I can't believe that people are trashing this film! If it's not the PG-13 horror film haters, which I'm one of those myself, it's people who expect some much from the little guys. This film wasn't handled by a multi-million dollar studio, it was handled by a true student of horror like, hmm, ourselves, with a little bit of money and an idea. I totally respect Mena for paying homage to films like: "The Town That Dreaded Sundown", "Psycho", and yes "Halloween", but folks give me a break! This film was good, violent, scary and had a storyline, two different plot points to be exact, along with a back story coming soon to theaters. Stay off these guys, they are one of us, one of the little guys who are trying to make Hollywood into what it used to be, to what we dreamed of, not what it has become.

"Malevolence", is a true horror film that everyone should watch! No it's not the best acted film I've ever seen, or the most horrific cinematic experience I've witnessed, but it's a true visceral, surrealistic film, that only the old 70's flicks could approach. Forget the lavishing special effects, with the beefy soundtracks packed with the latest heavy metal hits and hot models turned actresses. If you want to see a true gritty horror film, with big scares, large knives, synthesized effects and a potato bag wearing maniac, rent this puppy, she will deliver, I promise!

First off I have to say that I rented this at Blockbuster thinking it would be a piece of crap. I'm a huge horror buff so I pretty much rent anything genre related, even if it is a turd. Especially if it has Anchor Bay on it. I've seen my share of slasher films so I immediately felt like I was in familiar territory.

The film starts out with a little boy being forced to watch a young lady stabbed repeatedly. Then the film gets into a bank robbery that doesn't turn out and has the criminals fleeing to an old abandoned house. One of the hostages manages to escape and leads them into an abandoned slaughterhouse where a demented serial killer is shacking up.

One thing I noticed about this indie flick that sets it above others is that you can watch it on your plasma screen TV in HD. The sound is great when you blast it on 5.1 and just feel the vibrations from the bass heavy score. It makes you feel very unsettled. The camera work on this is a lot different from most other horror films, more than once I was treated to beautiful scenic lingering shots. You can tell a lot of work went into the sound and atmosphere.

The acting is a little hammy in spots but the cast of unknowns are very believable. I was relieved that the newest twenty something teen/TV star wasn't running around acting scared and spouting catch phrases. The acting is mature and serious. There's no self referential humor that is usually found in horror flicks these days. The whole thing is dead serious and reminded me a lot of another great slasher film I saw recently called Wrong Turn. A solid horror film looking to make you squirm and jump from what you see & hear. That's what I used to love about grindhouse horror films, they didn't try to be hip and make you laugh, they went for the throat. Malevolence is a return to this style of film making. That's not to say there aren't clichés but it blends them into such a provocative cocktail, it is kind of like reliving the good old glory days of horror.

With all the PG-13 teeny bopper nonsense doing so well these days Malevolence is like a breath of fresh air. The slaughterhouse location was creepy as hell and all of the stuff you see in the slaughterhouse was found on location and utilized on the set. This gives it a visceral punch, none of the sets look fake ala the new TCM remake.

The horror in Malevolence exists on a lot of different levels, the characters themselves are not purely "good" or "evil" and it is sometimes hard to feel for some of them. I found myself conflicted over if I was scared for some of them to die or if I wanted to see them gutted like a deer. The characters are anything but cardboard that's for sure.

Easily said that if you like Halloween, the town that dreaded sundown, Just Before Dawn, The Prowler, The Burning or Madman you will definitely love this. I have seen my share of slashers and this is the best of the recent pack. I know the genre has been done to death but there's still a lot of meat on the bones and Steven Mena does a great job of proving this.

For all the real horror fans out there, open your mind and give it a shot. I think you will be pleasantly surprised. My only regret is that I didn't go watch it in the theater when it was playing here in Toronto.

I look forward to the director's next effort.

I've been wanting to check this out since learning that it won Best Feature at the 2003 NYC Horror Film Festival. Now after watching it I'm guessing every other film it was competing against must've REALLY sucked.

Malevolence is in no way a bad film, yet it's just not that good either. The concept of mixing a robbery-gone-wrong story with a slasher film is pretty original, but this only makes it's heavy use of slasher clichés drag it down into mediocrity. What would be perfectly acceptable idiotic behavior from stupid teenagers in a fun slasher film, becomes unbearably frustrating because one would expect more from the unconventional characters portrayed here.

