Dark Summer

Plot synopsis:
Daniel (Keir Gilchrist) is a young man who has been placed under house arrest for harassing a young woman, Mona Wilson (Grace Phipps). Under the terms of his house arrest, he is not allowed visits from unaccompanied minors nor is he allowed access to his computer (which has been confiscated by the authorities) or the internet. As his mother is away on business, he is alone in the house. Daniel's parole officer, Stokes (Peter Stormare), explains that Daniel's monitoring tag will go off if he goes past the edge of the front lawn. If he does not retreat within five seconds, he will be arrested. Daniel mentions hearing of someone under house arrest who cut off their foot to get the monitoring tag off so they could flee to Mexico.
Despite the restrictions placed on Daniel, his friends Abby and Kevin come around and bring him a tablet so that he can access a neighbor's internet connection and Skype his mother. When he is about to Skype his mother, Abby contacts him instead. After a brief conversation, he receives an incoming Skype call from Mona Wilson, who kills herself on camera.
Following this incident, Daniel becomes more and more paranoid and keeps seeing Mona in the house. Daniel and his friends attempt a seance to contact the spirit of Mona. The idea is that by each holding pens, Mona will communicate with them. Instead, Daniel and Kevin stab Abby through the hand with their pens. She is then lifted up and dragged across the wall. Afterwards, we see the blood from her injured hand spells out 'Daniel' on the wall.
After more supernatural events, Abby and Kevin head over to the dead girl's house. They are looking for a personal item of Mona's they can use as part of a ritual to help her move on to the afterlife. When they arrive at the house, they find it empty. They break in and, guided by Daniel who has a blueprint of the house, they head to Mona's room which is bare apart from a blood-stained mattress (from Mona shooting herself). They realize, with Daniel's help, that there is a false wall at the back of a closet which leads to a secret room which contains a number of strange artifacts and a large number of photos of Daniel; Mona was stalking Daniel, not the other way around. One of the items they find has a strange symbol embossed on it. Daniel finds out what it is and uses the name of the symbol as the password to Mona's cloud account. There he finds a folder called 'Daniel' which contains a spell.
It turns out that Mona secretly had a crush on Daniel, and had been obsessivly stalking him for a long time. She put a spell on Daniel to make him fall in love with her. It worked, but he was too shy to contact her, so Mona used a second spell so that her spirit could enter into Daniel's body alongside his own spirit so they would be together. There are five steps to the spell, the first of which was Mona's suicide. They realize that if all the steps are not completed by Daniel, the spell will fail. Abby therefore takes the last step, hoping that this will break the spell. However, Abby has already unwittingly carried out the previous steps of the spell so performing the last step brings Mona's spirit into her body. While they are cleaning up after the failed seance, Abby kills Kevin and then cuts off Daniel's leg so she can remove his house arrest monitor and abduct him without notice. When Stokes visits, he sees the severed leg on the floor and just thinks Daniel has absconded, as he described when he was first fitted with the tag.
In a post-credits scene, Abby, still possessed by Mona's spirit, is seen driving Daniel out of town while he lets out muffled screams.

Tags: violence, flashback

Review:
It is like watching something in slow motion and you will understand what I mean when you watch the film.
I couldn't even watch through to the ending and stopped it feeling annoyed at spending time watching this film.
Well, still boring and walked away feeling even more annoyed.Really, you want a good ghost story, forget this one.
The camera work involves too many close ups, most of which are unnecessary, but is otherwise decently done.For a horror/thriller the movie is just not there..
This movie was a nice break from the 'insidious'/'sinister'/'paranormal activity' style movies that have taken over the horror/thriller genre.Because film crews often post extremely positive reviews (like this) on IMDb, I want to make it clear that I am not involved in the production of this movie in any way, nor is anyone I know..
This movie spanned a few days, and not a single adult was in that household except for Peter Stormare - the probation officer.The acting was pretty good, especially for a low budget film with people I've never heard of.
What he can do and what he can't do but towards the end it do offer some scenes that can offer some horror.Some shots are done in an arty way, have a look to the girl being shot in the pool, done in a really arty way.I still don't know what to think about it, for me it wasn't that bad after all but once summer is over I will have forgotten this flick...Gore 0,5/5 Nudity 0/5 Effects 2/5 Story 2/5 Comedy 0/5.
