Undertone – the scariest film you’ll ever hear?
In an age of podcasts where everyone seems to have made one especially during lockdown where a plethora of half arsed musings by bored people stuck at home that produced a number of such audio awfulness. And Undertone focuses on a pair of podcasters who discuss real life tales of terror with Eva (Nina Kiri) the cynic and Justin (Adam DiMarco) the true believer. And its Adam who has been sent 10 audio files that ramp up the unfolding mystery of a couple where a boyfriend has recorded his girlfriend’s nocturnal sleep talking that ramps up the audio atrocities not heard since the last X Factors winners’ album.
The Undertone story unfolds….
But as they work through the files each gets progressively more alarming with the emergence of a demonic figure playing a significant role along with children’s nursery rhymes taking on disturbing significance none more so than when played backwards. Now for a generation who remember vinyl records there was always a rumour about covert demonic messages if the record was played backwards which must surely have been a marketing ploy because it succeeded only in scratching records necessitating a new copy having to be bought. In fact for a generation of teenage boys hidden away in their bedrooms it would seem that the only message was not, ‘Worship Satan!’ but instead, ‘Start wanking now!’…. but we digress.
What you’ll hear….
But Undertone is all about the sound and it is quite brilliantly designed by writer-director Ian Tuason with brief moments of eerie silence dotted with potentially demonic utterings and at one point we’re sure we heard the Satanic utterance, ‘I am the Duchess of Sussex!’ but maybe we misheard.
Tuason combines this with often impressive camera work and framing with the suspicion that something is lurking in Eva’s dimly lit house where the entire film is located. It’s Tuason directs the audience just as much to look in certain areas that raises tension further that there maybe is something lurking in the shadows. Adding to the uneasy atmosphere is Eva’s terminally ill mother prostrate and silent in an upstairs bed that bit by bit builds to a hellish showdown.
Is the the scariest film you’ll ever hear?
Now the advertising for the film has pitched this as, ‘the scariest movie you’ll ever hear’. It’s a bold claim and certainly that aspect of the film works well but what lets it down is the unsatisfactory development of the story as each audio file is played which should reveal the story further but instead it becomes somewhat inconclusive frustratingly so by the end as the film hits its climatic moment
There’s a lot to be admired in Tuason’s feature film debut and stands him in good stead for the ‘Paranormal Activity’ reboot that he is helming. Undertone has the makings of a really great scary movie but is struggling to get out.
related feature : The scariest found footage film ever? Take a look at our disc review of , ‘Lake Mungo’
related feature : ‘Past Life’ stars Jeremy Piven, Aneurin Barnard & co-star Nicolas Farrell who chats about the film
Here’s the Undertone trailer….
The post Undertone – REVIEW appeared first on Any Good Films.
from Any Good Films https://ift.tt/74KRiUx