As the film stumbles forward through all the usual "scares" of the genre, I only became more and more frustrated by how a good idea is just thrown out the window in order to fall back on things that have been done to death (and much better) 25 years ago. All this is topped off by a soundtrack that was obviously intended to be "old-school" yet comes off as just really annoying and repetitive.

Still, as far as low-budget indie horror flicks go, Malevolence is decently shot, and while it does bring in a new mix to the formula, it immediately waters it down by simply not doing anything worth-while with it.

I just enjoyed this flick. However, having read the other reviews, I'm seriously wondering if viewers may have been on crack or are close friends with the director? Are they serious? No, seriously? I think that the best aspect of the movie is the fact that the director imbued it with so many MAJOR components of 80's B slasher flicks - the really bad synth music, the twisted ankle, the incessant screaming, the double twist ending - but without a hint of irony, which is rather difficult to do I would imagine! The tone is extremely deadpan. If someone had told me I was watching a horror movie made in 1988, I would have completely believed it - and is a very significant statement coming from someone like me by the way. Whether intentional or unintended, the movie works for both thrills and chills. Fun stuff - no second coming like a few other critics declare. An addendum to this story. My good friend left several messages recently for me indicating that she wanted to go to "Male Violence" - yes, several times she told me that we simply must see "Male Violence"? I asked her to spell it for me..."M- A-L-E-V-O-L-E-N-C-E"...."you haven't heard about Male Violence"? So in thanks to this movie I learned that my friend can't spell or really speak...wow.

No, it's not terribly original.

It is certainly reminiscent of Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Halloween, Friday the 13th, etc. in many ways. Oddly, it also called to mind for me a recent movie: Dead Birds (2004), which also started with a bank robbery where people got shot, and the robbers holed up at an abandoned house they knew about, where they get picked off by evil. Unlike Dead Birds, there's nothing supernatural in the movie apart from the killer's ability to take a licking and keep on ticking, but that's nothing new for a slasher.

The first storyline we are introduced to is that someone has been abducting children and killing them. Years later, a woman watches her daughter playing softball.

We also meet a young couple, and they along with the girl's brother and another man are going to rob a bank of about a half of a million dollars. The boyfriend needs the money to pay off loan sharks (I think), otherwise he wouldn't be in it. They're to meet up at an abandoned house where they will split the money and then split up themselves.

The couple and the brother are in one car, the other man is on his own. His car gets a flat, for which he is evidently unprepared, and he carjacks an SUV, which belongs to the mother and her softball-playing daughter, who are forced to come along with him. The three of them make it to the abandoned house first, and violence erupts.

The weakest part of the movie for me were the musical "stings" when the killer shows up or proves to be missing. They were pretty cheesy, to the point of spoof almost.

While the movie isn't very original, I nevertheless felt it was pretty good, and am surprised at some of the hostility towards this movie by other users. That said, if you're going to watch one bank robbers killed by evil in an abandoned house horror movie from 2004, I think Dead Birds is the more interesting one.

I see the director has a lot of friends to pad this place with glowing reviews.

There's nothing original about it. Nothing shocking. Nothing much at all except laughable synth stabs and a lot of unused set-ups. They waste twenty minutes setting up this robbery, go out of their way to point out that the ringleader planned to betray and murder his underlings... and they have the ringleader get killed in the robbery, so the planned betrayal never factors. They go through some contrived plot points to have the killer dress up like one of the members of the gang... and that goes nowhere. Too bad, because there was some genuine potential in the story, what with the four gang-members played off against one another, having to deal with hostages *and* a crazed murderer, but none of it goes anywhere. In the end, it's everybody against the killer, and that's been done to death.

And the killer? What, some 16 year old kid? Hell, I would've just wrung his little neck.

Don't waste your time. Go see 'Saw', a movie handed down to James Wan by the Lord above Himself.

Stevan Mena, your movie sucks. Tell your mom to quit posting reviews here.

A mother and daughter, coming home from a softball game, decide to stop for ice cream. Their plans change when a bank robber on the run kidnaps them and forces the mother to drive him to an abandoned house his gang is using as a meeting place. What the would-be criminals don't know is that their hideout is just over the hill from an abandoned slaughterhouse that's home to a crazed, psychopathic killer. Guilty or innocent, it doesn't really matter to this hooded killer – he wants 'em all dead!