Good Original Story for a Straight-to-Streaming Movie.
In fact, I'd say it's better than most of the scores of straight-to-streaming movies I see each month.The actors were watchable, the direction was excellent and the story was just a little more interesting than that of the average teen psycho horror tripe.
On the surface it's about a young man is under house-arrest so the movie gives you a sense of his boredom and isolation.The script, however, is taut.
Without giving away any surprises, let me just say two commendable things about the story: the relationship between the protagonist and his obsession gets interesting; and fifteen minutes into most movies I can usually tell you how it's going to end, but this one surprised me.
Having accomplished so much and with such attention to detail, you'd think the scriptwriters and film makers would've tried a little harder to make this character more than just a cliché.
But here again, you can't expect too much from a straight-to-streaming teen psycho horror movie.All in all, I was pleasantly surprised.
Even tho there are some intense moments, there are also a lot of slowly lingering scenes so I recommend not watching this when you are tired, I was close to dosing off a few times.Soundtrack and the sound editing were good.
He kind of has the part that is often played by has-been actors that have been dug up from 80s movies after making years of bad TV series.
This is movie comes with a lot of surprise "Why was it made, for whom"Simply a story which starts from nowhere, nobody knows who is what, what is happening, why is it happening and so on.
I have seen movies where 2 or 3 people have kept the film alive and done that but its not about people here but at least a basic story has to be intelligent.
I really was irritated that what they want to show to the viewers and literally watched it in fast forward and saved some time.At last its, don't waste your time, there are way better movies to watch..
I love horror/thriller movies.
Sure, it can suck watching a movie that's terrible, but it's worth the risk because you might find that movie that's so good your sack shrivels up like a prune.So even if the movie is terrible, I still enjoy it because it's all a part of the hunt.Dark Summer, however, was garbage.
Seriously, someone should have punched him square in the mouth and said: You are not a good director, stop it with the close ups!!OK, on to the movie.
The whole pretense of the film MIGHT have been decent, MIGHT have been almost watch-able, if it weren't for the shaky camera, sub-par, terrible acting of one of the most important characters in a horror film- the ghost!
There really is nothing worth giving a a good review about this movie.
If the writer to this story had different direction, it could have been a somewhat decent flick, but unfortunately, this was a COMPLETE FAIL-all the way around!!!
I see a bright future ahead for her.This movie was pretty dark, but it's not going to scare the crap out of you.
The story line moved along at a decent pace, there weren't any glaring plot holes from what I can remember and it was overall a fun watch.
Great Film Worth A Watch.
I enjoy this movie a lot its original and dark.
The main actor/actress who made the film great was the roles played by Keir Gilchrist and Grace Phipps who i have never heard of before this film but in sure we will be seeing them again in more movies, the was one star in this movie everyone would of heard of and that's Peter Stormare who delivered a great performances as normal.
I'm not sure of the budget for this film but it was well spent.Overall great film, good storyline with great acting.Sort and Sweet Reviews.
"Dark Summer" is a bit slow, but manages to lead itself to success, execution a unique, cool horror film that pays off.First for the plot of this film.
I honestly felt as if it was unique and fresh, the plot / story all together has a lot to offer, all of which leading to a pleasant experience if you look it the right direction.
It takes a somewhat mystery genre-like turn, as said before digging deeper into the story of the film, becoming pleasant, and giving the viewer more, and more to look forward to in terms of the events of the movie, as well as the plot / storyline itself.For the characters of the film, however; The film, honestly didn't go too in depth with this element.
The film kept the characters, in a way, a bit secluded from the audience knowing much of them, they're backgrounds, life stories, etc.
Just not as much depth, and understandings as executed toward the plot.Finally for the visual effects of the movie.
As said before, the film succeeds in intertwining many sub-genres of horror, of which lead to more wide spread amounts of visual potential, of which here were defiantly not missed!
The visual gore in this movie wasn't bad.
As the film progresses, the paranormal entity(ies) shown, as well weren't bad, but in terms of the ghosts of which were shown, they weren't the best, but as said before just right, fitting right in along with the story.
"Dark Summer" displayed some unique, and fresh new execution in terms of much needed movie elements.
