wicked little things Tagged Articles at Cinematical

At first I thought the "After Dark Horror Festival" ploy was a cool and clever one. Here we have eight low-budget horror flicks that, were it not for this new and somewhat unique release concept, would have premiered anonymously on video or late one night on Showtime -- and that'd be a shame, really. No filmmaker wants his movie to debut on the small screen, and so I applauded Lionsgate and After Dark chief Courtney Solomon for coming up with a new way to showcase the smaller terror flicks. And then I actually sat down and watched the "After Dark" titles, feeling duped and stupid all the way. Putting aside Mike Mendez's The Gravedancers, I'd opine that every one of the AD titles actually deserves a direct-to-video release, but I guess there's more money to be made by slapping together a one-weekend nationwide horror "festival" -- because, as we all know, no genre fans are more loyal than the horror geeks. Way to exploit the fanbase, fellas.

If you can find one original idea, one effective sequence, or one compelling concept in J.S. Cardone's Wicked Little Things, you're officially a more astute movie-watcher than I am. This is a stunningly inert, entirely conventional, and oppressively boring little chestnut, one that just might be worthy of a Sunday afternoon visit, but only if nothing better is on and you've already seen every good horror film ever made. From the script to the performances to the resoundingly uncreative look of the piece, Wicked Little Things feels like something that was written, shot and glued together over the course of one drab and uneventful weekend.

I was all set and ready to head out to the multiplex and enjoy a few of the one-weekend-only After Dark Horrorfest offerings, but unfortunately I got sidetracked and was able to catch only The Gravedancers -- which I quite liked! And then I found myself wondering when those horror titles would be available on DVD ... just as Fangoria was announcing the information!

On March 27 Lionsgate will be unleashing the following titles on DVD: Dark Ride, The Gravedancers, The Hamiltons, Penny Dreadful, Reincarnation, Unrest and Wicked Little Things. Regarding the other titles, Fango informs us that Nacho Cerda's The Abandoned will re-hit theaters early next year, that Snoop Dogg's Hood of Horror hits DVD on January 9 and that David Arquette's The Tripper (which popped up at only a few After Dark locations) will be released at an as-yet-undetermined time.

It's hard to say determine how big a success the After Dark Fest turned out to be, but it looks like it was a semi-clever gimmick to get a few direct-to-video Lionsgate titles some pre-release buzz (and bucks). Having seen only two of the flicks (Unrest being the other), I don't feel comfortable commenting on the quality of the concept, but hey: more horror movies for me!!