Review #32: 13 Cameras (2015)

This review was originally written in October 2017.

Movie #2- 13 Cameras

I thought this movie had a neat premise. A pair of soon-to-be-parents move into a new house with a creepy landlord, who (unbeknownst to them) has installed a ton of secret cameras that we never see but are to assume are totally hard to notice and not at all incredibly obvious high-grade film cameras. The wife is pregnant, and the husband is having an affair while his wife is pregnant. The pregnant wife is pregnant and she pregnants all over the place and then the landlord of the pregnant wife has a secret pregnant bunker under the house of the pregnant wife and she's pregnant pregnant pregnant. Oh, did I forget to mention she's pregnant? The movie sure didn't, they made sure to mention it multiple times literally every scene because maybe you forgot!

In all seriousness, this movie tried as hard as it could to portray the landlord as the most offputting person possible, and the husband is a complete and total scumbag. And as I established, the wife is the most pregnant person possible. That's basically the only character traits you've got to go off of for any of them. The protagonists are complete and total idiots- there's a door in the house to a closet (or so they're told) that they never bothered to open until after living in the house for a few weeks, and when they do finally open it and realize it's a staircase leading down, they NEVER bother to see what's down there. Ever. For several more weeks, there's an entire other room to their house that they've just never deemed necessary to go into or even look at. Speaking as a homeowner (as well as someone who has rented several apartments), I would NEVER view an entire unexpected room as anything but the greatest find in the world. I've never said, "Oh, we've got enough room, let's leave that one empty." And so of course when the creepy landlord turns a woman into a slave (who somehow eats and uses the chamber pot despite being her hands being shackled to the ceiling) the protagonists never bother to even open the door to that room they found and then immediately forgot about.

And, of course, the final confrontation with the landlord is idiotic. Not a single person does a single thing to resist being attacked by the shambling, geriatric slob who slowly hobbles toward them from the shadows. If your head were being held under 4-foot-deep water by an old man, wouldn't you... I dunno, stand up?

Oh, and remember how the wife is pregnant? (How could you forget!) It only amounts to one tiny detail at the end of the movie, which has no bearing on anything else. Way to drive that important detail home, guys.

Score: 3/10 Totally invisible and not completely obvious cameras

What I Would Do If My House Had An Extra Secret Basement: Jump for joy and tell everyone about it because it would be awesome

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