Blackout Haunted House (Review) (NYC Haunted House 2011)

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There was once a boxer from Brooklyn who started making waves in the sport. At first, people would hear whispers and first hand accounts of a kid with a serious punch who was knocking the shit out of his opponents. Nobody knew if this kid actually existed but then he got some exposure and the knockouts kept coming. He soon became the world heavyweight champion.

He didn't come out to any fancy ring music. He didn't wear a robe but instead wore plain black trunks and plain black socks and sneakers. You knew what you were going to see when he stepped into the ring. You were going to see the most intimidating man on the fuckin planet and a scared shitless opponent. When the fight started, there were hits you didn't see coming, punches that came out of nowhere and a knockout that brought you to your feet. This poor opponent didn't stand a chance and was left beatened, downtrodden and utterly stunned by what had happened.

That's the best way to metaphorically describe Blackout Haunted House, bar none the best haunted house in NYC. It's like stepping into the ring with an in his prime Iron Mike Tyson and though you know you're gonna get the crap kicked out of you, you'll live to tell about it. What's more awesome than that?

Having attended last year (see review here and walkthrough here) and the Spring edition (see review here) I am truly proud to be part of "The Survivors Club", a group of 20 or so strong men and women who have become hardened veterans of Vortex Theater's Haunted House. These select few who went through the May "invite only" have experienced the most extreme trauma they've ever paid for. I think some have not spoken about it since that day (well except for me). But even as a survivor, I was still a little nervous of what was to come. I had a gut feeling Josh Randall and Kris Thor, the minds behind this fringe experiment in terror, would up the ante and go over and I mean way over the edge of their previous installments. And they totally freakin do.

Blackout is their best version yet. It's like being a star in a living, breathing torture porn horror movie. You're the final girl (or guy). You meet the characters of Blackout, interact with them and even push the story to its final conclusion. But make no mistake, it's not going to be an easy journey.

YOU WILL SUFFER.

YOU WILL BE TORTURED.

YOU WILL BE FORCED TO DO THINGS THAT WILL MAKE YOU SICK.

YOU WILL SEE THINGS YOU WISH YOU NEVER SAW.

But as all final girls/guys do, you're going to survive. It's the most gratifying feeling you will ever get. Being a survivor of Blackout Haunted House is a graduation from your most dreaded fears be it sexual depravity, germ warfare, Abu Gharab torture, claustrophobia and the eerie quiet of pitch black darkness. Blackout has conjured up a class in each of these and the only way you actually FAIL is by screaming the word: SAFETY. And as far as I know, they've gotten a ton of failing students.

I however got an A+ and never uttered the word. But the experience was still as frightening as ever. It seems, unknown to me, Josh had personalized my walkthrough. Characters were uttering MY NAME as they leveled me with trauma. That really hit hard for me and made it 10 times more intimidating. As much as it was a treat for me, it's not standard treatment so don't expect you'll be hearing your name in the darkness.

I'm not going to give a walkthrough and spoilers until after Halloween. So if you came here to read a step by step guide, move along this isn't the review you're looking for. But I will tell you that Blackout is 100 times better than it was last year and more terrifying than the Spring version. You will have to go through it alone and you are equipped with a protective mask and a flashlight and all the rules will come into play. You will be touched, pushed and shoved like a protester at Occupy Wall Street (but without the baton beatings and pepper spray attacks). It's this level of physicality that separates itself from all other haunted houses. Expect it...it's gonna happen and it's gonna freak you out.

Blackout is NYC Halloween Haunted House on Grade A steroids. The performances by the actors are stellar and frightening. The crew is more volatile and unyielding. The sets and rooms and backdrops are beautifully crafted and convey a filth and deterioration of utter despair and hopelessness. As you go from room to room, you slowly fall apart. I started very aware and was mentally preparing myself for what was to come. Rooms with high tech jeepers creepers bring the creepy. As you move on to total darkness, your eyes shut down and your other senses get heightened. I even began to get some sort of Spider Sense. As I sat in a room, possibly all alone? shining a pathetic flashlight on any thing I sensed was getting too close...my spider sense started tingling.

Then BOOM! here comes the torturous depravity and by the time that's ended I'm completely disoriented and in the midst of my panic I don't hear an order to walk down some stairs and I'm stumbling into rooms I've already been in and being pointed towards the way out. But it continues and continues and you have to keep trudging along knowing in the back of your mind there is an end to this madness.

