Horror Movie Double Feature: GHOUL and THE CURSE OF THE WITCHING TREE

School is out (Yay!) and the rains just seem like they are never going to stop . . . so I decided to hit up Hastings for some new release horror movies this weekend and picked a pair of winners for a change!

THE CURSE OF THE WITCHING TREE (2015) has a few flaws but overall was an enjoyable story. A woman whose husband has been in a coma for some months purchases a farm out in the Kentish countryside of England and moves in with her son and daughter. (One of the biggest problems I had with this film is that the daughter appears to be the same age if not slightly older than her thirtysomething mother!) Turns out an innocent woman was murdered for witchcraft there back during the plague years, and her angry spirit seeks revenge by murdering nine local children every generation. Overall this is a well-done film, a bit slow, but with a nice building suspense and some genuinely creepy moments. The acting is not bad, and as long as you don't mind a slow burn, it's generally worth the finish. 4/5

GHOUL (2015) An American film crew visits Ukraine to film the pilot of a series called "Twentieth Century Cannibals". They are seeking survivors of the great famine of 1932, when starving Ukrainian kulaks ate their own children while struggling to survive Stalin's catastrophic collective farming experiments. They find that a local man was accused of killing and eating his comrade some twenty years before, but was not convicted due to lack of evidence. He offers to grant them an interview if they will meet him at a remote farmhouse, and they agree. A local psychic agrees to accompany them there, and once they are lodged there, Boris the cannibal does not show up . . . but eerie stuff begins to happen. They discover the house is linked with the blood-soaked career of Russia's most prolific serial killer, Andrei Chikatilo. The situation grows progressively more bizarre and unsettling with each scene, and the ending is incredibly intense and horrifying. One of the best "found footage" movies I have ever seen. This one gets a 5/5 all the way around.