Search - Walled In on DVD

Sharon F. (Shar) from AVON PARK, FL
Reviewed on 2/11/2022...

I hate it when they call suspense movies "horror" movies! Lots of twists and turns in this mystery movie.

1 of 2 member(s) found this review helpful.

K. K. (GAMER)
Reviewed on 1/4/2022...

This definitely has it's own uniqueness!

1 of 1 member(s) found this review helpful.

CLAUSTROPHOBIC HORROR

Mark Turner | 04/19/2009

(3 out of 5 stars)

"One good thing about the newest generation of horror film directors is their willingness to move on to something different, to make horror films with new ideas and stories rather than just rely on the tried and true. It may not always make the best film or the scariest, but at least they make the attempt and deserve credit for doing so. Such is the case with WALLED IN.



The film opens with a young child trapped in a tall yet small cell, perhaps 2 feet wide. As she calls for her father, the cell beings to flood with a dark bluish gray substance we can only assume is concrete. It fills until it covers her and we move forward to the present day.



Mischa Barton plays Sam Walczak, a young woman who has just graduated from her training as a demolition engineer. Belonging to a family and demolitionists, it is her job to study the structure of a building and decide the best way to bring it down. As a graduation gift, her father presents her with the task of setting up the demolition of a building made by a famous architect.



Arriving at the location, she is stunned to find that the building stands alone in the middle of nowhere. The building is a huge apartment complex. The inhabitants left in the building are sparse at best. They include the landlady Mary (Deborah Kara Under) and her strange son Jimmy (Cameron Bright), an elderly woman who was secretary to the architect and still houses many of his records/books in her apartment and a vet who lives there as well.



As Sam wanders the halls and checks out the building for stress points, she is observed by someone. We discover that it's Jimmy, who is attracted to her, yet definitely too young. Sam sees this and although engaged, somewhat flirts with the boy in the hopes of learning more about the building.



Jimmy does reveal a lot about the building and its architect. It seems that the building was the site of a nefarious murder many years prior, one that took the life of his father. While a handy man was blamed for the deaths, it was thought that the architect was behind them all, especially since he disappeared shortly after they occurred. In all, 16 people were missing and a few were discovered, cemented into the walls of the building.



Sam and Jimmy continue to look through the building, including a secret room that always remains locked upstairs. While there, Sam witnesses Mary talking to one of the walls and acting strangely. As she wanders these halls, her own sense of fear and claustrophobia take hold and she begins to feel as if she's being watched. Good call.



Someone is watching Sam. But just who is it and what they want aren't revealed until near the end of the film. And just what evil presides over this house and why don't come out till the building is nearly destroyed with Sam in it.



The majority of this film is build up and revelation as to the secrets of the building and its designer. Like an onion, pieces are peeled back and we discover not only the secret of the complex itself but that of its tenants and the reason it was built like it was. Giving up that information here might provide you with some answers, but the development of those answers are what actually make this movie better than one would expect.



Suffice to say that there is an evil here and one that affects all who enter. And it's not simply one person keeping an eye on the others but more than one. The last portion of the film, perhaps 30 minutes or so, deal with what happens when Sam discovers the evil behind the building and her attempts to escape from it.



The acting here isn't the best but not the worst either. Barton does a standard job but you sometimes question why the character doesn't just stop digging into the secrets and call for back up from her family. If it's simple pride because it's her first job, okay but still, when in over your head, look for help.



Bright as Jimmy is an odd choice. Having seen him in several other films, his characters always seem a bit off. It's as if you know up front that he's troubled and going to be behind a lot of what's going on. While he does a good job, perhaps someone else might have been a less obvious choice for the role. Then again, maybe he isn't what he seems to be at first. You'll have to watch to find out.



The movie clocks in at 91 minutes and all offer an interesting tale of horror that doesn't rely on gore or chainsaws. Instead we get a thoughtful well thought out plot that makes you glad you're not renting here. It's that sort of creepy old dark house feeling you got from classic films and yet it takes place in a modern setting. The spirits are definitely up to something here and just what or who isn't something you're likely to guess up front. For an interesting horror film that delivers, this one comes off pretty well.

"

If this film was in French it would be great Euro trash... O

APC Reviews | USA | 12/15/2009

(4 out of 5 stars)

"If this film was in French it would be a perfect piece of style conscious, Euro trash "suspense" and "terror-lite" type movie making. It is not in French. But it is, however, unashamed to act out its peculiar premise and its stylishly framed but derivative plot devices with a vague Euro-esque decadence, as though everyone in the film wished that they had in fact been speaking French or Italian. Think "The Shinning" meets "Psycho" meets "Sailor Who Fell From Grace With The Sea". In fact, echoing "Sailor Who Fell...", Mischa Barton bears a more than suggestive resemblance to Sarah Miles, and Cameron Bright bears a striking resemblance to Jonathan Kahn, the boy who played Sarah Miles' son in "Sailor Who Fell..."