My one gripe I always had with previous installments is that there was limited interaction with the characters. But that has all changed this year. I played the part of final hero guy and I played it well. You'll have to do actions when told to and some of these will make you gag and squirm. I even hesitated at times but I knew that in order to keep going I HAD TO DO IT. These new little quirks in the experience amplified the overall experience. You really do feel like your playing a part in a sadistic horror story that you've accidentally stumbled upon. And you don't even have to wait to get to the good parts. You're thrown right into the ending.

And it's an ending you won't forget.

Blackout Haunted House is the haunted house other haunted houses are afraid of. It may lack the glitzy blockbuster sets, tech and visuals of it's competition. It may not be artistic or thematic or have a catchy premise. But it is the best haunted house in NYC. It's pure blacked out storefront oozes of intimidation. Once you walk through the doors, you enter their ring.

Prepare to be knocked out.

The Vitals

• The official site
• Like Blackout Haunted House on Facebook
• Like the NYC Halloween Haunted House on Facebook
• Follow on Twitter
• Blackout Haunted House is located at 54 West 39th Street (between 5th & 6th) and it's close to all major subway lines
• Tickets are $35 and are usually get sold out quickly. You can purchase tickets here.
• Blackout Haunted House runs until Halloween, 10/31/11.
  
• For more photos of Blackout Haunted House, check out the jaded viewer Facebook page!
• Special Thanks to the crew and actors from Vortex Productions/Blackout HH for all the kind words about the jaded viewer and giving me an awesome experience!
  

Check out the trailer!

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Here is my walkthrough and spoiler review of Blackout Haunted House!

Did you survive Blackout Haunted House? Leave your thoughts and comments below!

The Collector (Review)

The Collector

The Collector (2009)

Directed by Marcus Dunstan

I never liked Saw. My main gripe was it was told in flashbacks that destroyed the suspense. So all that was left was seeing how somebody died or lived through the trap.

Mind you I still watch the Saw movies even though I despise them. Why? Because it's like a bad TV show you've already watched a couple of episodes and you feel like you gotta keep watching just to see what they do next.

So going into The Collector, I expected more of the same. More traps, more flashbacks and an unstoppable killer. Well what do you know? There were traps, no flashbacks and we got an unstoppable killer.

Sigh.

Boring Plot-O-Matic

Desperate to repay his debt to his ex-wife, an ex-con plots a heist at his new employer's country home, unaware that a second criminal has also targeted the property, and rigged it with a series of deadly traps.

Awesome Review-O-Matic

To review this in a regular way would give me a headache, so instead you get some Q&A. Deal with it.

1.) Jigsaw can be hired for house calls now? The bad economy hit him hard. So what's the deal?

OK, it's not Jigsaw but it's Jigsaw's cousin who likes Home Depot alot. Dude where's a black lucha libre mask and he likes collecting people. Yes horror minions, this dude collects people. I guess he thinks they'll go up in value in a few years.

2.) So who's our final guy? I'm betting he's Asian because Asians make good final guys.

Hmm I don't see Asian Final Guys in the slasher handbook. But no it's a regular white dude. Seems this guy needs to help his wife and uses is burglar skills to rip off some rich guy's safe. But Collector Man hits the same house. Oh fuck for non Asian Final Guy.

3.) I hear Madeline Zima plays a goody two shoes, God fearing, very devout virgin in this flick?

She plays a chain smoking slut. What did you expect?

4.) Do we get to see her boobs?

Yup. They're real and they're spectacular.

5.) I wanna discuss the traps. They seem like real traps that can be put together in a few minutes without any real skills. I mean a table from IKEA is harder to put together than these elaborate traps...right?

Hahahaha. Holy fuckin cow jaded viewers. The biggest logic issues (besides Collector Man's tendency to collect people) has gotta be how he puts these traps together. Let's go through the list shall we in a WTF list?

• He boards up all the windows with wood planks with razors attached to them (WTF!?! This would take at least 3 hours and a crew of 3...c'mon now)
• He puts nail heads on the steps (WTF!?! That's a lot of hammering)
• Acid on the floor in a room (WTF?!? Wouldn't the acid burn through the wood?)
• Like 20 Bear traps on the floor (WTF?!? Bear traps are heavy and take a long time to prensap into place)
• A scissors trap that results on a death by nails on a wall (WTF?!? Now this takes some serious levers and pulley systems...who is this guy? MacGyver?)
• Another trap which pulls a victim by the feet (WTF?!? More wires and pulley systems. Does he have MIT students helping him out?)
• Fish hooks in the shower (WTF?!? I mean seriously..this is some tedious type shit)
• Various other traps that would require a crew of 25, working 24/7 and take at least 3 months to set up

6.) So do people who seem like douchebags die? I like seeing death by douchebaggery.

Yeah some rich people get zilched so thats always a plus. A few sporadic others die.

