GRAVE ENCOUNTERS

Grave Encounters (2011)

Posted: 30 Dec 2011 02:46 PM PST

Directed and Written by: The Vicious Brothers
Cast: Sean Rogerson, Juan Riedinger, Ashleigh Gryzko, Mackenzie Gray, Merwin Mondesir

These days, it seems like you can't flip on the TV without seeing one of the "reality" shows about paranormal investigations; what started out as a relatively underground hobby that very few people took seriously has blossomed into a full-scale cultural phenomenon.

From the cheesy, scripted introductions to the predictable "oh my god, what was that?!" shrieks after every innocent sound, these shows provide both entertainment and sources of eye-rolling for audiences everywhere. For my part, I do believe in the afterlife, but I also don't think that most spirits are hanging around waiting to ham it up the minute a TV crew arrives.

The movie Grave Encounters has a pretty neat premise, all things considered. It's the tried-and-true formula of found-footage film but set within the boundaries of one of these paranormal research cable shows. Following the guidance of proven blockbusters like Paranormal Activity and The Blair Witch Project, the film casts mostly-unknown actors to enhance the realism and does not open with title credits. Instead, the film begins in a production office with a nervous-looking CEO sitting at a desk addressing an unseen camera man. He sets the scene by telling us that the show "Grave Encounters" had a very charismatic host, Lance Preston. Lance and his team of researchers wanted to investigate Collingswood Psychiatric Hospital, reputed to be one of the most haunted buildings in the world, and decided to film an episode while spending the night in the hospital. He informs us gravely that all of the footage we see is real and undoctored and has only been spliced together for ease of viewing, as it was taken from over seventy hours of raw footage found at the scene.

We meet the team, which consists of the calm and in-control Lance, the sassy punk girl Sasha, the wisecracking and cynical black man T.C., the histrionic and absurd "medium" Houston and the cute, awkward technical whiz kid Matt. The psychiatric hospital is a creepy locale: a huge sprawling property with only a groundskeeper and a gardener in sight. The groundskeeper assures them that it's haunted, citing that he sees things and that one window on the third floor refuses to stay latched overnight no matter what he does. The gardener, on the other hand, only sees ghosts after receiving a twenty-dollar tip from Lance and a request to play to the camera.

Once the team is securely locked into the hospital, they set about making their base camp, planting stationary cameras on "hot spots" for psychic activity and generally exploring the vast space. The expected build-up starts with the team stumbling onto confidential medical files that explain the horrific and inhumane experiments performed by the former head doctor — What a shock, right? Places like this are never nice, sanitary, HIPAA-compliant organizations — and feature graphic photographs of lobotomies and other horrible procedures.

This part goes on perhaps a little long before the first paranormal activity begins: the window unlatches itself, a wheelchair moves without being touched, a door opens with no one around. And honestly, the lack of soundtrack and the fact that all of this is shot via grainy night-vision or handheld cameras helps the movie. I watched it in a dark room, home by myself, and a few of the scenes were well-executed enough to give me goosebumps.

It's when the directors become too confident in their own story that the film falters. For example, the first reveal of a ghost (which is one money shot that's spoiled entirely in the trailer) is laughable. it's very clear that there was no budget for proper CGI or makeup and the result looks like that Zombify-Yourself iPhone app. After this, the film cranks everything up to 11, losing much of the suspense and tension the filmmakers had done a more-than-passable job of building up to this point. Instead of something moving subtly and peripherally, you have furniture hurled across the room, arms coming out of the ceiling to grab at people, people being lifted clear into the air by invisible forces and thrown down hallways, and other blatant, over-the-top displays of spiritual activity. The few twists in the script (the fact that the chained-shut exit doors, when bashed open by the team, lead to another hallway rather than the front lawn, for example, or the fact that despite the fact that they've been in the hospital for over ten hours, the sun never comes up outside the windows) are lost in a sea of "too much."

The story stretches on too long, and it left me as mentally exhausted as the terrified characters. While Lance Preston tries to keep it together while the world crumbles around him, T.C.'s primary role in the film is to be the archetypical angry black man. Houston is a completely useless coward, Matt is a raving lunatic the moment things begin to get weird, and Sasha is there mostly to run around screaming "what the fuck?" and clinging to the men for protection. You don't genuinely care about any of them except possibly Lance, and even then after the first hour of the film, you're rooting for the ghosts. After all, they just wanted to haunt a psychiatric hospital, not get put on reality TV. They didn't ask for this.

A weak climax finishes the film out on a "Huh?" note, leaving too many questions to which I don't care to know the answers. It's as if the filmmakers really had no idea where else to go with the movie and so they just tacked on a weird exposition from Lance and wrapped it up. The entire ending feels forced as if they put the writers in a room with copies ofQuarantine, Paranormal Activity, The House on Haunted Hill and The Blair Witch Project and said "Okay, watch these and then take whatever is decent in each one of them and wrap it up into one script."

These familiarities are the only reasons I enjoyed Grave Encounters on any level. We've seen all of this before. There's nothing new here, but you can watch it without wanting to completely gouge your eyes out. If it was less trite and broke any new ground anywhere, it would've been much more enjoyable. As it is, appreciate it for the few chills it can induce. Go in with low expectations, and turn off the lights