Circle of Eight DVD Review
Circle of Eight DVD Review
Ho-hum, humdrum horror.
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For those who can't seem to jump on the webisode bandwagon (raises hand… It's not that I dismiss them; I just can never remember to tune in, or/and don't want to watch on my computer and/or phone), it's a good thing the best of the 'Net eventually comes to DVD for straight-shot viewing (or quick ejection, as the case may be). This is how I saw Circle of Eight, the original series from Digital Entertainment (in connection with Blockbuster, Mountain Dew and MySpace).
While the 10-part fright-fest was running online, it was meant to be highly participatory: there were multiple levels of interaction available for the audience, including hidden clues, mobile content, an online game, standalone material to help build the backstory of the characters and to add dimension to their relationships, plus giving viewers the chance to affect their futures. But not to worry; none of this influences the DVD experience… it plays like any other low-budget, shot-on-digital horror movie.
Its plot and cast is like any other low-budget horror movie, too. Not that there's anything wrong with that, but why bother with something we've all seen 1,000 times before? Well, maybe that's the catch — Circle of Eight's target audience (young teens) probably hasn't seen it all before.
The spooky story follows 20-something Jessica (Austin Highsmith), a naïve farm girl who's decided to run away from a dark secret by losing herself in the great metro city of Los Angeles. We meet her as she's moving into a unit on the eighth floor of The Dante, an old-fashioned, coolly constructed, quirky apartment building that's home to host of oddball couples — and a menacing building manager (John Bishop) who's set up his office in the elevator, a mysterious loner (DJ Qualls), and a newly single (and of course super-hot) avant guarde artist (Ryan Doom).
Jessica is eager to blend in with her friendly neighbors and to forget her huge mistake, but she can't. For one thing, her neighbors are just a little too chummy, and for another, she begins to suffer horrifying hallucinations involving this past-incident. It's pretty easy to figure out Jessica's predicament, and unfortunately none of the characters are really refreshing enough to stand out or care about. The actors are competent, and the score and cinematography are fine; overall Circle of Eight is decent enough to watch all the way through once if you have to, but there are better horror movies out on DVD this month, so why bother?
DVD special features:
•Behind the Scenes of Circle of Eight — standard making-of featurette, showing on-set interviews with the actors, all saying how wonderful and innovate the project they're working on is, and how lovely all their costars are.
•On Haunted Location — This show was shot in part in the famous Linda Vista Hospital in Los Angeles, which is said to be haunted (uh-huh, right). The video shows off the darkened bowels of the building (including the room used as Freddy Krueger's boiler room lair in 1984's A Nightmare on Elm Street), has some very unconvincing acting from the crew saying they're scared to work there, and probably more (I didn't hang for the whole thing, but a jot like this really should have been played tongue-in-cheek).
•A Day in the Life of a Production Assistant — I didn't watch this one.
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Reviewed by Staci Layne Wilson
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