Review #102: Malevolence (2004)

Cast/Notable Credits:
Stevan Mena (Director): Malevolence 2 (2009)

Samantha Dark (Samantha)

Brandon Johnson (Julian)

Heather Magee (Marilyn)

Malevolence Trailer Link:

Malevolence: Ma-lav-o-lence: evil, disposed to injure others

Plot:

Ten years ago a little boy, Martin Bristol was kidnapped from his backyard and forced to witness horrific crimes by a deranged madman. His whereabouts were unknown over the years until now when a trio of bank robbers kidnap a woman (Samantha) and her daughter (Courtney) and decide to stay the night in an abandon house in the middle of nowhere.

The daughter manages to escape and flee to a nearby house. Unfortunately, she has no idea that she just escaped into the house of Martin Bristol who has turned into a serial killing psychopath over the years. One of the robbers chases after her, and crosses paths with Martin. Let's just say he doesn't "make it" and in turn puts everyone in fatal danger by letting Martin know that there are people around. Martin picks off the unsuspecting robbers one by one, and torments the mother and daughter in the process.

Malevolence is a great independent movie. It's old school horror at it's best. When I watched it, the film reminded me of a compilation of several classic horror movies. The house looked a little bit like the one in The Amityville Horror (house pictured left). But mostly it mainly reminded me of Friday the 13th Part 2.

First of all the film wasn't "polished" in it's final appearance. It had a rough, ragged look to the film. The lighting was extremely dark. That's old school!

There was none of this blue/green/yellow bullsh*t tint to the film. It was pitch black...well not totally, but the nighttime looked more natural looking. For me, I dug this look. It was tribute to the elder horror movies.

Secondly, the "killer" wore a pillow case over his head. Sounds a little familiar? Hmm. You're right! It's Part 2 reborn! Pre-hockey mask. Potato sack retard man! I just loved it. Nothing too elaborate, it was just a simple disguise. Sometimes the simplest things can be the scariest. Those were just two main ingredients that Malevolence rocked my boat with.

For a low budget independent film, it was pretty good. A big hit with me. The acting was okay in the film, but the acting wasn't really God awful either. The cast did a pretty good job overall. It also wasn't a huge cast, there were only six main characters in the film...a true sign of low budget. The actors/actresses did a decent job considering they're a bunch of nobodies. The robbers were actually a bunch of dweebs, but oh well, a horror movie needs some "cannon fodder".

Speaking of the cast, I couldn't find anything on any of them. What they did or what they are about to do. The best performance came from Samantha Dark, the mother in the film. She's practically an unknown actress asked to play a damsel in distress. She did a hell of a job in my opinion.

Sure it may be predictable just like most of the horror movies out there, but I give a huge pat on the back for employing the "old school" factor into the film. It wasn't too gory or covered in over the top blood. It kind of had a nice twist open ending. So if you ever run across it and want to burn an hour and a half, then check this one out.

Misc. Movie Trivia:
-Film opened on April 15, 2005 and went straight to DVD
-Popular enough to score a sequel!