7.) I'm a proud card carrying member of the More Gore in Gore Movies Association of America. Should I watch this? Also, can you not tell my mom that I'm a member of the MGIGMAMA.

If you love the gore, you'll see the following: Some intestinal fortitude spewage, tongue trauma, nail trauma, bear trap trauma and death by dog neck trauma, lip trauma, teeth trauma

8.) Do any little kids spew any vulgarities?

Umm no dude. This isn't Kick-Ass.

9.) So is this Collector Man as badass as Jigsaw, Jason, Freddy or Michael?

It's like this dude saw too many Saw movies and wanted to be a slasher in real life. You know a Unabomber intellect but gothy. I suspect this guy has severe mental problems and he is from Bulgaria. Also, he's fuckin fat.

10.) Is there a wildly, ambiguous ending that foreshadows a sequel that will never see the light of day?

You know how these movies go. When you think you've won, shit comes out of nowhere to mess up your day. I blame inept cops and terrorists.

WTF Moment

How the fuck did he put all these traps together in like 20 minutes?

The Jaded Viewer's Final Prognosis

Well if you're a fan of those Jigsaw traps, I guess you'll like this flick. It's got some serious wicked ones which is why it gets half a rating more than it should get. The obvious logic questions in all these Saw and The Collector type movies has gotta be this:

1. How the hell can they afford to make all these traps?
2. Is there a website where I can learn to make these awesome traps? Say deathtrapsforbeginners.com?

Well I checked, there is no such site. Sigh.

Rating:

1/2

The Trailer

I'm a fan of watching people get surgically connected by their anus

Last September, I first heard of The Human Centipede and my jaw dropped. The stills were WHA!?!? The plot was double WHA?!? I even wrote:

"Is this the start of biotorture horror?"

The thing about a movie like The Human Centipede is its like eating really uber spicy food. Or kinda like eating super apocalyptic, nuclear hot wings. It's not going to taste good, you are probably going to vomit and it's going to make you feel sick, but if you get through it....well you're one of the few to get to experience the glory of getting through it.

I'm for one want a challenge. Only a few movies have seriously disturbed the shit out of me. And most of them have been German. But never did I think the Netherlands could come up with this (they must have awesome weed).

There are a few people who would seek out a film to see like this. In my 5 Types of Moviegoers who watch Horror Movies, The Core are #1. I'll go one extra. The Uber Core are the one's who want to experience seeing the vilest, disturbing, horrific films ever put on celluloid (or video).

These are the few, the brave men and women who've seen pseudo snuff horror, porn torture-core and vomit horror. Well let's add biotorture to the list. Are you Uber Core? Well if you want to be, a viewing of The Human Centipede is step 1 in joining this rare group of horror-ites.

If you missed the trailer, check it out below. Thanks to Twitch Film for the trailer.

Penance (Trailer)

So after Halloween, you just figured the horror flicks would die off. Well that's true for Hollywood. Nothing is really coming out in the last 2 month of the year but what you'll see on DVD shelves makes the end of 2009 very exciting.

Also coming out November 17th is Jake Kennedy's Penance which according to Fangoria:

"A beautifully brutal film, PENANCE delivers more cringe inducing terror than even the most hardcore horror fan will be able to endure. Prepare to atone for your cinematic sins of the flesh, because you won't be able to turn away from the sumptuous savagery assaulting your senses on the screen" --Scott Licina, FANGORIA

Wow check out that hype. Hmm, looks like torture-core is still not dead yet. I may be a little skeptical about this flick because its "from the producers of Automaton Transfusion", a flick I did not like (full review here).

But the all horror star cast is infreakintriguing. Marieh Delfino, Michael Rooker, Tony Todd, James Duval and others.

Here be the plot:

With unrelenting suspense and terror, Penance is the tale of a young, demure single mother, Amelia (Marieh Delfino), who hits upon hard times and decides to take her future into her own hands by taking up the one profession that can promise fast cash for a sexy girl like her - becoming a stripper.

Everything is going well until Suzy her stripper friend is beaten up on a job and recruits Amelia to take her place in a high-class strip job that night. Reluctantly Amelia takes the job, only to find that the job isn’t everything that it seems.

Driven to a strange location by a dark and mysterious man (Tony Todd) and confronted by a grizzled hit man (Michael Rooker), Amelia’s world is turned upside down as a case of mistaken identity leads her to be taken captive and forced to confront her sins – the sins of her mind, body and soul.

Her captor (the mind bending Graham McTavish), is intent on one thing and one thing only – to purify Amelia and the other women in his incarceration. It’s time for them to pay their Penance!

Check out the trailer.