Alright, let’s jump in with both fists.<\/p>\n
The girl ghost in the white dress who seeks revenge through technology was already kind of a genre of its own by the time the film came out. \u00a0The casual horror observer said \u201cOh, the Ring.\u201d \u00a0The more interested horror fan raised his nose at the casual observer and said, \u201cNo, Ringu!\u201d \u00a0The seasoned horror fan was too busy shouting curse words followed by, \u201cNot another angry ghost in a white dress!\u201d<\/p>\n
Let’s face it. \u00a0What Lies Beneath was pretty much the same kind of movie, but without anything to make it genuinely frightening or even interesting.<\/p>\n
Me, being off in my own world, grinned. \u00a0\u201cYes! \u00a0That’s the guy who did House on Haunted Hill!\u201d \u00a0Then, with that kind of silly anticipation you can only get when about to pay someone with real currency to scare you senseless, I talked the woman who eventually became my wife into going to see FearDotCom together.<\/p>\n
Malone comes back with his visual style as well. \u00a0The film is built around nightmarish hallucinations, which is visual style Malone seems to sincerely enjoy working with.<\/p>\n
Did the movie deliver? \u00a0At its best, absolutely.<\/p>\n
Stephen Rhea’s performance as \u201cThe Doctor\u201d left a lot to be desired. \u00a0An interesting counterpoint to his performance would be Dee Snyder’s \u201cCaptain Howdy\u201d in Strangeland. \u00a0Rhea’s character was detached from his deeds, audibly expressing contempt for his own actions and the people who took interest in them. \u00a0This created an uncharismatic, illogical and often dry villain. \u00a0Strangeland’s \u201cCaptain Howdy,\u201d was a villain who put himself through nearly everything that he put his victims through, was passionate about his actions, felt they were his life’s work, and even believed he was changing the world for the better. \u00a0Howdy, then, had the insane insight that makes a villain charismatic and interesting.<\/p>\n
Charles Manson will always be more frightening for his insane insight and charisma than most real-world villains.<\/p>\n
There is a lot that can and probably should be done with the kind of villain archetype that \u201cThe Doctor\u201d in FearDotCom fell into.<\/p>\n
However, we do get more scary nurses. \u00a0You can’t have a doctor without a scary nurse in a William Malone movie. \u00a0I’m pretty sure you can’t even have a William Malone movie without a scary nurse. \u00a0That’s alright by me.<\/p>\n
Note to self: \u00a0Write a \u201cNurses I Know\u201d Interlude.<\/p>\n
Back on track. \u00a0The only other complaint about this movie is a character death involving a motor vehicle. \u00a0Something about the last second of that looked too rigid. \u00a0Rigid looks especially out of place in such a visually rich film.<\/p>\n
The sound was there, although to a lesser extent than House on Haunted Hill. \u00a0Again, \u201cyou had to be there\u201d when the movie played in theaters.<\/p>\n
The visuals consist of more camera experiments from the director. \u00a0The director’s commentary explicitly states that the overall look of the movie was meant to be dark versus light, and that shadows or dark rooms were exceedingly dark for this purpose. \u00a0The same concept duality would be better explored later in Parasomnia, but it made for a different looking movie in its own day. \u00a0FearDotCom was released during a period when colored filters ruined way too many movies. \u00a0At least dark shadows are genuinely scarier than a Smurf-blue or sewage-green filter over a werewolf.<\/p>\n
Or a pale blue filter over a scary ghost girl in a white dress.<\/p>\n
FearDotCom also works on the tried but frequently forgotten principle of messing with reality. There is a certain level of fright and fun in being unsure of what is real when the characters are experiencing such wild hallucinations. \u00a0A lost grip on reality is my personal terror. \u00a0Fear is a personal emotion, and the execution of those hallucinations touched that nerve with precision.<\/p>\n
The final note I want to push is the mystery aspect of the movie. \u00a0The colorful characters and bizarre occurrences recall more of the charm of Dark City than the tired tropes of private detective stories. \u00a0The small roles and supporting cast deserve a lot of credit for putting a lot of flavor into FearDotCom.<\/p>\n
Overall, FearDotCom is a rewarding experience. \u00a0It mixes adept usage of a hallucinatory experience with an interesting paranormal mystery, a creepy serial killer, and an unusual cast of secondary characters. \u00a0The strangeness of it all keeps me happy despite any weak points. \u00a0This is why the movie gets a lot more rotation in my dvd player than I typically admit to most horror movie fanatics.<\/p>\n
It’s not about the body count, the blood, or the splatter. \u00a0It’s about the seedy underside of the fantasy genre, the terror of forgetting what is real, and the adventure of \u00a0fighting against certain doom.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Alright, let’s jump in with both fists. The girl ghost in the white dress who seeks revenge through technology was already kind of a genre of its own by the time the film came out. \u00a0The casual horror observer said \u201cOh, the Ring.\u201d \u00a0The more interested horror fan raised his nose at the casual observer … <\/p>\n