Not all horror fans will enjoy this, I may add, again, as said before, this film is a bit slow, and tends to drag, but leads to story depth.
After that is a lot of nothing mixed in with scares intermittently as is expected in a horror film.
This is one of those rare movies where I didn't see the end coming and that made all the fast forwarding worth it.
Multiple retakes were needed when the camera bumped the actors' heads when filming.It doesn't matter what this movie was about, what genre it is, what was in the script, or how well the actors did.
It's funny people watch Harry Potter and get all into magic but if you really want to know what real magic is like, watch this film.
Most of the time when I watch movies about magic, I rip them to shreds.
Even megastars, like Chris Pratt got his start on a low rated CW drama, and did B-movies for a decade before he was cast as Star Lord, this is the position Keir Gilchrist finds himself in now.
Dark Summer follows Daniel, (Gilchrist) a 17 year old who has recently been sentenced to house arrest for stalking a girl from his school.
As for his nights, they are filled with a lot of jump scares and loud noises that again ultimately turn up nothing, as Dark Summer is just one of those films where nothing happens until the last twenty minutes, and by then, who really cares anymore?
The bottom line, even a great actor couldn't save this film, it's your typical supernatural horror film, filled with a lot of jump scares, good looking people, and a whole lot of nothing else until the very end..
I like slow-burn horror films.
Sorry, but have you ever watched some of the first true horror films?
The main character is unlikeable (is that a word?) and manages to elicit NO sympathy from the viewer.The film itself is a standard teen emo horror with average effects and a suburban location and delivers just what you expect when you expect it.You will already have seen this film with different characters a few times before.The best part of the movie was the simmering sexual tension between the Geek and the Girl.End of line..
Quite possibly the best horror film I've ever seen..
I can not emphasize enough how incredible and wonderful and wholly accurate this film is, nor the success it has in sweeping the viewer along through all the mystery.If you wonder why this movie has such a low rating, it's easy, the people rating it have absolutely no idea about the reality of the world depicted in this film, or were so beyond terrified they hated the experience it provided, or they did not finish watching it.The soundtrack only contained a few audible songs, but the one that really stood out was one of the most poetic and beautiful songs I've ever had the pleasure of hearing, and even that song was perfectly selected for the unexpected direction the scene takes (you'll know the one I'm talking about, especially if you are watching with good subtitles).This one is definitely a permanent fixture in my collection.
I've not seen such a well researched, shot, scored, and acted film since As Above, So Below, and if you enjoyed that movie, you should DEFINITELY check this one out, as you will not be disappointed..
Overall, I think this movie has been given a bit of a bad rap.
Compared to a lot of recent horror films, this one was actually pretty good even with the budget restraints.
The only adult in the film is Daniel's somewhat sympathetic parole officer played by Peter Stormare.
I had way too many questions by the time the film ended.BEWARE, HERE BE SPOILERS It becomes obvious why Daniel suddenly became smitten with Mona, yet she did little to reciprocate his obvious attention.
I neither expect not want to have a movie explained for me, but just a little more information concerning the above could really have made this a much more creepy movie Dark Summer wasn't a great film.
It was a pretty good film that didn't waste my time.
To say much about the plot would probably spoil it but for a film with very few actors and a very limited set it has quite good scope.
All of the actors play good parts and though some of the script may be a bit clunky it is all believable enough to pass.
There isn't a lot of gore so if you're looking for a slash and splash horror film this probably isn't for you but what there is looks very realistic and there are enough scary and gory moments to justify it's rating.
I thought all the blood effects in this film looked very real.
A young hacker, Daniel (Keir Gilchrist), gets put on house arrest for cyber stalking.
The girl he stalked, Mona Wislon (Grace Phipps), takes her own life right before his eyes then the stalker becomes the stalked.Initially I thought the movie was an incredibly lame idea.
The Acting is OK and the Plot, while Ambiguous at times, is Trying Hard to be a bit Different.A modicum of Success is Achieved in this intriguing Happening, but Modern Horror Fans seem to want more Chills and Blood than this one is willing to offer.
Not an Awful Film but Never Rises to its Goal of Producing a Teen-Oriented Midnight Movie with a Twist.Worth a Watch for Horror and Paranormal Movie Completest.
