to a gimmick. I'd be interested to catch the original. Not going to compare this to The Shining, obviously, but Kubrick captured that tension via very little action extremely well. Here they did a very good job in my eyes. No doubt it helps that horror is one of the genres I enjoy. Then again, I like pretty much every genre because I, like many here, just simply love the movies. It, of course, helps that Olsen is a top talent and bewitchingly beautiful.

Jeff, what it has to do with FF is this: long, continuous shoots. That's why FF is cheap to make. That's why it's in demand. Don't trust me: Google is our friend.

If that is not the reason why they used such shoots in this film, what is?

Kev, it was totally a concept thing, to make a movie that looks like 1 continuous shot.

What Rick said is 100% correct.

This has not been done very often, if ever.  Hitchcock's Rope was probably the first attempt, and it was not viewed as a success, most likely for the same reasons this was not.

I've only seen the original and knowing about the one-shot gimmick, kept looking for places they could have made the cuts.  I lost count I think of how many times they could (and probably did) do it.  It's so dark all time.

One shot or One hundred shots, I was still bored and watched the most of it on x2 speed because I couldn't wait for it to end. The end reveal was okay if I remember but wasn't worth the 80 mins it took to get there.

Speaking of one shots, anyone seen 'Russian Ark'?  Apparently that was done in a single take, but again I kept looking for a cheat rather than paying attention to the actual content of the film.

@Kev and Jeff,

You're both right.

Like everything in films there are no hard and fast rules. It is harder in some ways to film a ten minute or longer take (if you're trying to make it good) and it's not necessarily cheaper. You could shoot Avatar in a single take, theoretically.

However, due to the simple mechanics of only one lighting set up, and the fact that these types of films tend to be small scale...they are generally a lot cheaper than films shot with more coverage. Just as found footage films are generally a lot cheaper than conventional films...even if not necessarily so.

Maurice Devereaux's '$lasher$' (2001) was also designed to look like one take (although there were a couple hidden edits in darkness + a separately filmed intro ). It's a great movie for those who enjoy some horror cheese. I seem to remember him saying somewhere that the one shot-process was kind of a PITA compared to his standard shooting (for low budget anyway).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W9zX-eLQUU0