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13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Campy, surrealist horror, January 3, 2005
This movie isn't for everyone. If you're looking for a straightforward horror film, go away. If you prefer clear, definitive endings that don't have to be contemplated, discussed and savored over coffee afterwards, look elsewhere. If you cannot stand movies with wandering timelines (Memento, Pulp ficiton, etc.), this is not for you. And if you're just looking for a lot of blood and some nudie scenes, dear god, please put down this review right now and go watch Friday the 13 Part 200 or something.
Like camp? Like humor? Plots that twist in upon themselves? Great quirky acting performances by Jeffrey Combs and Seth Green (and an amusing cameo by Alice Cooper)? Strange Lovecraftian references buried for the alert to notice? This movie is for you.
Still with me? Great. All the other reviews have summarized the plot, so I won't waste more pixels on that. Rather, here's some advice for watching this movie: Don't try to take this linearly (advice uttered by the director himself when I saw it at the sneak preview). Don't expect everything you see to be as it appears. Take careful note of what frames the main character's experiences, for that denotes the boundaries of the real from the experienced. Pay attention - there are a lot of subtle things that you'll miss otherwise. Yes, some of the acting is campy and doesn't seem real - hmm, could that be intentional? And don't watch this with a six-pack and a bunch of friends who like to make fun of movies; you won't be able to follow the plot at all that way.
This is a fun movie. It is also a movie that expects, nay, demands, that its viewers pay attention and think if they want to know what is going on. Partially an enigma to be puzzled out, partially a campy rollercoaster ride. All good fun.
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8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
The Attic Snoozes, August 15, 2002
As a lover of the strange and macabre, I thought this movie had real potential. Sadly, it didn't live up to that potential. The initial setup of a young man in an institution trying to piece together his memories of a bizarre ritual gone awry was promising. Andras Jones (Alice's brother in Nightmare on Elm Street 4) does a credible job of portraying the tortured patient. Jeffrey Combs, who I have always liked, is wasted here as the psycho doctor performing off-the-wall brain operations in hopes of discovering the whereabouts of the magic book our hero used in the aforementioned ritual. The rest of the cast, led by Seth Green, are decent as the other residents of the "house". Seth's character is by far the best. Unfortunately, these were the only high points of this film. The rest of this mish-mash is a series of dialogues and dream sequences that leave the viewer saying, "What did I just watch?" And this is by no means a compliment. The ending only suffices in enhancing this feeling. I gave this two stars only due to the acting, and a few interesting visual elements such as an attic trunk with a staircase inside. If you like truly bizarre movies with no real outcome, you may enjoy this. Otherwise, there are better choices out there.
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14 of 18 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Esoteric Minds and the Doctors That Break Them, November 30, 2002
The Attic Expeditions, met most unfairly by a storm of rejection, is not a film for the atypical movie-munching masses. In fact, when my friends first saw it they told me that this was a throwaway and that it was something to avoid, but, defying their wishes because of Mr. Combs, I picked it up, watched it, and was thoroughly smitten by the complexity of the product itself. It is this exact reason that I think this film finds many a negative opinions because, unlike most movies, it works through multifaceted means, coupling a rich plot and the stunning array of quality actors with a concept to grasp the attention of those wanting a bit more than blood and the beastly. Typified as "the thinking person's horror movie," and rightly so, it spends a great deal of time addressing the psychologically barred windows within the human condition and adding in a dash of the esoteric to boot. Here we have an oddly enjoyable experience pitting the incomparable Jeffrey Combs, playing the wonderfully diabolical Doctor Ek, against the psyche of our main character, Trevor Blackburn, a man awakening in a sanitarium after a four year hiatus from reality with only fragments of yesterday to feed from. The good doctor muddles the matter for our memory-devoid lead even more by telling him that he was involved in the bloody murder of his fiancee while participating in, as Blackburn himself supposedly described it before his little 48 month nap, "a magikal ceremony gone awry." Ek then tells Blackburn not to worry about the reluctancy of his mind, that he will be giving him the best care possible by sending him to the esteemed "House of Love" and that his memory may come back to him there. From the moment he steps foot into the House that Ek Built Blackburn can tell something is awry, though, for everything from those strangely patterned walls that induce a feeling of Deja-vu to the introductions to his curiously deranged cohabitants that seem oddly untrustworthy makes him uncomfortable, making him (and the viewer) wonder what's really going on. His dreams further complicate things, showing him a place in the attic with a somewhat familiar trunk in it, one that holds secrets in both reality and within Trevor's mind. Even in the opening sequences you can tell that this movie is going to have some plot complexities and defy the atypical approach to psychological horror, introducing the viewer to a strange framework from the initial "waking up on the operating table and not knowing who you are or what's going on" stages to the diced bits of memory that Blackburn slowly beings to recall and, finally, to both the build and the ending that keeps you guessing until the end. There are even a few Great Old One connotations sprinkled in there for the fun (and to make the ceremony seem a bit more delicious), further getting my Lovecraftian blood pumping. Its worth watch multiple times if only for the torment of it all.
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