This film ends very badly, and very suddenly, which is a pity because it promised a lot more, even though it was made with a small cast and an even smaller budget..
The same old story and in this horror film.
In a nutshell, if you like this kind of movies and you don't have much of expectations, this is the right choice for you..
Keir Gilchrist, who I typically love (he was great in It Follows and United States of Tara, where I was first introduced to him), plays Daniel in this supernatural horror/thriller, a bit of a hacker who is under house arrest for cyberstalking his classmate and love interest, Mona (played by Grace Phipps).
Things start to get spooky after he watches her commit suicide and his friends Abby (Stella Maeve) and Kevin (Maestro Harrell) are worried about his safety — and his sanity — as he spirals into a pretty dangerous mental state and fears for his own life.Honestly meh.
I thought the premise — Daniel being stuck in his home while one might normally run the hell away — was interesting initially, but the scares were just too cheesy and predictable to really have any serious effect.I may have audibly yawned when it's revealed early on that his friend Abby has this unrequited love for him.
There were a couple good, creepy moments — his phone going blank and playing "When" by Elysian Fields, for example — but largely the scares fell flat, especially any time they showed Mona.
At one point, one says the guy's situation "Reminds him of that Shia LaBeouf movie." Lesson No 1: NEVER REMIND THE AUDIENCE OF A MUCH BETTER FILM THAN THE ONE THEY'RE WATCHING.
I gave it 4 out of 10 stats because it wasn't the worst movie I've ever seen, but if you're looking for a horror movie that will scare you this probably isn't a good option.
DARK SUMMER is the newest addition to a never-ending wave of dark and dreary teen horror films which go for a dour, downbeat look throughout.
One of the main problems with the thing is the obtuse nature of the direction, which doesn't exactly make it clear just what's going on.The main character, Daniel, is a creepy stalker currently under house arrest for stalking a pretty young girl.
The whole film lacks pace and tension and your interest wanders off, at one point I was thinking he needs a decent meal in him as he looked painfully thin.
You actually need to watch the movie and pay attention to understand what is going on and it starts off a little slow, another strike against the typical American viewer.
I actually watched the movie and guess what?
Keir Gilchrist plays Daniel, a teen under house arrest for a cyber stalking charge.
So, this is Dark Summer (2015) Directed by Paul Solet, and written by Mike Le, Spoiler Alert, I'm going to be discussing this movie, Should you watch it?
First the story, Daniel, played by Keir Gilchrist is a seventeen year old placed on house arrest for the summer, while his parents are away.
Bottom line; Daniel is the victim of some very dark spell cast on him by Mona, a demonic spirit played by Grace Phipps.
I would say that the directors style of story telling either takes the blame for the movies slow pace, or takes the credit for giving us an unusual experience.
The budget may have been low, but the scares generated are more worthy then many an overused CGI horror film, think along the lines of Paranormal Activity.The acting overall is very good.
This is a horror film aimed at the teens.
Abby has a crush on Daniel and doesn't understand his infatuation with Mona who is "perfect." Then the big event happen EARLY PLOT SPOILER, Mona blows her brains out in an on line chat with Daniel.Now the film gets good as Mona haunts Daniel, or is it his medication?
Coming up to the final days of the IMDb boards October Horror Challenge,I decide to look for an easy going title that I could view for the challenge on Netflix.Taking a look at the titles on Netflix,I spotted a movie which had a short and sweet running time,which led to me getting ready to see the sun go down on Summer.The plot:Caught attempting to hack into the online accounts of Mona Wilson whilst his mum is on holiday, Daniel is caught,and quickly put under house arrest.Banned from owning a computer, Daniel gets his friends Abby and Kevin to bring a laptop round,whilst welfare officer Stokes keeps a close eye on Daniel.
This movie is just a tale of possession with a bad ending.
This one has a few unique things, but ultimately, it is not worth watching at all.You should only watch this if you like possession type movies with excessively bad endings.
From a decent horror concept, Dark Summer had some excellent sound design, really good cinematography and a perfect soundtrack of songs from Elysian Field On the other hand, the script was nothing more than mediocre.
The directing was pretty poor, casting and acting in itself really awful.Dark Summer could just as well have ended up very good, if all those moments had been addressed.