V/H/S/HALLOWEEN - Mark Reviews Movies

V/H/S/Halloween, Shudder

Follow on Facebook | Follow on Twitter | Become a Patron

Review by Mark Dujsik | October 2, 2025

Every segment of V/H/S/Halloween has something going for it, which doesn't feel like something that could be said of an installment of this series for a while. This eighth entry, though, maintains a consistent conceit—revolving around the spooky holiday, of course—and a steady effort on the part of the assorted filmmakers to try something a little different, even within the context of familiar stories.

For example, it's almost a bit comforting, as strange as that may seem, to see the first full segment embrace a completely clichéd setup. That's because writer/director Anna Zlokovic knows exactly what we should expect from a series of creepy tales that take place on or near Halloween, and the challenge for every filmmaker here is to twist or subvert those expectations in some way or, at least, take them to some extreme.

Zlokovic's "Coochie Coochie Coo" goes for the second option. The story is nothing more than a tour through a haunted house, where Lacie (Samantha Cochran) and Kaliegh (Natalia Montgomery), two young women who are ready to head off to college and are arguably too old to go trick-or-treating, find themselves on Halloween night. As is the tradition for the overwhelming majority of the shorts across the series, each segment here has a found-footage gimmick. It's notable, perhaps, that the first section in this film, following a bit of the also-traditional framing story that runs through this one, is the only one that doesn't quite sell us on the notion of its characters recording everything that happens to them.

Even so, that shortcoming is mostly irrelevant, because Zlokovic has a fairly unsettling horror show to present. It has the two women being lured into a remote house in their neighborhood, believing the place to be someone's idea for a fun and scary experience on Halloween, and quickly discovering that the building is actually inhabited by a supernatural entity only known as "the Mommy" (Elena Musser). In addition to some sights that would be goofy if not for how disturbing they are, the segment feels oppressive for its distinct lack of color. Everything looks a bit gray, and even the gooey liquid here, leaving a trail of where the two shouldn't or need to go, is bright white.

What's fascinating is how two other shorts in this anthology also directly feature or distinctly suggest the concept of a haunted house, yet all three feel distinct in terms of both the storytelling and the tone. Writer/director Casper Kelly's short, for example, has four teens (played by Lawon Greyson, Riley Nottingham, Jenna Hogan, and Jake Ellsworth), who are also a bit too old to be doing so, on a trick-or-treat expedition. In "Fun Size," they also find a remote house, with a bowl filled with off-brand candy on the porch.

After taking more than the one piece allotted by a sign under the bowl (and joking about how the candy they open looks distinctly like something anatomical), the four are swallowed up by the bowl, end up in a large factory, and are tormented by the weird company's mascot. This might be the weakest of the six segments, if only because Kelly is clearly going for over-the-top humor and no one in the cast seems to realize it. The running gag of candy-related mutilations and deaths is still wickedly amusing.

The third short to deal with a haunted house is the final one, called "Home Haunt" from writers/directors Micheline Pitt-Norman and R.H. Norman. The tale focuses on Keith (Jeff Harms), who has made a haunted maze for the neighborhood kids for years and learns that his own son Zack (Noah Diamond) has grown tired and annoyed by his father's enthusiasm. Wanting to impress his son and his increasingly skeptical neighbors, Keith builds this year's maze bigger, swipes a forbidden record from the local Halloween shop, and unintentionally unleashes various supernatural beings inside his creation. It's a good thing a previous segment (technically two, if one counts the framing one) has already prepared us for the notion that kids aren't safe in these stories, because some of the grisly, exaggerated violence in this one might have otherwise been a shock.

That previous one, by the way, is writer/director Alex Ross Perry's "Kidprint," in which a serial killer in a small town has been targeting children. Tim (Stephen Gurewitz), who runs a local electronics store, has started providing a service to parents, recording their kids to help the police search for any ones who might—or will inevitably—go missing in the future. Perry is certainly an intriguing and unexpected choice to helm a segment in this franchise, and he brings a grounded, disquieting sense to a tale that suddenly becomes quite a nightmare. It's the most the severe of the bunch, and even the dramatic irony of the punch line is upsetting.

The best of the segments, though, is "Ut Supra Sic Infra" from co-writer/director Paco Plaza, which has the police investigating a sort of locked-door murder mystery the day after Halloween. Enric (Teo Planell), the sole survivor of a massacre, insists he's guilty, but there is no physical evidence to show that he could have gouged out his friends' eyes and broken most of the bones in their bodies. As footage from the party plays out (with some nifty editing to transition between the timelines), the cops re-create the scene of the mass murder to jog Enric's memory. Once it becomes clear what has happened and is about to happen again, Plaza maintains a sense of inescapable dread.

Sure, writer/director Bryan M. Ferguson's "Diet Phantasma," like most of the framing segments in this series, feels as if it gets short shrift by being divided throughout the film, but even it is a funny, bloody satire of corporate branding. If that's the biggest complaint about the general effectiveness of V/H/S/Halloween, it's one barely worth noting.

Back to Home

Buy Related Products