I've seen several reviews that use the word "derivative" when describing Malevolence. In fact, the director, Stevan Mena, uses it himself in one of the special features on the DVD. I cannot think of a better word. Malevolence is derivative of every slasher that came before it. There's very little originality in much of what's presented on screen. Take the music. I don't see how anyone could listen to Malevolence's soundtrack and not be immediately reminded of Halloween. Even the music cues are the same. I realize that when you're working with something as tired as a slasher, it's got to be hard to come up with a movie full of original ideas, but I'm not sure Mena even tried.

But I've got to give Mena and Malevolence credit for a few things. First, there's the plot. I do appreciate the fact that Mena tried to do something rather unique and shift gears about 30 minutes into the movie. On the DVD, he claims to have been inspired by Hitchcock's Psycho. Whatever, it was an interesting move on his part. Second, I really like the authentic locations Mena chose for Malevolence. There's nothing like a real, old, crumbling slaughterhouse as a setting for your slasher. The location does give the film some atmosphere and a very creepy look. Finally, I like the way Mena has us as an audience rooting for the bad guys. Mena manipulates the audience to actively cheer for the characters who are essentially the bad guys in the first act of the movie. Sure, bank robbers and kidnappers aren't the kind of people I want to invite over for dinner, but I'll take them over a mindless killer any day.

In the end, I can't really call Malevolence good, but I've certainly seen much worse. I appreciate some of the ideas Mena had for his film, but overall it lacks originality in its execution. However, I would be interested in seeing what Mena does next.

After a bank robbery doesn't go as planned, the criminals seek refuge in an isolated abandoned house. Soon the robbers and their two hostages find themselves terrorized by a madman. This movie is like a combination of two other horrors released around the same time: "Dead Birds" and "Toolbox Murders." Unfortunately, it isn't as effective as either of those films. The director and many reviewers have claimed this is a return to the gritty 70s style of horror film-making, but I found this to be more like your average 80s slasher. However, it doesn't have that ambiance that a film could only have by being created in the 80s. It isn't nearly as entertaining. I watched parts of the Director's commentary, and all of the things he pointed out as "homages" are things that have been done so many times that they most fans would probably take them as genre clichés and not homages. The most irritating part about this movie (besides the average acting) is the musical score. For the most part, it is eerie and subtle. However, whenever something scary happens, someone goes wild with the Casio, and the effects are grating. While "Malevolence" isn't a terrible movie, I'd honestly rather sit through an 80s slasher than a modern film that tries too hard to recapture that era.

"Malevolence" owes a lot to other films. It pays homage to "Halloween", Texas Chainsaw Massacre" and "Friday the 13th" with a little dash of "Psycho" for good measure. This time around when a bank robbery goes sour the crooks are forced to break up and meet at a predetermined location. Unfortunately a silent madman is on the loose that chases a hostage, her daughter and the criminals around a spooky abandoned slaughter house in the sticks.

Sounds familiar doesn't it. All the tried and true "slasher" clichés are here but are done well. As I was watching I kept seeing the grabs but they really worked. The photography was excellent. I can't remember a better shot "slasher" since maybe the original "Halloween". The music was very nice and recalled the best parts and usage of John Carpenter's "Halloween" score. The acting is perfectly fine with no major complaints and as with the case of most "slashers" character development was a bare minimum. However the only flaw the film suffers from is that the editing keeps it a bit slow in the beginning. A good Dr. Loomis-like character would have helped that out. Highly recommend for fans of the classic "slashers".

I had the displeasure of viewing a screening of this movie at the recent Horrorfind Weekend Convention in Hunt Valley, MD. I had high hopes because Anchor Bay is a great company that usually puts out great movies. Unfortunately this was not the case. The movie was boring, the music was annoying, and the story line was lacking some good content. I will say that the acting wasn't too bad, but the bad story line didn't help them any. If the writer would have stuck with how the movie started out, and played along with that story, then it would have been one amazing movie.

The first 5 minutes made it look extremely promising, but it went down hill after that. This is one I wouldn't mind seeing a remake of. After the screening they wanted us to say good things about the movie to the camera, but I'm sorry to say that even though I so wanted to, I couldn't because of the let down of the movie. Steven Mena does have some good potential though as a director, but he might want to leave the writing up to someone else.

