Dirs. Carlos Cobos Aroca, Berkley Brady, Mikel Cravatta, Carlos Omar De Leon, Daniel Garcia, Tony Morales, Paul Stamper, & Buz Wallick (2023)
An anthology of stories focused on a man who must share them via the internet to escape a malicious presence that has him trapped in a murder house.
CAUTION: MAY CONTAIN SPOILERS
Anthology horror movies are notorious for being uneven, with each story representing various levels of quality and scares. Creepypastas, the scary stories that spread like viral wildfire around the internet, also often have a defining feature: they’re generally not as good as they should be despite having some pretty good concepts behind them. The new Creepypasta, coming to Screambox tomorrow, has a bit in common with the tenets of both of the genres it represents, as it has some wildly successful entries and some that are a bit lacking, but few of them are actually as good as they would seem on the surface.
The cut that I watched of this film was a bit of a rough cut, so it’s important to keep that in mind when reading my review (and for me to keep in mind while reviewing.) For instance, there were several shorts within that were in Spanish, and my screener did not have subtitles; I feel sure that the finished copy that is streaming on Screambox will have those, and consequently the shorts will likely be a bit more coherent. One thing I can say about those two shorts, however, is that they were actually pretty decent even without knowing what the people in them were actually saying. That’s a mark of good filmmaking, that they were able to make them fairly scary without even having an intelligible (to me) script. The other thing that was lacking from my screener were end credits, so I can’t actually, at this time, attribute each short to its appropriate director. I will do my best to go back in afterwards and give credit where its due.
Those caveats out of the way, I have to say that there were more shorts that were lackluster than those that were homeruns, but the ones that were good were pretty damn good. One of the shorts (which I will try to go back and name at a later date) was about a guy who never followed the rules, entering where the signs say “do not enter” and drinking with pills that directed him not to drink after taking them. When a message comes on his television screen telling him not to watch what was to come, he, of course, watches anyway, unleashing hell on our unfortunate rulebreaker. This short was the shit. I’m actually looking forward to watching this movie again just so I can see who made it, because it was impressive as all hell and just about as good (and disturbing) as you could make a film in such a short runtime. Another short that was impressive was one of the aforementioned Spanish shorts, which shared a good bit of its storyline with the incredible Daywalt short Bedfellows, which is one you should immediately check out on YouTube if you haven’t seen it before.
There were several other shorts in Creepypasta that were pretty decent, and overall, the film was a pretty good collection, though there were a few that fell short of my expectations. The wraparound short was, predictably, a bit poor, as they always tend to be in anthologies with very few exceptions. The effects were pretty good throughout the film, however, and that’s a credit to the filmmakers who put them all together. There’s a lot of talent here, and I have a feeling that a few of these filmmakers will get the chance to make some feature length stuff in the future. As much as I’m a fan of horror, it takes a lot to make a really good anthology film, and for my money, you can count the really good ones on one hand or less. I wouldn’t put this one in that category, but it was decent, and that’s just about all you can ask from a horror anthology. It’s well worth taking a chance on, especially if you already have a Screambox subscription. If you don’t, what are you doing with your life? Get on that shit now.
Who this movie is for: Horror anthology lovers, Short film fanatics, Internet fear mongers
Bottom line: While certainly not the best anthology, or even in the top twenty, there were some shorts within this one that packed a hell of a punch, and even the “bad” ones weren’t that bad. That’s something you can’t say for even most anthologies, so this one is definitely worth a watch. If you have a Screambox subscription, it’ll be streaming starting on 5/23, and if you don’t, you need to rectify that problem immediately. There’s a ton of good stuff streaming on Screambox, and it’s well worth the price of admission for any good horror fan.
