Hello I have returned from beyond the grave. Or, actually just some severe laziness and lack of motivation to do a lot of anything. But today I watched a movie and it made me want to start back on my blog! So here I am, (mostly) ready to write again. (On an unrelated note I aim to start a special series where I rate and review every house for Halloween Horror Nights - Orlando this year so stay tuned for that as well!)
I'm a huge fan of the first Hell House LLC. I think it's one of the best found footage movies ever made. I also love found footage movies so when I found out (like 2 weeks ago!?) they were releasing a sequel to HHLLC I was so stoked! I couldn't wait to see how they follow it up. And follow it up they did. Returning as director and writer is Stephen Cognetti, a man with a definite flair for these types of films. He takes the story he told in HHLLC and really expands upon it, and it mostly works.
The first 45-50 minutes or so of exposition had me just slightly confused, mainly because of the editing. I wasn't sure when certain things were taking place (ex: I didn't know if some of the stuff was happening before the news interview we were seeing) but once the new group of explorers made their way to the house I understood. I really enjoyed the addition of videos filmed by other people exploring the house, it gave more options for some nice scares. I did however really miss the tension built in the first movie. The subtle slow burn of the haunting is what scared me the most and because of that made the jump scares way more effective. There was an obvious lack of that build this time but they still managed to include some creepy moments and one jump scare that almost gave me a heart attack (it has to do with the medium and his cameraman and if you watch it, you'll know).
I was also a little disappointed with how much mythology they tried to cram into the ending. I'm so interested in Andrew Tully and his cult and why they have the "chain of dominos" to bring people to the hotel but it wasn't explained much. My pros do outweight my cons and I really enjoyed watching this, especially home alone with most of the lights off. The acting was good and the filmmaking was so great, especially for this medium. It's hard to do found footage without relying on whipping the camera around and this succeeded. I love when it would glitch out, that alone was a great tension builder. Overall I definitely recommend this, especially if you like the first one. Bring on Hell House III please!!
3 stars out of 5
Hell House LLC II: The Abaddon Hotel is currently streaming on SHUDDER (subscription required).