There's something about the film that makes you think that the producers and writers were thinking of Asia Argento, or felt that aspiring to make an Asia Argento like film was a high calling.



The production values are much higher than you might have any reason to expect, and the film is stylishly and well designed, lit and photographed. The lead actors all do very serviceable work, and Mischa Barton is especially good in her Sarah Miles mode. However, the presence of many different production and distributing company logos on the front end of the movie is the sure tip off that this direct to video production has been handed around quite a bit to raise the necessary capital and deals to get itself before the camera and finally out into the marketplace. How many companies does it require to fund, produce and distribute a C-list movie? Four or five, evidently.



This Blu-Ray disc is so cheap it has no menus, no pop up menus, no extras and no sound options at all. Nada. It just plays, over and over.



Is it scary? Not really. Is it anxiety provoking? Well, no. Is it peculiar that a world famous architect, thought to be dead, has been secretly living the life of an imprisoned mole at the bottom of an eight story tall well hidden in the center of a Neutra like high-rise apartment building located in the vast empty fields of Saskatchewan, while waiting for a beautiful woman to someday fall into, or be fed into, the shaft by a Norman Bates like looney-kid with a strangely foxy mother, who both live almost alone in the building after all the other residents have either been inexplicably murdered or have moved out, so that the architect may entomb the woman, or himself, using an automatic concrete mixing and pouring system of his own device, built into the building with forethought of this eventuality and a knowledge of ancient Egyptian building practices, so as to make the foundations of the building immortal? Well, uh-huh.



Is it great to watch Deborah Kara Unger be Deborah Kara Unger and to scope out the decaying but stylish mid-century modern sets, furnishings and set dressing? Well, you betcha. This film has to be on the "guilty pleasures" shelf. But, still, it's there for a reason. Oddly recommendable.

"

Condemned for being structurally unsound . . .

trebe | 02/07/2010

(2 out of 5 stars)

"Walled-In (2009) does provide some twisted minor thrills, but despite having four writers, the story makes almost no logical sense. Director Gilles Paquet-Brenner is in charge of this mess that features Mischa Barton (The O.C.), as Samantha Walczak, of the firm Walczak and Sons (where are the sons?) who are in the business of demolishing buildings. Her job is to determine the best way to demolish an ugly, monolithic apartment building, located in an isolated area, in an unspecified American location.



The structure was designed by architect Joseph Malestrazza (Pascal Greggory), who apparently had some radical ideas regarding building materials, as some fifteen years prior (1993), human bodies were discovered inside the concrete walls of the structure. One of the dead, was the husband of the building's current caretaker Mary Sutter (Deborah Kara Unger), who along with her teenage son Jimmy (Cameron Bright), are among the handful, still residing in the condemned structure. Jimmy is enamored with Sam, and their developing 'relationship' is about all there is happening here, besides Sam wandering around the halls measuring, and painting red X's where the demo charges are supposed to go. Events suddenly take a dramatic turn in the film's final act, as matters descend into a dark twisted opera.



Relying on `atmosphere' and ignoring reality, pretentious, melodramatic, drivel like this, insults the intelligence of the audience. The setting is unique, but not in a credible way. The unattractive building is supposed to have been the home for hundreds of people, yet there isn't even a paved road to the place. There are no visible utility poles, so power and communication service apparently gets there via underground lines. Hardly likely. The building is built alongside a lake? Tricky to do, but possible. The structure isn't compliant with building code, as it has no elevator, landscaping, fire alarm system, exterior lighting, or covered parking. It does however have crappy lighting, hidden shafts and passages, some restless spirits, a totally wacked out roof (are those solar panels?), and an overall design that would never have been approved by any competent building department in the USA. The building's biggest 'secret', just could never happen.



Sam Walczak is laughable as an engineer. This job is her big test as a professional, yet she knows absolutely nothing about the history of the building, and has to rely on a kid for information. The term 'blueprint' is archaic, referring to a process that has not been used for decades. Explosive charges are typically placed to destroy structural members, usually columns. A structural wall does not crumble when hit with an axe, so there's no point painting an X to plant a charge there. Sam is working in a low light environment, exploring unlighted shafts, but doesn't even have a flashlight.



Mischa Barton does what she can, but the script is appallingly awful. Cameron Bright does a good job as an annoying, creepy kid, but unfortunately the best acting that Deborah Kara Unger does, is in the humorous making of featurette, where she talks about how great the film is."