Some horror fans are complete snobs...I just don't get them. On one hand, they'll praise a film like CABIN FEVER to high heavens, and then on the other they'll trash a film like MALEVOLENCE. Funny...I thought this was a great little horror movie, and far better than any of the mediocre fare that has been released to theaters recently.

Granted, the plot is nothing new: A bunch of people (in this case a gang of thieves and a kidnapped mom and child) are stalked and killed off by a hooded killer (in this case the demented disciple of a Satan-worshipping mass murderer) in a secluded setting (in this case an abandoned farmhouse in the country). Yep, nothing new at all.

But what I loved about MALEVOLENCE was its sheer refusal to play any of this for laughs. The truth is, this sort of thing has been done so many times most filmmakers would probably feel the need to poke fun at themselves while they're doing it. But the filmmakers here smartly go for the opposite approach and try to emulate the gritty 70's style of THE Texas CHAINSAW MASSACRE. OK, so it never reaches that level of intensity, but there are some genuine chills here, and I absolutely loved the country atmosphere, which was suitably menacing.

Seriously, folks--lighten up. For a low-budget, direct-to-video (but shot on film--hooray!) slasher this is really, really good. I wish it could've gotten a theatrical release--it would've been panned by braindead critics (who automatically give these sort of films bad reviews anyway) but it still deserved to be showcased like many other, lesser horror films are. See it.

I also was at Horrorfind 2004 in Maryland and went with other two people that commented on here to this movie. I have to say, I'm glad I didn't pay any money to see it.

This movie looked very promising and it was a huge let down. The acting wasn't good, the lead lady was annoying and all I could think was when was she going to die. She couldn't seem to decide whether she wanted to have a British accent or not.

The dialogue was terrible and the story was very lacking. The music was redundant and loud, not suspenseful like it was meant to be. It was a huge let down.

We were asked before the movie started that if we had some positive comments about the movie to please go to the cameras at the end of the film...I only saw one women go to the cameras...Everyone else walked out of the theatre shaking their heads...They all looked disappointed.

This movie isn't worth the view...and nowhere near a good horror film.

I knew exactly how I wanted to review this film until I read most of the reviews here. Now, I'm almost at a loss for words but that won't last long. I have a few things that need saying. What set me back were all of the positive reviews praising this movie. To me, that was more shocking than anything the movie attempted to deliver. Many reviewers have pointed out, and I agree, that the positive reviews are most likely the director himself, signing up a bunch of IMDb accounts. Note that those reviews are from persons who have reviewed only one film, MALEVOLENCE. Curious, don't you think? To be honest, I wouldn't take the time to sign up just to talk about this movie. But, I have an account so, here goes:

The DVD starts up with classic trailers like Sam Raimi's Evil Dead, Clive Barker's Hellraiser and Carpenter's Halloween. WTF? If it's a matter of Anchor Bay distributing them it's one thing, unfortunately, I think it was an attempt to somehow hypnotize us into thinking what was about to unfold would be forever linked to those classics. BULL(expletive deleted)!

The most tragic thing about this film is the fact that the opening story scroll is ominous with it's use of statistics regarding missing persons. I was actually drawn in for a brief moment. The scene with the woman chained up and the boy being brought in, revealed when the sack holding him was opened, hinted that this was a dark journey and it got me expecting a psychological thriller. Even the murder of the woman as seen by the boy (complete with parts of the framework of the house obstructing the view) was well done.

Then what happened? I could trash the acting all day long but, I'll give the players the benefit of a doubt. Some of our best actors have had directors who coaxed dead pan performances. It's been known to happen. I won't waste any time on that issue other than to say that this film would not serve any of them well as a reference.

Early on, the most interesting character is killed off. He's got a small part but he should've been a driving force for the action of the film. Nothing after his death works. The motivations of the characters are all wrong. Come on, a mother who has been kidnapped with her daughter (who manages to escape) falls asleep after some feeble struggling? Give me a break! Maternal instinct alone dictates that that woman would rip her flesh to get free. There would be no stopping her. Other than the young girl, there is not a single protagonist in this movie. We're supposed to feel for the man who was reluctant to participate in the robbery but, he participated and deserves what's coming to him. Be it from the law or a deranged killer.

