The V/H/S/ franchise, a series of horror anthology films from rising directorial stars in the genre in which the components share the same thematic conceit of purportedly being found footage and the same overall time frame, certainly has a devoted fan base in the genre film community but I must confess that they have not done that much for me. The problem is the same one that has plagued pretty much every film of its type not named Creepshow or made in England in the early Seventies as a way to supply people like Peter Cushing with pocket money—while each of the movies (including the 2012 original, V/H/S/2 (2013), V/H/S/Viral (2014), V/H/S/94 (2021), and V/H/S/99) has had at least one stellar contribution to speak of, the other entries in each title have varied wildly too wildly in terms of overall quality, leading to the deep desire in viewers get into the spirit of things and hit either “fast-forward” or ‘reject.”
Because of that, you can probably surmise that I was not exactly filled with glee over seeing this year’s entry to the saga, V/H/S/85, which tells five stories smack dab in the middle of the Reagan era. That said, I have to confess that my original instincts were correct because this one is actually one of the more consistently entertaining films of this sort that I have seen—unlike most cases, where the misses outrank the hits, this edition has a greatly improved batting average this time around. In fact, I would say that four of the stories are definite successes and even though the fifth ultimately doesn’t work, it is more along the lines of a missed opportunity than an outright dud.
The trouble with reviewing a film like this is that because the stories are short, quickly get to the punch and contain surprises best left unrevealed here, it is hard to recount then to any degree without running the risk of spoiling them, though I will do my best to avoid this. In MIchael P. Nelson’s “No Wake,” a group of friends drive up in an RV to a secluded lake where they come across some junked signs that appear to be a warning about something—inevitably, the gang decides to ignore them and just as inevitably, things soon go quickly and gruesomely out of control. Gigi Saul Guerrero’s “God of Death” opens in the midst of a Mexican news broadcast that is interrupted but what appears to be a catastrophic earthquake—as a group of survivors struggle to make it out of the crumbling studio, they discover that being crushed by falling concrete is the least of their worries.
Natasha Kermani’s “TKNOGD” finds a performance artist doing her latest piece before a small and mostly perplexed crowd that revolves around her belief that we as a society have rejected our traditional notion of God in order to worship technology. To critique and mock this mindset, she then employs proto-VR technology to help make her point but it ends up backfiring badly (though it does result in the rarity of a performance art piece where something actually happens). Scott Derrickson’s “Dreamkill” follows two cops, a detective (Freddy Rodriguez) and a videographer (James Ransome) investigating a series of videotapes they have been receiving that seem to depict grisly murders that don’t occur until a couple of days after they were sent. Finally, serving as a sort of wraparound, Dave Bruckner’s “Total Copy” uses the format of a Hard Copy-style magazine show to present the story of a group of scientists who discover what appears to be an alien life form and put it under observation in their lab without having any idea of what it is or what it is capable of—needless to say, it does not end well for most of them.
Of the five, my favorite is probably “No Wake,” which, in addition to being the goriest of the stories (not that the others are particularly reticent in this regard), includes the cleverest storytelling, including a particularly audacious narrative gambit that may frustrate viewers at first but which ends up having a particularly inspired and darkly amusing payoff. “God of Death” maybe falters a little bit when it gets to the punchline but the journey that it takes viewers on to get there is staged in an impressively grueling manner (though this is the segment where the conceit that someone is still running a video camera amidst the unfolding chaos is stretched to the near-breaking point). “TKNOGD” is an intriguing idea and while not all of its elements quite come off (the presence of the live audience for the show is not handled well), it is short enough so that it is over before it begins to get repetitive. “Dreamkill” is another standout that effectively mixes the found-footage horror concept with a story that at time plays like an homage to MIchael Mann’s 80s-era classic Manhunter. “Total Copy” is the one that doesn’t quite make it for me—it ultimately plays more like a shaggy dog (or some other creature) story that a satisfying narrative—but even then, the accurate replication of the cheap syndicated magazine shows of the era ensures that it is at least watchable.
Of course, as is always the case with anthology films, your mileage of the various segments of V/H/S/85 may vary. That said, there is no obvious clinker in the bunch as has been the case in past entries and they all do a pretty good job of both integrating the found footage conceit and evoking the era in question though the various visual approaches used throughout. Overall, the film is a smart, grisly and largely effective Whitman’s Sampler of what is going on with the new voices in contemporary horror cinema and for once, the news is pretty good. I don’t know if the producers just got lucky with this crop of stories or if they made a concerted effort to go in with stronger material but the result is by far the best of the bunch and sets a high bar for the franchise to attain when the next installment comes along.