Movie Review - The Gravedancers

The Gravedancers




Last post I said how Wicked Little Things was the weakest movie of the Eight Films to Die For series that I'd seen. After seeing The Gravedancers, I've decided that Wicked Little Things was steps ahead of this movie.

The Gravedancers isn't horrible in any sense of the word. It's watchable, semi-entertaining, and at times funny. Yet I had a few problems with it where I think it could have been better.

For starters, I felt the beginning of the movie was one of the strongest parts. The premise is great - three friends, after their other friend's funeral, go back to the cemetery to have one last drunken party together. They find a notebook, utter an enchanting curse, and dance on the graves of the dead. Turns out that's a pretty disrespectful thing to do, because the dead get pretty angry and come back to reek some havoc on these friends.

The beginning is pretty creepy, and even got me to jump a couple times. The starting atmosphere is pervasive with spookiness. You know that something is coming, but you don't really know when. Granted, they're pretty cheap scares, but all in fun, right?

But when we get to the mid-late part of the film, everything starts to drop off. The movie stops being scary and becomes laughable for some reason. At times it feels like it's supposed to be laughable, but if I was in the audience at Horrorfest I probably wouldn't want to pay $10 to laugh at a supposedly scary movie. Was I supposed to be laughing? The female zombie-ghost thing moves utterly slowly. What's there to be scared of? It's like she's on a slow-moving treadmill. She glides on one foot, except she moves like a sloth. And they still can't get away from her!

Sometimes the cast seemed like they didn't know what their cues were supposed to be. Generally the acting was tolerable at best. The wife was one of the most ridiculous characters I've seen. She's always jealous, always suspecting, and if I were him I would've dropped her when she got pissed off about the girl in the room and said, "Fend for yourself, you're annoying."

And some qualms:

1. Before any spooky stuff begins to happen, when your cat starts growling at a dark room, no one normally begins to be terrified. You go and open the door to see what's wrong, you don't cautiously sneak up on it like you're a ninja going to assassinate someone.

2. A lot of plot elements aren't explored thoroughly. Why did their friend die? That's what brought them there in the first place. I guess I understand why they went to the cemetery, but it seems kind of weird when you're grown men and women. Teenagers do that sort of thing; you're not in college anymore.

3. Gigantic ghost head? Won't even go there, I just laughed really hard.

4. If a piano is playing by itself, I would IMMEDIATELY suspect something supernatural was going on. If I walk in the room, the piano stops playing, and there is no one there, it's a ghost. What else do you think it is, the cat learning Chopin? Come on, I just people in ghost movies would believe in ghosts from the start. It's hard to skeptical when doors are slamming around you, there's a girl with BULGING EYES in your bedroom, and the piano likes to play itself.

5. The bulging eye-masks were creepy when you didn't really get a good look at them, but when you see them in the light, like the little boy engulfed in flame, it looked like they came from a cartoon.

The movie's not bad, especially if you want a laugh, a few scares, and little blood. Okay, more than a laugh, it's better than some comedies.

The Gravedancers on Rotten Tomatoes