The entire film is a rip-off of much better films. Every attempt at a "jump" scene is old and tired. Come on, we know the killer is going to get up when the others aren't looking. I want a movie where, when the victim gets the drop on the killer, they keep pounding, slashing, kicking and pummeling him until there's no possible way he could get up. (See Bruce Willis in Sin City, attaboy!)

There's been bragging about the low budget and the resulting "high quality" of the film despite it. I'm not seeing it here. I commented to my wife about the incredibly crappy soundtrack (plink, plink, synth string chords, blah blah blah). How shocked I am to see so many reviews complimenting it. (Mostly due to some comment padding by people involved, no doubt). In all honesty, this movie is made worse than it needs to be because of all of the false hype.

Overall, the best experience of the evening was the trailers that preceded the feature. As a child, I saw the same Halloween trailer in the theater and was scared out of my mind. It was interesting to see how it still had the same effect. Shame on Anchor bay for packaging the DVD so beautifully. They sold me on the movie with that alone. Shame on Anchor Bay for putting those trailers on the DVD as well. Shame on Stevan Mena for hyping his film and himself so much that God Himself couldn't live up to it. Movies have changed. I know Mana doesn't like the "Hip" modern horror films. Most people don't. However, there are examples of where to find success. SE7EN, for example: You don't witness a single murder (unless you count Pitt shooting John Doe) on screen. It's all psychological. The first SAW was similar in it's execution. Now those are scary movies.

If Mena set out to make a slasher flick paying homage to (or ripping off) the greats, he succeeded. If he set out to make a film to match the greats, he failed. If he wanted to make something amazing and groundbreaking, he failed miserably. I do wish him luck, however. You need passion first. That, he has. But, I beg, please, please don't make those other two Malevolence movies. Do something better with whatever budget you are given.

In the movie, after all the main carnage is over and we're supposed to feel at ease, mom has a nightmare and wakes up screaming to find that her daughter has entered the room. She cannot sleep because of the horrific ordeal. She gets in bed with her mom and smiles. Sure, I walk into my mom's room and she lets out a blood curdling scream. I feel safer now.

I notice that there were two films called Malevolent released last year. IMDb designates films and even people that have the same name with roman numerals to differentiate them. The other film was # I. Very fitting, because this movie is definitely # II.

This movie is such a piece of garbage. It is a total rip off of TCM for one. The screener that I saw even had Leatherface saying how good this movie was. (they must have gave him a lot of money) It starts out with a crappy plot about a bank robbery gone bad and the brother of the girlfriend gets shot. From there he dies in the car and the two main characters talking about find soft ground to bury him in. Soon afterward they are putting their clothes back on. WTF! What did they do with the body that they had to put their clothes back on!! Not to mention the killer in the movie wears a pillow case on his head which is just plain silly. And like any horror movie you think he is dead a bunch of times and he gets back up and pops up later. A very unoriginal plot and music that will make your ear drums bleed. I was watching this outdoors with about 40 other ppl and every time some suspenseful music came on everybody groaned because the music actually hurt our ears. Awful Awful movie do not waste your money.

I had looked forward to seeing this film for a while after reading about it. I thought this was a solid film from start to finish. It borrowed from others but in a very respectful way.

I think a lot of the other post here are very hard for no good reason. If you want to see a very good horror film this one is better then some of the more recent Box office releases of late.

I never felt the acting was ever that bad. Thought the story was tight and the writing fine, Not sure of the budget but did not have a cheap look or feel to it.

Take a chance rent this one. I hope to see more from the filmmaker.

This movie's eerie, I'll give it that. But scary? Sadly, no.

A bank robbery goes wrong, the survivors rendezvous at a house, someone evil is in the house. Bank robbery aside, this movie has been done. And done. Many, many times before. I respect the fact that the movie was shot for practically nothing and that it represents a noble attempt to return to those halcyon days in the horror genre when killings were brutal, the production decidedly unpolished and, for the most part, the movie terrifying. But rather than paying homage to films like "Texas Chainsaw Massacre," "Malevolence" adds nothing to them. "Continuing in the tradition of" is very different from "aping."

