Customer Reviews

The Landlord

5 star:		(0)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(2)
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1 star:		(0)

 

 

This was a fun movie. Great concept about (potential spoiler) a landlord who is a slave to a couple of demons and ensures a steady stream of tenants who can double as food for the demons. Its a fun tongue-in-cheek style horror, obviously much more focused on comic elements than achieving actual scares. While I very much enjoyed the concept, the production values were just awful. For example, the demon shown on the DVD cover art is a character in the movie. Its a normal guy (not CG) who carries a ton of makeup to look like the demon, not a mask or any other special effect. The problem is that the makeup is very unevenly applied, and changes in every shot. In some cases, especially side shots, you can see clearly where the makeup artist got tired and just gave up. I know this is low budget and meant to be low budget, and there is a certain kitch-yness to low budget horror, but that got a bit distracting after a while. Also, there's scenes shot outdoors where individuals clearly not extras accidentally ended up being part of the shot merely by virtue of their observing the filming. Very amateurish. Also, while the story was clearly fun, there were a lot of extraneous elements that just confused the matter. There's an affair that just doesn't quite add any value to the story, a separate group of different breed monsters/demons that also add no particular value. In short, it tried to achieve too many plot elements that ended up distracting and not adding value to the story. Again, it was a cute movie that could have been better, but clearly is very worthy of at least a rental.

I enjoyed this film, I picked it up last year in 2009 at a horror con in Chicago from the filmmakers. I feel that it is not meant to be true horror film but rather a horror comedy type of flick. The main character in the film is rather funny from the way he does things. Some dude has these demonic things living in one of his apartments that he has somewhat became buddies with. The demonic creatures kills the tenets before the owner can collect the months payment...I like it when the cops come to investigate as they are just waiting for the landlord to slip up and make a mistake...the landlord always gets stuck cleaning up the mess that the demons leave behind (most of the time). I would recommend this film as I have seen nothing like it before.

Too many low-budget films are too ambitious for their own good. What's wrong with making a genuinely entertaining film on the budget you have to work with? The makers of "The Landlord" clearly had this in mind, and the result is a low-budget film that almost completely avoids most of the pitfalls that detract from the entertainment value of many low-budget films regardless of genre. Lead actor Derek Dziak is excellent and endearing as Tyler, young landlord of a three-flat where the top floor is inhabited by a pair of demonic entities with a bad habit of eating new tenants as soon as they move in. Meanwhile, Tyler's policewoman sister Amy (Michelle Courvais) and her partner try to keep the city's supernatural forces from spilling out into everyday life while skimming a little off the top for themselves. The film moves at a good clip, with strong performances across the board, and while the special effects aren't the center of attention they get the job done-- you'll probably be having too much fun to care. One of the best independent horror films I've seen in ages, definitely recommended for horror fans looking for something fun and unique!

I had expected The Landlord to be scary, and in many ways it is. It is also rather campy.
I had never thought a bunch of demons to be so funny and in many ways stupid. And that goes for the landlord himself as well.