Anneliese: The Exorcist Tapes (DVD)
Starring no one of any merit or importance
Directed by no one of any merit or importance
Distributed by The Asylum
The Asylum has long been a film(!) company of little merit. From their endless stream of mockbusters to their popular by sheer absurdity films involving mega this-or-thats and giant something-or-others, they have managed to carve out a name of sorts for themselves within the industry. How much water said name holds is a completely different story, but nonetheless, they’re apparently here to stay.
When word broke that they had uncovered actual video recordings of possession victim Anneliese Michel (real details here), we knew it was going to be bullshit before we even saw the trailer and clips. The chick playing Anneliese didn’t even have the right hair length. Still, we thought maybe, just maybe, at the very least they could put together a semi-coherent low-budget spooker. That was not to be.
What we have here is shit. Shit, poo, crap, excrement, and brown biscuits. All this flick is, is a shoddily assembled direct-to-video farce using elements from three cameras (one of which appears to be an HD camcorder, so the makers of this mess must have transcended the space-time continuum) with your usual cast of people who can’t act, working from a script you can’t buy, pulling tricks out of The Exorcist playbook that you won’t care about. Nothing works. Nada, nil, zero, donut land.
I give it to the actress playing Anneliese, though. For better or worse she really goes for it, and whatever shreds of goodness there are to be found here come from her performance and her performance alone.
In terms of the actual recordings The Asylum claims to have secured for this latest cinema travesty, every once in a while the actual audio recordings of the real Anneliese are played over either a black screen with white text or over a scene of the lead using her body language to do something “scary“. Listening to Anneliese is deeply disturbing. You cannot help but feel the pain in her voice and the torment that she went through. Using those recordings (which by the way are readily available on YouTube so The Asylum in all actuality secured jack-shit) to sell DVDs is not only exploitative, it’s just plain tasteless and not in a fun way.
In keeping with their mantra of “What you are about to see is real”, also included on this DVD is a quick documentary that by the time all is said and done you will not give a fuck about.
There’s only one reason to watch Anneliese: The Exorcist Tapes, and that’s to marvel at the fact that The Asylum is not only in business, but that they’re actually making money. Well, that and the silliest sounding German accents ever put to film since “Hogan’s Heroes”.
Avoid this one like a hooker with a scorching case of herpes.
Special Features
1 out of 5
Special Features
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1/2 out of 5
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