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2020 was a wild year. With the pandemic hitting early in the year, most people had no choice but to stay in their homes to protect themselves and others. But things can still go wrong within our own homes and through the confines of the Internet, which is sort of what this "found footage" movie, filmed during the pandemic, explores.
Host follows a group of friends that, for some reason, decide to perform an online séance. However, most of them are taking things lightly, not "respecting the spirits", until things start to go awry and weird stuff starts happening around them. Since each of them is in separate locations, it makes it harder both to know what's happening on the other side, but also harder to help.
This is a film that was recommended by the co-creator of The Blair Witch Project Eduardo Sánchez, during an interview we had last year. What makes the film more unique is that it is entirely set within a Zoom video call window. The film starts when the call starts and ends as the 1-hour time limit expires. This makes for some really interesting directorial choices and gimmicks.
Those gimmicks might lend themselves for some cheap execution, but here it works. There were a couple of times where I literally jumped off my seat, which is what we want from a horror film. Host has a lot of things on its favor. The premise is uniquely executed, the performances are solid, the sense of dread is genuine, the jump scares feel earned and organic, but most importantly, with a runtime of just an hour, it doesn't overstay its welcome.
Grade:
HOST
(2020, Savage)
A film with a budget of less than $500,000 • A film with a title that starts with the letters G or H
(2020, Savage)
A film with a budget of less than $500,000 • A film with a title that starts with the letters G or H
"So because we're doing this over Zoom, what it does mean is that we're slightly less protected than we might've been, so it's very important that you respect the spirits, and you respect each other."
2020 was a wild year. With the pandemic hitting early in the year, most people had no choice but to stay in their homes to protect themselves and others. But things can still go wrong within our own homes and through the confines of the Internet, which is sort of what this "found footage" movie, filmed during the pandemic, explores.
Host follows a group of friends that, for some reason, decide to perform an online séance. However, most of them are taking things lightly, not "respecting the spirits", until things start to go awry and weird stuff starts happening around them. Since each of them is in separate locations, it makes it harder both to know what's happening on the other side, but also harder to help.
This is a film that was recommended by the co-creator of The Blair Witch Project Eduardo Sánchez, during an interview we had last year. What makes the film more unique is that it is entirely set within a Zoom video call window. The film starts when the call starts and ends as the 1-hour time limit expires. This makes for some really interesting directorial choices and gimmicks.
Those gimmicks might lend themselves for some cheap execution, but here it works. There were a couple of times where I literally jumped off my seat, which is what we want from a horror film. Host has a lot of things on its favor. The premise is uniquely executed, the performances are solid, the sense of dread is genuine, the jump scares feel earned and organic, but most importantly, with a runtime of just an hour, it doesn't overstay its welcome.
Grade: