Don't Knock Twice (2016) Horror Demon

Don't Knock Twice (2016) - Oh what a twisty tale we tell of the supernatural work interacting with the real world.  Jess (Katee Sackoff) is an artist who in the past did not take care of Chloe. She was a addicted artist who was not keeping her life together. Chloe (Lucy Boynton) is now a teen / young adult who is not so sure she wants to come home and have a relationship. There is a lot of interpersonal development in the first forty five minutes of this film. We learn about Jess and her early life as a partying artist, her rough relationship with her husband Ben (Richard Mylan) a banker who spends way too much time away from home. Now that Jess who has become a successful artist wants to bring Chloe back home and get to know her again.  We see her working and she seems to be a good artist. Jess receives an eye amulet from a model Tira (Pooneh Majimohammadi) who is posing for her.  Seems like it is given to protect her so I guessed it was going to come into play later.  We explore every detail of Chloe and Jess's relationship through out the film in reams of exposition that eventually gets us to the two caring about each other?  will the mother who abandoned her daughter be able to save her from the witch who knocks twice.
  Now how Chloe gets back to Jess is where we get some of the story that is supernatural. She and her friend Danny talk about a local witch who steals children. You can go to her house and knock on the door twice and the witch will come and get you. It will knock on your door twice before it takes you.    Unexplained is why Chloe on the dare knocks on that door of that witch even though she knows about a disappearance. Danny her boyfriend does it also and then gives her a good scare.   We see the witch in action because Danny was the first to knock on screen.  Drifting rotating camera as we move to Danny's apartment. He is woken from sleep frightened. Two knocks at his door, he goes slowly to the door and looks through the peephole at an empty hall then the lights go out. The far end the light goes on and there is a female shape "Danny" She is coming for him. He is afraid but lights and then a call on his computer its Chloe. When she steps away from the computer he is raised in the air by a mysterious force. Hurt and dragged through the open door behind him. She returns and he is not there, but a flash of some kind of gruesome face scares her before it too disappears.
She now can't get in touch with him.
  After establishing that the supernatural is real we eventually get to the story behind it. Chloe finds a myth Baba Yaga to explain what is going on.  "Evil hag, Dark Mother, she is the most evil kind of demon. she opens a doorway between hell and the world of men so she can devour the innocent. The demon's power are limited so she needs the help of a human slave or a cursed soul to do her bidding here on earth. you can tell who the human slave is because the demon marks them." (Just so happens to be the pendent Jess is wearing.) When you knock the 1st knock raises the demon the second summons the human slave. And the only way the human slave can be free of the demon is if they kill themselves, or if they trick someone else into replacing them by forcing them to do something truly evil. Tira, who gave her the amulet meets Chloe and is immediately anxious  and wants to leave.  "Be Careful Jess. You can't help her. She belongs to someone else, there is a darkness around her. Trust me Jess I know about these things. She's marked by something terrible."  Again the exposition to get to this place is really long and a bit tedious.
  Danny is missing so detective Boardman (Nick Moran) comes around to see if Chloe is okay.  Danny and Chloe were at the children's home with another boy Michael Flowers who went missing. They got it into there then 9 yr old heads that it was the red headed old lady Mary Aminov and went to her house night after night knocking on her door. The old lady couldn't take it anymore and killed herself. He does not believe it and thinks Danny and Chloe had something to do with that. Now he does not believe her about Danny.  The way he interacts with the women it sheds doubt on the sanity of Chloe making it harder for Jess to buy into the supernatural aspects of her story.
The detective is outside staring at the old house by the highway where Mary once lived so it the slave the detective or Jess. Jess could be the red herring in this one. They back this red herring up with scenes that make Jess doubt Chloe and her story before the two women start having shared eerie experiences. This certainly changes the tone of the film.
 Scary scene where lights go out, Jess outside at the time and Chloe is alone in the house. after locking the door behind her she finds it open but when she goes to enter some force pushes the door against her. Chloe looking around the house while Jess with a large knife is stalking the house for strangers. "Run" Chloe hears the whisper. Mary passes in the background. Neither Mom or daughter hear each other. Lights on and off let us know ghosts are about. Hiding in the bedroom the demon leaves the clothes cabinet to get Chloe. Jess saves her at the last minute pushing through the door. Lights suddenly On. Jess says there is no one in there. They take all the doors out of the house and burn them which seem a reasonable response to an actual haunting where the being knocks on the door.
As the supernatural events expand and the women share them they go to Tira for help about it and she suggests  Mary was accused of a crime she did not commit, and was driven to suicide. Chloe helped spread that lie and now Mary wants revenge. Clear Mary's name and the curse may end. Chloe runs from this encounter. Jess calls the cop for info, With Mother's intuition to guide her she seeks the truth. At her studio she finds a box inside is Michael Flowers posters a profile of Mary and the interrogation of Mary on a memory stick. The cop is being super hard on her accusing her of the disappearance. So is he the bad guy?
  The film is a bit of a twisty twist and so not to give away the ending we should stop talking about the rest of the plot in detail. The women seek a way to save Chloe from the demon but there is a big and strange climax that leaves the viewer scratching his head. When all is said and done we have a resolution but it is not what the film seemed to be moving towards. Now I would normally really like that but in this case it was so exposition heavy to get to that point that I don't think it worked as well for me as it should. The ending which leaves more questions than answers was not as satisfying as I wished.  Then there were the weird things like Jess oddly appearing before the board of people at the group home to discuss what happens next as far as her daughter staying with her. The odds were already against that but the interpersonal dynamics are driven repeatedly home by Writers Mark Huckerby and Nick Ostler. Director Caradog W. James does a decent job with a complicated script. He manages the shot well and the scares have some tension in them.  I wish I liked the film more but it is not bad. More it is one of those films that just hits on some cylinders but not all.

