From what I can gather, these are just short films that had already been done, and then compiled into this indie anthology with a wrap around story. I’ll break down each short film briefly, then discuss the wrap around story. It’s just easier that way.
The 9th Circle
Basically this chick is at Realmsville Station, waiting for a train. Across from her sit this clown who honks his horn. Art The Clown to be precise. He’s creepy, in a good way. He then drugs her, and she wakes up chained by her neck with 2 other girls. The girls apparently get taken by these Ghouls or monsters, whatever. One of the girls is tied by her wrists to the ceiling and is pregnant. In the ritual, they slice open the belly and drink the blood. At one point they rip the main chick’s top off, but she’s wearing a bra, so you can’t even be excited for that. The main person appears to be getting ready to sex her up, and it ends.
Something With an Alien (I have no idea if there’s a name for this segment.)
This chick is waiting for her man to come home, and she gets herself all worried after checking out her dude’s painting. The car isn’t working, her cell sucks, so she just waits for him to come home. Then comes along an alien, with an alien mask, and man hands, in gloves, and I just….I can’t. It isn’t a good look. She hides, and he uses some device that is really high pitched that makes her scream. The alien confronts her and she rips one of the many hoses from his gear. She hides, and her phone rings, so the alien kinda prances towards her. It’s so silly. Caroline gets dragged away while John is on the phone screaming for her. As she struggles, she rips the sheet that covers the painting, which is of Art The Clown.
Terrifier
Some chick runs out of gas and goes to a gas station. She approaches and finds the gas station attendant dealing with Art The Clown who has made a terrible mess in the bathroom apparently. Oh, they are clearly going for a grindhouse look. She’s a costume designer. They hear a thud inside, so he goes to check it out and she waits outside. She checks, and Art is using a hacksaw to cut off the dude’s head and hand(s). So she books it and is on the phone calling for help, but not calling 911. As she drives, she finds Art on the side of the road hitchhiking with a sign that reads “Circus” and her phone’s battery is dead. She nearly avoids an accident…..because women drivers. Then Art shows up next to her window, so she drives away. She finds a car with its flashers on, and there’s a person with their face on the steering wheel, and she lifts it up, and the person is a bloody mess and missing a hand like the gas station attendant. She drives away. Now Art is in the back seat and uses saran wrap around her face. She smartly tears it off of her and slams on the brakes, and now it’s time to go running in the woods. She fines this building, so she goes and bars the door shut. ArtA is trying to get in through the door, but gives up. Yeah, she then puts her ear up to the door, which you are never supposed to do. So she backs away, like a coward and sits down. There’s Art coming up from the ground, he burrowed underground to get her, and so she tries to escape, but the door won’t budge, so like whips he with this sash of sharp objects. She grabs a knife and stabs him in the eye, then another to the top of his back. She then runs back through the woods out onto the road, and within 3 seconds, there’s a vehicle in the distance. She flags him down, and he gives her a lift. He asks her “Are you OK?” Dude, does she look OK? Art is rising up, the chase is on. He asks “Are You hurt?” and she says “I don’t know”. Seriously. A car pulls up next to them, and it’s Art driving, and he shoots the dude driving, and this causes a big car crash. She wakes up on a table under a big bright light and sees many bloody tools. Then looks and sees Art laughing. He has carved “PIG”, “SLUT”, “CUNT”, and “BITCH” into her, and amputates her arms and legs, and then we see her full body, where her nipples are cut off, and we still see fake nudity though. It’s just her head with a fake body, but they tried.
Wrap Around Babysitting Story
Sarah is babysitting Tia and Timmy. One of them got a VHS tape put in their candy bag….in 2013, so they want to stop watching Night of The Living Dead. This movie lost me already. The acting…..Tia is a decent actor. Sarah is hit or miss, and Timmy, not so much. So they watch the first one, and Timmy was pumped. Time to send the kids to bed. Tia found the clown funny at least. Tia is weirded out about her closet being open slightly. Sarah doesn’t want to give Timmy the tape back, so he says “You suck Sarah” and I laughed. Sarah tucks Tia in and Tia asks if the clown was real, and Sarah regrets letting them watch it. Tia comes into Timmy’s room to sleep because she’s scared. After the Alien one, Sarah sees someone and is blaming the kids, but they are in bed sleeping. Timmy torments Tia about the clown, so this is funny at least. She tells them to get back to bed and he says that they could if she would stop checking in on them every 5 minutes. So Sarah sees that Tia’s closet door is opened and then she does nothing so she goes back to the VCR. Sarah gets a call, similar to the last film with the girl calling for help. Now there is more audio from the VHS, and we see a basement, and there’s Art, and he comes closer to the TV. He looks at Sarah and waves and appears to be trying to break out of the TV, but then the screen shows Sarah. But we see Art behind Sarah but, in real life, he isn’t there. So she tries removing the tape and then smashes it on the ground, and now she can’t see where Art is. She hears Tia scream, and at the top of the stairs is a blood-covered Art who is laughing at Sarah and we are going Grindhouse appearance again. She goes in Timmy’s room, finds the kid’s heads, tons of blood, and ART written in blood on the wall.
End Film
Final Thoughts – Let me preface this by stating that this is a lower budget entry, very indie, C level horror maybe. That’s not a criticism, it’s just stating the obvious. I understand better than most, the plight of working on an indie film with a terrible budget. So did they do a good job with what they had to work with? I think that they did because it’s not always an easy genre to do cheap. They tried some odd things, some worked better than others. The alien one was the worst for me, while I felt indifferent about the first once Art was gone. The 3rd worked for me, but I hated the grind house style, just for the sake of it. Still, the story was there, and the acting was absolutely terrible, but it made me laugh at least. So the 3rd one shined. The gore was fine, the score was fine, and Art was fucking awesome. The wrap-around story served its purpose and wasn’t bad, but I felt that they could have used a few more retakes on a few of the early scenes especially. Like any anthology, this one is a mixed bag. If you have a subscription to Screambox, check it out. If you have other means to view it, do so. The first and third segment are supposedly on YouTube. If you like it, support the makers.
Rating – 4.5 I wouldn’t watch this one again. There’s no real rhyme or reason to, and I wouldn’t show this to a friend unless they specifically requested something of this nature, in which case, i would oblige. This isn’t bad, but it simply wasn’t for me, and the alien segment really did hurt this film I feel. If you just cut that out, this goes up to a 5.7 I’d say.
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