Review of The Ward (2010) by Brett B — 23 Nov 2011

John Carpenter's comeback film, The Ward, does not reflect the same director who gave us Halloween, The Fog, They Live, and The Thing. The Ward stumbles in almost every way straight to video films stumble, most obviously lazy filmmaking, poor acting, and even poorer writing.

One appeal of the horror genre is that most such films are made by indie directors, on low budgets with seemingly out of date equipment, and inexperienced but cheap actors. When such a film works, it's because the director is very resourceful, and has meticulously thought out the story, plot, and themes. When it fails, the result often invokes much unintentional laughter and a film that is so unbearably bad it almost never sees the light of day.

Carpenter's new film shows that he is no longer as resourceful as he used to be. Not only did he choose a flawed script, he forgot to fix the problems. When a story works, the poor filmmaking is often forgiven. But when the story sucks, the poor filmmaking is even more apparent.

What's the film about? Simply a girl who is admitted to a haunted psychiatric ward. There are only a handful of inmates with her, all becoming cannon fodder for the demon until the main character remains standing. But there is a twist, and the twist is so predictable, you see it coming before the halfway mark.

The Ward is not eye-gouging bad, but it is instantly forgettable. It's only 85 minutes long, but it's 85 minutes you could have spent watching a much better movie. This is a half-assed approach to low budget horror, and the biggest problem with that - one John Carpenter should have been aware of - is that low budget filmmaking has to be anything but half-assed.