Deadstream

Directed by Joseph Winter and Vanessa Winter, Deadstream follows vlogger Shawn Ruddy (Joseph Winter) as he documents his journey into a notoriously haunted house. There’s little doubt, ultimately, that Deadstream fares best in its promising, engaging opening stretch, as the Winters, armed with their own screenplay, do an effective job of establishing the affable central character and the perilous situation in which he finds himself – with the agreeable atmosphere heightened by an initial emphasis on creepy, ominous happenings within that aforementioned haunted house (ie the film is legitimately tense in parts). There’s little doubt, then, that Deadstream’s eventual transformation into a larger-than-life, over-the-top horror comedy is rather disappointing, to say the least, as the movie’s frenetic (and egregiously broad) second half grows less and less interesting (and more and more tedious) as it unfolds – with the tolerable vibe due almost entirely to Winter’s continually likable turn as the sympathetic protagonist. The final result is a typically erratic screenlife endeavor that rarely, if ever, lives up to the potential of its early stages, although, by that same token, it’s fairly apparent that the picture’s goofy bent is as love-it-or-hate-it a proposition as exists.

** out of ****