Rent Grave Encounters (2011)

Grave Encounters review by Alyse Garner - Cinema Paradiso

A film crew lock themselves in an abandoned mental hospital in an attempt to capture a real-life haunting; but they soon realize they’ve got far more than they bargained for.

After a tour of the old hospital, in which the crew discover the existence of secret underground tunnels and the horrific and illicit experiments conducted on patients by Dr Arthur Friedkin, the crew attempt to make contact with the spirits they believe to be dwelling in the hospital. After some brief, but increasingly hostile, contact with the spirits of previous patients the crew begin to prepare to exit the house, only to find the front door now leads to another corridor of the hospital and the stairway ends in a brick wall.

Violent and unpleasant attacks ensue in which ghosts and demons appear and dispose of the crew one by one.

Named after the fictional reality ghost hunting show the film crew belong to Grave Encounters is another found footage movie supposedly consisting of data pieced together after the fact, as is the current trend with horror movies. Grave Encounters takes a slightly different approach from its more popular Hollywood counterparts however offering a more suspenseful and mysterious narrative rather than simply scene after scene of violence. The unexpected twist at the end is not quite enough to cause audiences’ eyes to widen and mouths to gasp open, but it will make you make a funny little grunt of surprise.

With a significant cult following Grave Encounters was more of a success than many critics expected it to be, and though horror fans will find much to enjoy in the movie, don’t expect anything too life changing.