The Cottage (2022) User Reviews

Short and not that sweet

[bowmanblue · 2/10 · 23 November 2023]

Five friends go to a cabin... how many times have horror movies started out like this before? Okay, so this time it's technically a 'cottage,' but I really don't think that makes much of a difference.

First of all this has to be one of the shortest films I've seen in a long time. Rather than being close to ninety minutes, it's not even close to an hour long - clocking in at about forty-nine minutes.

Therefore, there's not an awful lot to say about a film that's so short. We get a whistlestop tour of the characters and - believe it or not - they're not bad actors and the dialogue they share is actually reasonably believable. Then, before you know it, there's supernatural events going down and it's all over.

Sadly, if there's one word you need to know about this film it's 'budget.' Or lack thereof, I should say. Just because a film doesn't have a lot of money behind it doesn't mean it's going to be bad. Take this one - the actors are just fine, as are their performances. But it is technically a 'horror' film and with something in that genre, you're going to need at least a little bit of cash put by for a scare or two.

So, here the film-makers use every trick in the book to avoid actually showing anything that might involve spending money. Even the sound effects and demonic voices are only played when an actor is facing the other way - I guess that saves on matching up an actor's mouth to the dubbed dialogue.

This could have been a student film for it's overall look, feel, cast and lack of budget. If you're looking for a great film called 'The Cottage' then there's an Andy Serkis film of the same name released back in 2008. It's wonderfully black comedy and it didn't have much of a budget either, but it's a million times better than this one.

I gave it a 5 because it was so convoluted, may be a 1.

[song_of_rainbow · 5/10 · 12 June 2023]

I had zero idea, of what the heck this is. Plus it had 5 characters (hence the 5), or at least I think so. Great comedy, assuming that was the idea. Or what ever. This doesn't contain spoilers because I was so confused. A group of 5 which turn to 4, until number 5 shows up again 25 minutes later, except that it was night time two or was three times in between. I am not kidding., The group included an high school exorcist, who did nothing but tell someone else to do something. I don't remember having this much fun with such as mess of "horror" movie. If someone decides to review this movie, let me know, I need help. LOL.

So Dull It's Hard to Review.

[icocleric · 1/10 · 5 October 2023]

A film so bad even with it's 47 minute run time it managed to put stay it's welcome. It's boring, and painfully amateur from the acting, to the film quality itself. You can even see the camera shake at times. Nothing much happens.

It gets weirdly religious too, with a lot of prayers, and prayer circles. The end was so amusing it could have been from a horror comedy, but I can't tell if it was meant to be like that or not?

Overall its boring and adds absolutely nothing new to the horror genre. So much, that it's actually difficult to get the word count up on this to leave a review. It really was that dull.

What have i just watched?

[iamtherobotman · 1/10 · 11 October 2023]

I know film makers all have to start somewhere, but i would urge the makers of this to not make another film.

There was a loose plot for this which i think was about five friends heading off to a 'cabin in the woods' for a weekend away before they all head off for college. They inadvertently awaken something Evil.

If you're imagining something akin to 'Evil Dead', then get that idea right out your head.

This was so bad, i swear they adlibbed the entire thing. The camera work is terrible. You visibly see the shot wobble on a couple of occasions. Once the 5 arrive in the 'wilderness' which is actually a main street in a small town(yes, the wilderness is a small town with a wide main street) the 'actors' are out of focus as they get out the car.

The sound is poorly dubbed, with certain lines very clearly having been recorded indoors while the 'actors' are clearly outdoors. We have so much background noise at times and then the editing has a deafening silence as we await the next Shakespearean line to be uttered from one of the Fantastic Five.

So once they arrive in the 'wilderness' it's a 15 minute walk to their cottage, so off they saunter and i do mean saunter, with absolutely no purpose, almost as though if they did walk at regular walking pace for 30 seconds, they'd arrive at their main street 'wilderness' cottage. All the shots of them walking through the 'wilderness' are accompanied by the main street clearly visible in the background. Along the way, one lad starts reading an information board, stating that the 'witches' of Salem stayed here before moving onto Salem. This would then suggest that the film is going to contain elements of Witchcraft, perhaps even have a slight 'Blair Witch' element to it. Right? Wrong. This scene would be as well not being in the film, as it leads nowhere.

This 15 minute 'crawl' seems to exhaust them all, as once they arrive at the cottage(which has a clear road outside of it, so they could've driven right up to the gate), one of them declares that they should 'check-in'. They all stand at the gate, 5 paces from the door and declare that they just want to sit down for a couple of minutes (so i presume they were to go to a certain cabin in order to 'check-in' with the owner). They then all sit on the porch for pretty much the rest of the film, so who did they check-in with? No one.

They decide to then go and collect some wood for a camp fire later that night (we find out later that it's only around 10am, so no one can accuse them of being unprepared for night fall.). The two females head off and after some painful dialogue about one of them fancying one the lads and not knowing what to do and the other lassie giving some of the worst advice i've ever heard, they trot the 10 yards back to the cottage with literally half a dozen twigs between them.

The lad the lassie fancies, then decides he needs to use the toilet, but there is only an outhouse at the bottom of the garden(which judging by everything else in relation to the cottage, can't be any more than 15 steps away), but he decides that he'll walk back to where the car was parked and use facilities he saw there( probably a restaurant or a cafe, Hell, maybe even someone's house. I don't know?), so off he goes. It suddenly goes dark and the outside porch light magically turns on (when it had previously been off during daylight hours)... It must be an eclipse. No, it can't be "i've not read anything about an eclipse" says our in house genius. Nothing about an eclipse not happening as though someone flicked a switch... Not to worry, 'you' can head off 10 steps and pick up another 3 twigs because what 'we' collected 5 minutes ago might not be enough to sustain the camp fire tonight...Really?? You think so??

So something happens, they all split up and are attacked by an unseen assailant. Three of them make it back to the cottage safely (well done on navigating those 10 steps by the way) and the one who was sent to get to more wood for the fire gets lost, even though the house is literally within touching distance of the one area which seems to have twigs. By the time she bursts back through the door, the light switch has been flicked again, and it's daylight and no one seems bothered by this in the slightest.

Nothing else happens, but the light switch is flicked one more time and it's dark again and the lights are once more switched on where they had been switched off during the daylight.

One of them turns out to be possessed by something, i don't know what because we've not actually been told anything in this film so far, and after an attempted exorcism which failed quicker than their collective acting careers, they decide to pray to 'bless' the house.

Toilet guy bursts back through the door, and the light switch has been flicked again, that's right, it's broad daylight again.

"Where have you been?" they all cry out in unison. "Why i've been to the toilet"..."How long have you been away?"..."only 30 minutes... But i'm ready to get out of here now, if you guys are up for that!".. Wait. What? You've spent a total of 5 minutes at the cottage, then you ran off to the toilet for half an hour and you're ready to go home?? How bad was the toilet?? (i suspect it must be at least as bad as this film). SO of course they all rush out of the cottage and arrive home 5 minutes later (because presumably this entire film was filmed within a 20 meter radius).

This was bad. I have a certain admiration for those involved for actually releasing this and not just wiping it off their hard drive. That shows courage.