The Haunting of Helena (2012) Horror Tooth Fairy Ghost

  The Haunting of Helena (2012) - This Italian product from One More Pictures in Italy, has a complex plot with a twist ending that should make it a winner. Why it is not really a winner in my eyes will take some explaining. The plot is not to be complained about here. A young girl at the point of losing her first baby tooth gets haunted by a ghost who is looking to regain her own teeth that were pulled out in a horrific crime. The film does a decent job of feeding us the back story of Battista Greco a violent man who pulled all the teeth from his wife's mouth and left her to die in a closet. She, The Ghost uses the timing of little Helena's first tooth loss to start haunting the girl and her Mother Sophia. Now there have been a couple other instances where the plot of a vengeful spirit goes after the teeth of children. In Darkness Falls (2003) Falsely blamed for a couple dead children, a good woman is burned to death and her curse is to come and retrieve the last baby tooth a child in the town loses. If you don't look at her you are okay but...  The other is The Tooth Fairy (2006) where a child on vacation learns of the local tooth fairy myth but the myth comes for her teeth. This film is different enough in origin story for it to not seem like a rip off.
  The first act of this film is all about that haunting. Sophia (Harriot MacMasters-Green) and Helena (Sabrina Jolie Perez) move into an apartment after Sophie leaves her husband Robert (Jarreth J. Merz). This is a creepy old house with a creepy old man Mr Ferri (Paolo Paoloni) in the neighboring apartment. When Helena loses her first baby tooth her Mom tells her about the tooth fairy and plans to make the tooth disappear replace by a coin. When she attempts this the little girl is awake and says the tooth fairy already came. The mystery deepens when Helena is caught at school buying other children's teeth for old coins. She insists that the coins are from the tooth fairy and that she wants Helena to get her more teeth.  Mr Ferri fills in some information talking to Sophie about the murder that happened in the house. Battista Greco (Marco Fattibene) killed his wife after pulling out  and hiding all of her teeth. He locked her in a closet until she died. Could the ghost of his wife be the tooth fairy. There is quite a bit of spooky and the monotone music is sometimes overbearing playing stingers even when there is no reason for them. When the ghost arrives in the apartment and comes for teeth Sophie does what any normal people would do and flees with her daughter. It actually is a decently staged scene with a piano in the way and the creepy ghost closing in. We are a third of the way through the movie and this is a major climax. Through out the film the music is scary serious and because of it there is this pall over the whole film. It could be that I noticed the stronger music by Michele Josia, when it swelled but there really was very little action connected to it. It seemed more that a mood was being created and that mood was seriously ominous.
  The second act takes place eighteen months later in an adult psychiatric ward of a hospital. Little Helena has not spoken since the frightening events and Mom is naturally so concerned that hospitalizing her seemed necessary. In this act we have a horrible trope come to life, where we are asked to consider if Sofie is actually a crazy person and all of this is in her head. To get there the Writer/Director Christian Bisceglia in a shared directing credit with Ascanio Malgarini brings back Robert to be the antagonist, being absent on all this time he really only serves to question his former wife's sanity. When Sofie calls him an asshole he responds "I would rather be an asshole than be crazy". It is not clear whether Sofie is a patient too or just staying with her daughter. She is seeing a psychiatrist who adds to the theme around her sanity, revealing that Sofie's Mother killed herself in a psychiatric hospital. This section culminates with her doubting herself "I might be the fairy?"  The end of the act has a great reference to Poltergeist (1982) when Sofie and Helena are watching television and the screen goes to static, and Helena says "She's back Mom."
  The final act not only clears up Sofie's bad relationship but fills in the all the details of the crime that created the tooth fairy ghost. Robert probably should not have stayed around and I'll leave it to your imagination as to why. There is a full story here so be prepared for a long climax where we learn to get rid of the ghost Sofie has to find her teeth for her, not any teeth will do. This draws her back to the apartment building and creepy Mr Ferri oh but there is so much more. Several really effective scare scenes featuring the little girl and her father actually make this film interesting. after what you think is the films climax you get a twisty twist that takes the film in another direction. I won't spoil that here since this is one of those films on the fine line of a recommendation. There are drawbacks though, something about the single tone of the music and the pacing of the directing make the film feel slower than the plot development would make you think it should be. The cinematography by Antonello Emidi is pretty stagnant also it seems to be stationary most all the time. This could be the director's call so I would not put it totally on him. He is an experience technician with a varied list of credits on IMDB.  Listen I am not an expert at this stuff but there is just something a bit off in the presentation. So I am on the line about this film, I found it to be a bit less than I hoped but there are things in it of real horror value. You make the call.
  

