Havenhurst Review

Disclaimer: Contains spoilers!

Plot Summary: A woman stays at a, seemingly, idyllic apartment building where her friend mysteriously disappeared.

Review: Once again, I only bothered with this movie to see my dear Danielle Harris; it has been a while since I covered one of Danielle's movies anyhow. Unfortunately, she is barely in the film--unceremoniously killed off within the first two minutes. Yeaaah...not the best way to start things off for me. However, that is the least of "Havenhurst's" worries as it's as mundane and pointless as a horror can possibly be. It's not that it's a completely bad movie, but it's boring and, at times, painfully stupid which is unforgivable given the extremely short running time. The only redeeming qualities are the set designs and the polished picture quality that makes you think you're watching a bigger budget flick. Typically I'd consider Danielle a bonus point unto herself, but that ain't happenin' this time around.

I'll just start naming random problems as they come to me: the main killer is nonsensical and has supernatural strength and speed with no explanation; the killer is implied to be human so this is just a bizarre decision to make. Yes, this is a horror trope, but this guy is fucking teleporting and throwing people around like rag dolls while not exactly having the body of Jason. Anyway, the little girl character is absolutely annoying and her line delivery makes me weep for humanity. She's just so mechanical that I should probably blame the director for allowing such a shit display. Furthermore, making her join up with the family of killers is stupid and comes out of nowhere with no buildup. Introducing characters for five seconds just to bolster the body count is cheap and ineffective. The traps and mechanisms scattered about the apartment building aren't even cool since they feel contrived; pretty much all the mechanisms are so ridiculously situational that it would be virtually impossible to imagine them in advance without a need for their implementation. For example, the random switch in the vent or the barricade that drops down. None of these would have a reason to exist unless the creator anticipated someone uncovering their secret AND the killer being in the perfect position to trigger these traps too! It's just moronic. And who the fuck is maintaining these traps a hundred years later?! The film tries to claim this family of killers are connected to the serial killer, H.H. Holmes, who lived in the goddamn 1800s! These mindless contraptions would be rusted to hell and back at this point. Ugh, fuck this movie...it's putting me to sleep merely thinking about the idiocy.

Other than a decent production quality, there is nothing of note besides Danielle Harris. The film is boring, predictable, cliched, and outright stupid more often than not. The traps, which should have been the highlight of the action, are too convenient and illogical to take seriously especially when being implemented by an invincible killer that defies all reason. I mean--FUCK--there was a scene where he's in the basement and then, maybe, 30 seconds later is dropping out of the ceiling! WHAT?! And the cherry on top of this shit sundae is a horrible little kid actor. Seriously, stop adding children to horror movies! Or at least have the balls to kill them off. Overall, I do not recommend "Havenhurst" at all. It's not the worst movie out there by any means, however, it's forgettable and doesn't even employ any so bad it's good moments. Plus, killing off Danielle so quickly is the worst mistake you can make.

Notable Moment: Thinking up a worthwhile scene is actually kind of difficult. "Havenhurst" is just that mediocre. Umm...I guess when the killer pulls a drill arm out of his ass. I think that qualifies as shenanigans, but I had become bored out of my mind at that point.

Final Rating: 4/10