Ultimately, this movie is more Greek tragedy than horror. Things start off at a turning point for the characters, things fall apart, people die. What the movie's lacking is a real sense of horror. It's awfully hard to be scared when everything happens right on schedule.

I can understand why so many people disliked this movie. It's not as slick, fast moving as a lot of the newer horror films. It doesn't have state-of-the-art gore and special effects. The script is simple, the direction is a bit slow. We've seen the idea before in a way. But in a way, it's nice to see it again.

We all love the classic old horror movies. The ones that were made in a time when the scripts, characters, and style was completely believable. At least for the time period, anyways. These old movies at the time turned the genre on their ear and gave audiences things that hadn't been seen before, fear they hadn't felt before. Malevolence goes back to that. Unfortunately for the director, it has been seen and felt before.

There is, however, plenty about this movie to like. It wasn't as good as I thought it would be, but the acting was solid (better than standard b-movie fare, regardless of previous gripes), the story was completely "this could actually happen," and the theme of the film draws in childhoods and real life issues.

The thing that hooked me most about this film is the fact that I have a 4 year old child, and watching it's mother/child dynamic really helped bring a sense of fear to the film. It wasn't overt; I didn't jump out of my seat or cry ever during the film, but the dynamic did aide in its personal effect on me.

In conclusion, the film had enough classic horror elements to make it a worthy attempt at recreating the standard horror film formula, with just enough new elements to create a differential. There were some key spots "ripped" from films, such as the fist through the door scene, the stereotypical Michael Myers / Jason Voorhees killer aesthetic, and the Night of the Living Dead hero death. But it was still a good job all around, with atmosphere, cinematography, and acting.

I almost paid to see this at the theater. After renting it last night I'm glad I went with the latter.

After a bank robbery doesn't go quite as planned, some thieves end up at the hideaway where they were to divide the cash. Only problem is, the hideaway is very close to a slaughterhouse where a sadistic killer lurks. Not only are the criminals in danger, but also a couple of innocent bystanders being held captive.

While watching this movie you might see things that remind you of Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Friday the 13th Part 2 while it sounds a little like Halloween at times.

If this movie ever makes it way to cable then you might want to check it out, but I wouldn't recommend buying it.

If you're looking for talented actors, superb dialogue, and excellent character development... maybe Malevolence isn't your movie. However, if you want to be scared out of your chair, biting your nails or get another great slasher flick under your belt, see this movie. Mena's brilliant score moves very smoothly along with Kimoto's cinematography, the villain is almost a solid example of the typical deranged killer (always nice), and to be honest, the story isn't too cheesy to enjoy. All in all, Stevan Mena has put together a very good slasher film. The mediocre acting, predictable falls from key characters and the sociopath murderer all fall into place to make a great scary movie; and on top of that, it's an original idea! You don't get too many of those from indie filmmakers in Wilmington.

Hell, I can't wait for the sequel.

This was possibly the worst movie I have ever seen. It was so boring that I had my car keys in hand, ready to leave 30 minutes into it. The people I was with thought it may get better so we stayed. It was a complete waste of time and money. The acting was horrible, the plot was predictable, and the music was so annoying. All these people who are comparing this movie to TCM, Halloween, and Psycho are complete idiots. This goes into the genre of Blairwitch: a movie that gives the horror genre a bad name.

Come on Stevan Mena, we have seen the masked killer and heard the lame music a million times all as an attempt to scare people. Get real. It is 2004. I think we are all beyond those infantile means of being scared. Do the genre and us a favor--- scrap the other 2 in this trilogy.

This movie had all the Hype of a Major motion pic, but fell dreadfully short of it's so called "Horror movie of the Millennium" billing. Although for a low budget picture, the effects and acting were not bad, the characters and storyline were both very lackluster and sluggish throughout much of the duration of this movie. The overall premise of the movie prevailed prominently for the most part, but was cluttered by a few to many inter-story plot's and happenings that were never really established well enough to make relevant for the director to include other than to extend the overall picture length. Much of this film should have been left on the cutting room floor, the editing was very choppy and blunt at times which was another tell-tale sign of a low budget "B" type movie. In conclusion, this film in my unprofessional opinion is in whole just a rip-off of a multitude of your classic horror movies, such as Halloween, Texas Chain Saw Massacre, mostly Friday 13th,and to top it all off with a little taste of the Blair witch in there. They even went as far as to give the villain the same cheesy sack over the head with two eye holes cut out as Jason had in Friday 13th part 2. In conclusion, if it were not for sheer curiosity and the simple fact that movies have become to expensive, I would have, and should have walked out on this one after the first 30 minutes, that includes the 10 minutes of upcoming movie trailers.

