The Telling
The Telling
R | 14 April 2009 (USA)
The Telling Trailers

In this horror anthology film, three girls pledge the most popular - and cruelest - sorority on campus. For their final task, they must tell the scariest story they know. Containing three distinct stories - one featuring a murderous doll, one a has-been actress and her run in with a film crew of the undead and, finally, a hunt-and-kill fright-fest.

Reviews
GL84

Gathered together for Sorority Rush, potential pledges are brought together for the final initiation rites, their telling of a scary story.The Good Stor(ies): Doll Fear-Living together in New England, a woman isn't particularly pleased with her boyfriend inviting ex-girlfriend to live with them, until he gives her an antique doll as a peace offering. Growing impatient over the situation every day, she gradually comes to think that the doll is alive and after her, which no one in the house believes. As a series of weird incidents around her force her to believe that the doll is alive, she eventually discovers the truth and tries to stop its murderous antics. This was an incredibly enjoyable and entertaining entry, with a lot of really great stuff about it. One of the best things it does is the build-up with the doll being alive. From the different sayings in different situations, him waking up with the doll despite being placed in another location beforehand, as well as the best set-up, watching them have sex and giggling while doing so, followed up by the encounter on the stove afterward which really works well. All of these make the jealousy angle all the more fun and creepy, and once it moves into the final stalking, there's even more fun. The off-screen clattering and giggling set-up the slashing perfectly, the trail of bloody footprints is chilling, and the final resolution is really good. There's only one flaw in this, the fact that it's a pretty clichéd story and pretty much goes right where it's expected to without really offering anything surprising, but it's not a detrimental flaw at all.Prank Call-As their plans are canceled, friends stay home and decide to play a couple of prank phone calls, only for them to accidentally hear a murder over the phone during one of their calls. Understandably freaked out when they start receiving numerous threatening phone calls tormenting them about what they did, and their suspicions eventually get the better of them, they find that the killer may have found them. This is the most middle-ground of the stories. This here gets the tension of the situation really nicely, with the prank phone calls as well as the act heard over the phone which is quite creepy, followed up by the killer's call knowing of them with no knowledge beforehand. The police investigation segments are perfectly in keeping with that approach, and the first murder is really surprising. The stalking throughout the house is also pretty thrilling, especially the second one with the shadowy figure on the wall. These are all melded together nicely to make for a great premise, despite the execution somewhat lacking as the fact remains, however, that this is incredibly short and really could've done more to expand its stalking parts. There isn't enough to really play with all its' capable of and really should've used a few extra minutes into its stalking moments to actually get going nicely, as well as actually showcase its murders on-screen with some gore, which would've been helpful. However, it's still really good.The Bad Stor(ies): Crimson Echo-Fallen on hard times, an actress agrees to meet with an eclectic director on a new movie and goes to his house for preparation of the film. As he begins to explain the concept of the film, she grows incredibly uncomfortable with what's asked of her, until she learns the truth about the movie and what they demand of her. This one is really problematic, as it's such a potentially-entertaining segment. Easily the most chilling part of this, and the film as a whole, is the dinner party, from the silence from the guests as they sit around the table to the intense lecture given that goes well with the upcoming tension and growing concern over where it's heading, which works nicely. There's also the rather creepy masks worn as well as the abduction part at the end, along with the rather disorienting dream sequence that is highly erotic and trippy. There's some work to be done, though, in that the most disturbing segment, the showing of the war footage to really throw her off, is marred by the lame song played over the scene, not even showing it but just her reaction which really ruins the impact it's supposed to have as well as being utterly inappropriate for the situation. There's also the fact that, almost immediately afterward, one of the listeners aptly describes the entire segment as being weird over scary, since it's low on scares and tends to get by on its rather hypnotic look and feel to generate scares, and as well as ruining the dinner party scene, the abduction at the end and eventual torture is seen in such mild flashbacks and cuts that it's impossible to determine what happened to her or why it should be something to fear, and instead the end is just her acting like one of them without any explanation why, greatly ruining the power it should've had and altogether ruining the entire segment.Rated R: Graphic Language, Violence and Nudity.

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suite92

There is a bit of a grisly segment where a sorority girl is killed. We flash forward one year to an induction sequence at the same sorority. Three pledges get the challenge to tell the scariest story that they know. So the film anthology has its overarching context ("Sorority Sisters").Story 1 (Dollface): A man and his girlfriend have a woman house guest for a couple of weeks. The man finds an antique doll in a dumpster. The doll is possessed, supposedly, and engineers the deaths of the two women, and manages to get the man blamed for it.Story 2 (Crimson Echo): A fading star gets fewer and fewer parts until she gets none when she's over thirty. Out of the blue, she gets a gig in Europe. She's desperate enough to take it. She's drugged and prepped. Then she meets her crew, who are all undead. What becomes of her?Story 3 (Prank Call): Three young women go out to catch a horror fest, but did not get tickets first. They return home with the hope that the cable guy is done. They get into telephone pranks; things go downhill from there.After the three stories are finished, the sorority rejects all three of the pledges. One of the pledges is the sister of the girl in the first sequence. Guess what happens next.-----Scores-------Cinematography: 7/10 Reasonably good.Sound: 5/10 Also reasonably good. Some of the incidental music was rather enjoyable, but I could not figure out what it had to do with the film.Acting: 0/10 John D'Aquino was the only one I recognized as an actor. The rest were uniformly terrible.Screenplay: 0/10 Oi, as bad as the acting. Well, perhaps worse: nothing new, nothing scary, nothing remotely believable.

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gavin6942

In this horror anthology film, three girls pledge the most popular -- and cruelest -- sorority on campus. For their final task, they must tell the scariest story they know. Containing three distinct stories -- one featuring a murderous doll, one a has-been actress and her run in with a film crew of the undead and, finally, a hunt-and-kill fright-fest.There is really nothing to say about this one. I do not know the history, but based on what I was able to determine, this was more or less an excuse to get Playboy models to appear in a movie. And, you know, I guess if that is all they wanted to do, it worked.Now, if they wanted to be in a good movie, they failed. We have a very poor version of the Twilight Zone's "Living Doll" episode. There is a decent second segment but it is pulled off terribly. And after that... well, ugh.

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brooke-hyaatt

Unfortunately, the film was hard to get hold of here in Australia but I eventually found it online. If you're a girls next door (girls of the playboy mansion) fan, (which i am) and saw the episodes when they were filming the movie, you will enjoy watching it and seeing how Bridget's project came together. The acting was pretty dismal and the plot wasn't great, lots of naked hot girls though. Bridget gets her clothes off as well as a couple of other random actors. Unless you watch GND none of the actors / actresses will be familiar, and only 3 of the girls in the movie are from playboy. If you are looking for a horror / thriller, I wouldn't suggest it. Its not very scary or jumpy.

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