Thursday, July 27, 2017

The Overlook Theatre Reviews: Dead Silence, Hugh Gallagher's

5 of 5 viewers "Liked" "Dead Silence" (1989, USA)
Here's what the creatures had to say:

Lord Battle - "Imagine Bo from The Dukes of Hazzard has died. Luke has since taken up grave robbing and, between reading porn and pissing on skulls, harasses a paranormal investigator, ultimately stealing her EVP recordings. Funny thing is he gets possessed by the playback. Hilarity ensues as he tries to run down people in his AMC Pacer and is trailed by a desk jockey in his Suzuki Samurai. I highly recommend that micro budget fans head to SRS Cinema and buy this film, because the only thing better than watching Dead Silence, is watching Dead Silence with Hugh Gallagher's commentary track." - 3.5 Stars

Huntress - "Dead Silence was a combination of the elements I love and hate about micro budget horror movies; it had an awesome story, interesting characters, and cool kills, but my god could some of those scenes overstay their welcome. The good easily outweighed the bad though and all the weirdness made this bizarre movie a lot of very unpredictable fun." - 3 Stars

Dabbles - "This was well done, given the year it was made and the story. It was surprisingly well done. Wow that dolly shot. Production value and a home cam video. Good times." - 4 Stars

Math Mage - "Revived by a tape recorder as the titular dead silence, a satanic serial killer posses an incompetent grave robber to get into a series of car chases with a mulleted woman, set to a soundtrack provided by the writer/director/producers band. Terrible effects, bad writing, and worst acting (read your lines in advance!). A must see!" - 3 Stars

The Great Hornito - "Dead Silence was not a typical micro budget horror movie. It really focused on the build up and character development even though it wasn't that good. The story was pretty interesting but the delivery was not that effective. But for a micro budget film it was entertaining. Not a bad movie at all." - 3 Stars



The Overlook Theatre Final Rating*
(Below is for after you've seen the film)

Imagine an old farm house. This old farmhouse has been abandoned and since become dilapidated. Nature has started to reclaim the land as grass grows knee high and footpaths become lost. The barn itself has long faded in the sun and now the paint gives way to bare wood. Locals have started telling stories of strange music emerging from the house late at night, mostly on weekends, and have now begun calling the American ruins Hell House. This is perfect as a band named Hell has been using the now legendary (if only locally) space to practice.
One day while band front man, Hugh, was watching TV and stumbled upon a program that explained that placing a recorder on the grave of someone who died a violent or unusual death would yield paranormal results. So Hell set off to do just this. They found the grave of a local girl who had killed herself or something and left a recorder on the soil above her corpse. Returning a couple hours later, they collect the recorder and quickly head the Hell House to play the tape. After hooking the recorder up through their PA system and listening to a lot of nothing, they began to hear someone moaning... After an initial startle, the idea for Dead Silence was born!

The story above was embellished by Lord Battle and inspired by the commentary on the SRS DVD release of Dead Silence. I highly recommend listening to it to find out about a library full of Christians sitting through a 2 hour Hell set, the director's wife playing my 2 favorite roles, how the original score was created, and why/ how the brutal stunts were performed without stuntmen. Also, Hugh Gallagher is brutal while critiquing his own film, and it couldn't be more interesting. Listening to a director trying to fathom why people would not only watch his film, but buy it, then listen to a commentary track is amazing. I also feel like I should note that we all thought he was going for pacing during or first screening, and to hear him then shred his "padding" was amazing. For more from Hugh Gallagher check out his magazine Draculina (you can find this rabbit hole here)!


- Lord Battle

The Overlook Theatre materialized in a residence for a screening on 7/20/2017
*Based on the star ratings turned in by character reviewers, others viewed and got to "Dislike" or "Like" but that does not affect the rating.

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