This was a great, low budget slasher movie that was more of a throwback then most of the crap Hollywood has been putting in years. It's good to see that a director actually understands that a slasher movie doesn't necessarily have to tons of gore to be effective. This movie is in no way original unless you consider most horror movies are still trying to cash in on PG-13 movies with tons of crappy WB actors who will disappear in 2 years when their shows finally die. Remember Jennifer Love Hewitt? Remember Joshua Jackson? Remember Kerr Smith? It's always refreshing to see a horror movie that doesn't pretend to be anything it's not. Instead of crappy, unrealistic dialogue like in the ridiculously lame Teaching Mrs. Tingle or I Know What You Did Last Summer this movie is straight forward and gritty. Is the acting great? Of course not, this isn't the Omen or Exorcist. The director was obviously influenced by Halloween, Texas Chainsaw Massacre and other classic movies. Is this as good as Halloween or Black Christmas? Of course not, it's not supposed to be. It's just a serious horror movie with no humor and slasher who doesn't spit out one liners or wear Abercrombie & Fitch, Hot Topic and 200 dollar jeans from Urban Outfitters. I'm anxious to see what Stevan Mena does next and have heard rumors he's working on two sequels for this movie to form a trilogy. With a budget of 250 thousand dollars, few directors could actually pull off a pretty good genre flick. How much was the budget for the ridiculously lame Cursed? I know that Craven lost a lot of creative control over that movie and Dimension Films screwed him over even though he did give them the Scream trilogy but in a world of remakes, how can any fan of horror not like this movie? That being said, it's not Argento or Romero. There's no beautifully choreographed, elaborate death scenes and that's acceptable. It's a basic stalk and kill movie. No matter how derivative this is, it's still a REAL horror film. Movie snobs who take themselves too seriously and honestly don't love horror, will hate this and I doubt Stevan Mena was trying to get Roger Ebert to give him a great review or even get that corpulent slob to see Malevolence. He's too busy watching urban movies and giving movies like the Honeymooners 3 stars but will in turn give Cabin Fever and Wolf Creek horribly negative reviews, haha. What a tool.

A great horror/suspense movie in the vein of Halloween and Texas Chainsaw. No cheesy rap music or 90210 actors in this one. The way horror movies used to be made. The way they should be! The movie starts with a grizzly murder in an old slaughterhouse. How great is that? The audience was jumping out of their seats throughout the film. The last movie that kept the chills up for so long was the original Halloween. The movie flyer I had gotten stated the movie was "relentless in its desire to scare the heck out of you". It definitely was true in this case. I hope this movie will start a trend towards good horror again. Music score was really creepy throughout the film. Highly recommended.

The music alone in this film immediately sets it apart from 99% of all the other dreck out there. Utterly classic. Opening scene is by far the creepiest I've ever watched, and this film has I think the scariest scene ever committed to film. I won't give it away, but let's just say you will sh*t yourself.

My friend saw this at the Village East in Manhattan, and he asked me to go see it with him a second time. I may go see it again, it was that good. My only complaint was it was too short, only 80 or so minutes. But still, overall an instant classic. This will go right in my library next to Halloween, Nightmare, Suspiria and NOTLD. Tomorrow I am going out to look for the soundtrack.

"Malevolence" is one of the best horror movies I have seen in a long time. The acting was very good and director, Steven Mena, did a wonderful job of writing and directing this film. Many of the elements of a good horror film ie; Halloween, Texas Chainsaw Massacre, The Shining were incorporated in this film. Mena could become another John Carpenter in this genre. One of the things that surprised me was the absence of sex. In most horror/slasher films, the gratuitous sex with college/high school kids is there while the bad guy is running around trying to find them. This film had a scary story line and stuck to it. "Malevolence" just made me jump out of my skin several times. Generally, I'm not very scared with these types of films... not so with this film. I'm so glad that this is the middle part of the trilogy. I can't wait to see the other parts! Go see this film. It's GOOOD!!