The Children (2008) Revisited Horror Christmas

The Children (2008) - REVISITED! As a virus infects the children of a couple families having Christmas together the sick children get pretty evil and begin to kill the adults. I noticed the  character's relationships a bit more this time through. The visiting family of Mother Elaine (Eva Birthistle) has a young adult daughter Casey (Hannah Tointon) and a young boy, Paulie (William Howes) who I have to say is a real Mama's boy, from an earlier relationship, Her husband Jonah (Stephen Campbell Moore) also has a child from a previous relationship a little girl named Miranda (Eva Sayer). It is obviously not the perfect nuclear family but they seem to be making it work. This is to contrast Elaine's sister Chloe (Rachel Shelley) who has a sucessful husband Robbie (Jeremy Sheffield) and two children Leah (Rafiella Brooks) and Nicky (Jake Hathaway). The dynamics between the sisters is some what interesting as sister relationships are in real life. The younger, Elaine seems a bit put off by her more successful older sister. She seems to have the perfect house and husband. They are both already retired in their forties after selling a company. They live in a large beautiful house and Chloe is portrayed as a know it all when it comes to raising children. There is the conflict between couples about permissive upbringing versus strict rules based child rearing. Robbie is a tall successful and handsome man who now spends his days investing his money and living a life of leisure. He is the cool uncle but really comes across a bit creepy when he interacts with the Casey. There is also the dynamic of how unsuccessful Jonah is, he is a schemer trying to hit it big. It is revealed that he has been scammed in the past and is not great at choosing his opportunities. He is hoping to sell some Chinese medicine scheme to Robbie but gets cut off each time. It all works to create a tension that is wonderfully under the surface of the weekend.
Then there is the fundamental disbelief the parents have when the harm starts. Of course as a parent there is no way you are going to think your child is trying to kill you. This movie co-ops the fear that behind the innocent faces there is evil waiting to strike. The underlying tension also comes to the surface also which is really well done. It makes it difficult for the parents and Casey as the adults to join together to deal with the situation. In fact the parents can never think that the children are responsible for acts of violence. Where most of the damage at first happens when adults are isolated from one another it the makes then think each other are negligent for the apparent accidents that are happening.
When I think of evil children the movie that comes to mind is "Children of the Corn". It is a more overt film with the theme being right out there from the beginning. The children killing the adults of the town is one of the first scenes and you know from the start what will happen. In The Children" The process is slower and the immediate danger is not there, but the threat grows as more of the kids get infected. The film is effective at not letting the parents catch on too quickly and even though the Casey seems onto the games of the kids. Being the younger than the parents but older than the children she is not really listened to by the adults when she knows something is wrong. In fact she is seen as not helping enough early on and then becomes distrusted as the possible killer later.
There are not too many ways this plot can go so.  What it does is builds a series of mishaps to the adults who think that negligence and accidents are to blame. Then as more evidence that it is the children comes to the fore they start to turn on each other. The children on the other hand use their relationships with their parents to do the maximum damage. It becomes a fight for the parents to deal with a threat from the most innocent beings they know.
During the film you wonder what the hell, why are the police and ambulance not responding. It in the end can be cleverly explained though.  There is also a great twist between Elaine and Jonah that I did not see coming. It really is a cold blooded change that fits one of the characters pretty well. When the last couple of survivors try to get away what will they be running to? You will have to watch it to find out. There is this one final scene that the staging of I have to say I don't really like. You come across the a situation and you are in the protected inside of a car. Do you ever leave that safety to check a scene out? I say no! but over and over again in horror film it is necessary for the tension to have someone get out of the car and investigate something.
Writers Paul Andrew Williams and Tom Shankland (who also directed) do a good job making this a believable story and the horror of parents being attacked and having to defend themselves against there children is chilling. The directing was sharp enough to build a believable survival story. There is that one thing though, when is it when the people are in a car and see what looks like a dangerous scene, one or both of them have to get out of the car to investigate? I can see early in a film but late in a movie when the characters already know there is a ton of danger. Watching this film for a second time I was impressed with the construction of the characters and the blocking of the incidents so that the reactions of the adults were somewhat believable. In the end I think I liked this film more on a second viewing. If there is one drawback I would critique it on is one of the characters totally seems to give up at one point even though fighting would not be that hard. I just hate that in a character.
Rating (6.6) 5.0 and up are recommended, some more recommended than others.

