V/H/S Viral

The V/H/S series continues with this typically erratic entry that’s often as tedious as it is entertaining, with the movie boasting a trio of tales revolving around a power-hungry magician, a portal to an alternate universe, and a trip to Tijuana gone very, very wrong. (There’s also, as expected, a wraparound story that’s both useless and incoherent.) It’s worth noting that V/H/S Viral gets off to a fairly promising start, as the first installment, Gregg Bishop’s Dante the Great, details the exploits of a fledgling magician whose career takes off after he discovers (and begins using) a demonic cape. Bishop’s decision to abandon the found-footage format – the story is presented as a documentary, essentially – results in a refreshingly coherent atmosphere, and although the short’s first half is quite engaging and creative, Biship offers up a scare-free, over-the-top finale that’s more chaotic than anything else. The movie peaks with its second tale, Parallel Monsters, as filmmaker Nacho Vigalondo offers up an intriguing, sci-fi heavy story about a man who discovers an alternate reality, with the Twilight Zone-esque trajectory of this installment essentially compensating for its complete lack of creepy or frightening moments/images. The final short, Aaron Moorhead and Justin Benson’s Bonestorm, contains a decent setup that’s ultimately squandered to a seriously distressing degree, as the story builds to a finale that couldn’t possibly be less interesting and more incoherent. (It doesn’t help, either, that Moorhead and Benson’s protagonists are about as unlikeable as one could possibly imagine.) The end result is an anthology that’ll please fans of this series and annoy its detractors, and it’s ultimately impossible not to wish that the filmmakers involved would put some effort into actually scaring the viewer.

**1/2 out of ****