It was a light week of movie-watching for the Film Vomit crew. After a hotel room trashy horror double feature for their last night in Telluride, Jalen and David flew back home, with Jalen embarking on a much-deserved vacation while David returned to his favorite local theater to see Tim Burton’s latest legacy sequel before sequestering himself to write reviews of all the movies they saw at their first film festival. Here’s everything we at Film Vomit watched last week:

'V/H/S' Magnet Releasing

V/H/S (2012)

Directed by Adam Wingard ("Tape 56"), David Bruckner ("Amatuer Night"), Ti West ("Second Honeymoon"), Glenn McQuaid ("Tuesday the 17th"), Joe Swanberg ("The Sick Thing That Happened to Emily When She Was Younger"), and Radio Silence ("10/31/98")

David: 5.75/10

Like most anthology films, V/H/S is inevitably a bit of a mixed bag. It consists of six shorts stitched together, though one serves as the framing narrative for the entire film. V/H/S features work from recognizable names who would go on to dominate the horror genre in the years following its release. Adam Wingard, who has since transitioned from horror gems like You’re Next and The Guest to helming the Godzilla franchise at Warner Brothers, provides the film’s framing device, “Tape 56” – easily the weakest of the six. Idiotic characters are a staple of the horror genre, but Wingard’s short finds a new low, depicting what could be the stupidest gang of criminals ever.

An all-male group of mentally deficient morons spends their time filming their crimes, which largely consist of vandalizing abandoned buildings and pulling up unsuspecting women’s shirts. When an anonymous source hires these repulsive troglodytes to break into a home and steal a VHS tape, they, of course, accept, setting the stage for the five other shorts the film has in store. Once inside the derelict home of their target, the gang struggles to identify which of the numerous VHS tapes they are supposed to steal. All they've been told is that they’ll "know it when they see it." As such, the gang—and by extension, the audience—starts watching the tapes, discovering escalating horrors in each one.

The five shorts vary in quality, with the most impressive surprisingly coming from not one of the well-established horror directors, but from Joe Swanberg, one of the major instigators of the mumblecore movement. Swanberg’s short, “The Sick Thing That Happened to Emily When She Was Younger,” may be in need of a shorter title, but it chillingly depicts a genre-inflected toxic relationship through a couple’s recorded video chats. The unifying theme across all the shorts is the use of found footage, a trend that, thankfully, died down in the mid-2010s. Some shorts find more clever ways to implement this technique than others. David Bruckner’s “Amateur Night,” for example, is shot through a hidden camera in a pair of glasses worn by one of the characters, as a gaggle of douchey frat bros attempts to film an amateur porno with an unsuspecting girl before having their night royally messed up by a succubus. Others simply employ the tired conceit of a character shakily holding a camcorder as horrifying events unfold.

Despite Glenn McQuaid’s “Tuesday the 17th” sporting a cool premise for a slasher killer, and Radio Silence’s “10/31/98” displaying some slick visual effects, what becomes clear as V/H/S unfolds is that the movie is simply too long. At nearly two hours, V/H/S sluggishly grinds along, feeling much like letting YouTube’s algorithm autoplay random videos for 116 minutes in a state of utter disassociation. Trimming at least one short – preferably Ti West’s disappointing “Second Honeymoon” – would greatly improve the viewing experience, though it still wouldn’t explain how the majority of this footage ended up on VHS tapes in the first place.

Your enjoyment of V/H/S will depend on your tolerance for the found footage fad. If shaky, low-res horror is your thing, then V/H/S might be for you. For those craving a more cinematic experience, steer clear of this overlong omnibus.

'AquaSlash' Red Hound Films

AquaSlash (2019)

Directed by Renaud Gauthier

David: 5/10

Renaud Gauthier’s AquaSlash perfectly encapsulates the inherent fallacy of a numerical grading scale, in the sense that it is an objectively terrible film yet one of the most gleefully entertaining things I’ve watched in quite some time. Perhaps AquaSlash just arrived at the perfect time for me, as I was desperately craving a relentlessly mindless movie to shut my brain off to after a weekend of attentive Telluride screenings.

A slasher flick set at a water park (take my money immediately), AquaSlash follows a group of high school graduates attending a celebratory rite-of-passage weekend at their local aquatic playground. The park is owned by the estranged married couple Paul and Priscilla (Nick Walker and Brittany Drisdelle, respectively). Paul has started an inappropriate affair with one of the female graduates, the bossy and entitled Alice (Madelline Harvey), while Priscilla – who has a reputation for picking one of the male graduates to sleep with every year – is courting a real estate developer named Michael (HoJo Rose), who has designs on owning the park.

The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree, as Michael’s son Josh (Nicolas Fontaine) – a bullied member of the band performing during the weekend-long celebration – becomes entangled with Kimberly (Lanisa Dawn), a taken member of the park staff. This puts her jealous and vengeful boyfriend Tommy (Paul Zinno) on the warpath. Everything culminates in a killer set piece centered around the weekend’s big event: a three-person race down the park’s waterslides, with the winners taking home a cash prize of $1,000.

With two blades inserted into a waterslide to form the shape of an “X,” AquaSlash delivers delicious gore in its signature sequence, turning the park’s waters red with blood. A throwback slasher with an utterly hollow core, AquaSlash spins a blissfully stupid whodunit yarn with so much irreverent chutzpah that you can’t help but be splashed by its charm.

Don’t let that number scare you; I cannot recommend AquaSlash enough. If you love trashy, low-budget horror—which, really, why wouldn’t you?—then you’ll love AquaSlash.

'Beetlejuice Beetlejuice' Warner Bros. Pictures via MovieStillsDB

Beetlejuice Beetlejuice (2024)

Directed by Tim Burton

David: 7.25/10

The Juice is loose, and you can read my full thoughts about that here.

While it can't hold a candle to the original, Beetlejuice Beetlejuice earns a hearty recommendation if for no other reason than its sublime autumnal vibe. Burton's latest is an excellent tone-setter for the fall, and a welcome reminder that Halloween will soon be upon us.

So, that’s everything we watched last week, but we want to know what you’ve been watching! Jump into the Discord and let us know if you’ve seen anything good lately.