The Children (2008) - Horror virus

The Children (2008) - Children of the snow. As a virus infects the children of a couple families having Christmas together the sick children get pretty evil and begin to kill the adults. There is not a lot more plot than this really. There is the conflict between couples about permissive upbringing versus strict rules based child rearing. There is the teenage girl sort of flirting with her aunts husband and his creepy acceptance of it. Then there is the fundamental disbelief the parents have when the harm starts. Of course as a parent there is no way you are going to think your child is trying to kill you. This movie co-ops the fear that behind the innocent faces there is evil waiting to strike. When my daughter was small 3 or so I had this dream that I awoke and heard her little feet pattering out of our room. Strange I thought and got up to follow her, the apartment we had could be circled in going room to room. I would hear the patter and follow only to not see her. Then I entered the kitchen after the footsteps, flicked on the lights. Joy was up on a chair reaching enough to pull a butcher knife out of the block. When the light went on I only saw this in a glimpse as she push it back in quickly and leaned to the sink saying, "dwink, water". The whole dream was wrapped in a feeling of being a bit afraid. This is what this film does. The parents can never quite be sure what is going on. There is a threat but it is from the least likely to cause it.
When I think of evil children the movie that comes to mind is "Children of the Corn". It is a more overt film with the theme being right out there from the beginning. The children killing the adults of the town is one of the first scenes and you know from the start what will happen. In The Children" The process is slower and the immediate danger is not there, but the threat grows as more of the kids get infected. The film is effective at not letting the parents catch on too quickly and even though the teenager seems onto the games of the kids. Being the teen she is not really listened to by the adults and in fact becomes distrusted as the possible killer.
There are not too many ways this plot can go so I was waiting for the reveal that the problem was not just an isolated incident but a worldwide epidemic. When the last couple of survivors try to get away what will they be running to? Will they escape and infected zone or just be heading into new terrors? You will have to watch it to find out.
Writers Paul Andrew Williams and Tom Shankland (who also directed) do a good job making this a believable story and the horror of parents being attacked and having to defend themselves against there children is chilling. The directing was sharp enough to build a believable survival story. There is that one thing though, when is it when the people are in a car and see what looks like a dangerous scene, one or both of them have to get out of the car to investigate? I can see early in a film but late in a movie when the characters already know there is a ton of danger.
The acting was solid with Eva Birthistle and Rachel Shelly as adult sisters, Stephen Campbell Moore and Jeremy Sheffield as the husbands, and the lovely Hannah Tointon as the teenager Casey. Oh and one more thing, Blue Crayon!
Rating (6.2) 5.0 and up are recommended in the Zombiegrrlz rating system I would say Rent It!