The Banana Splits Movie (2019) Horror Evil Robots

The Banana Splits Movie (2019) - Being a child in the late sixties, early seventies I remember the Banana Splits variety show fondly. Fleegle the beagle dog, Bingo the ape, Drooper the Lion, and Snorky the elephant were a regular part of my childhood viewing. It was a variety show based a bit in structure like the show Rowan and Martin's Laugh In. The guys in animal suits who were musicians in a pop band by the same name also introduced different cartoon and live action segments. My favorite as I remember it was Danger Island. It was all good childhood fun as far as I was concerned. Designed by the famous Sid and Marty Krofft the costumes were similar to those I saw on another kids show, H.R. PufnStuf. The Banana Splits was fast paced and filled with commercials, the primary sponsor was Kelloggs cereal I am sure it did not muddle my brain too much. When I heard there was going to be a movie based on the show and that it was a horror movie I was thrilled. The Banana Splits costumes could be seen as a bit creepy, in fact a lot of what the Kroffts did was a bit "far out" (as we said in the 70s). So the idea of a horror movie featuring the quartet is not so unbelievable.
  In the film set in modern time is a world where the Banana Splits is still a show being aired on television, since 1969 and is still a popular show with kids. Harley (Finlay Wojtak-Hissong) is a kids who loves them and loves Snorky the best of all. He may be a bit old for the show but has yet to grow out of it. An isolated kid who is fatherless after a death he does not have many friends. The show seems to be his life. His family is dysfunctional, with his Mom Beth (Dani Kind) who has had a 11 year relationship with Mitch (Steve Lund) he is a bit of an ass if you ask me. Not really bought into the idea of somebody else's children as his even after more than a decade. She chose a safe route after her husband died and will regret it soon enough. The nineteen year old Austin (Romero Carere) is her other child who has a good heart but sees right through Mitch. For Harley's birthday the family goes to see a Banana Splits live taping and that is the setup to where things go horribly wrong.
  Unlike the real show in this reality the Banana Splits characters are not men in suits but instead complex robots who perform the show. We see early on that a failed software update in Drooper leads to him having little red lights in his eyes. This can only mean evil right?  The software command when they turned that color was "The Show Must Go On!" which also gives an indication as what it to follow. Added to the mix is the character Stevie a human adult who sort of plays the foil for the robots. He hates his job and when he learns that the show is being cancelled he seems elated. After setting up some stuff about getting backstage to meet the robots and introducing the peripheral characters, um victims we move into what is essentially a slasher film. 
  When the computer virus spreads to all the robots it is just a bit of time before the show ends and it is time for the meet and greet you start to get the idea that those in that group are going to be in some trouble. The slashing and smashing starts behind the scenes with isolated characters getting offed by the robots. The character driven story features Harley and his family it is shaped just enough to get you through the slasher movie. It all works for what it is, but possible it could have been possible to get a bit more humor into the script. Its a tough line though between the tension of a slasher and trying to hit the comedic notes that the show would bring into play. There is some pretty decent special effects including decapitation, characters being run over, cut in half etc. It all culminates with the defective robot making the show go on in the most deadly way. Beth works hard to protect her children and end the killing learning that although she can't save everyone she can use her agency in the time of crisis.
  I don't want to say to much more since this is sort of a fun feature especially for anyone one who loved the original show. It is amazing how creepy those big suits are when they are just a little bit aggressive. Writers Jed Elinoff and Scott Thomas hit a lot of great notes balancing the slasher aspects of the film with the family melodrama. Both writers have an imdb pages full of children's and preteen writing gigs and I love the idea that they had these dark thoughts about what was a wholesome, cereal selling cartoonish characters. The Director Darnishka Esterhazy really gets the tension in a slasher and keeps the pacing solid throughout the film. So viewers young and old will probably enjoy this film and I certainly recommend it.