What to Watch: Host (2020)

By Andy Bartsch, GGR Contributor

The world’s a crazy place right now. Between a global pandemic, race riots, protests, a lousy economy, and an uncertain future, 2020's been a bit much. Luckily a handful of filmmakers and actors used their time quarantine wisely andd made a very entertaining film now available on Shudder entitled Host. 

Taking place (and filmed) during the COVID-19 quarantine, six friends conduct a séance over Zoom. One of the friends accidentally invites a hostile demon and everyone’s night is ruined. While the plot isn’t exactly original, for example: it takes elements from movies like Unfriended, it ultimately succeeds where that film failed (and I say this as someone who actually liked Unfriended).  There’s real, actual tension built up as the film goes along and the actors do a pretty good job in their roles.  The scares are fairly creative and have some really interesting setups which do pay off quite well.

There are some pretty interesting details and ideas that director Rob Savage uses, such as a timer for a “free trial” Zoom call (which I didn’t even notice until the very end of the film), which ends up making the film roughly about an hour long. The end credits is set up to look like a software credit window, and to be honest, I’m hard pressed to think of any obvious cuts I saw during the takes.  But then again, there are normally at least three characters on screen at any given time.

Of course with this being a “found footage” movie, there are some long static shots of dark, narrow hallways which usually end in jumpscares. However they don’t feel cheap and I genuinely felt creeped out by the surprise.  I even tried to pause at the right time to get a good look at what I saw.

The actors, Haley Bishop (Angel Has Fallen), Jemma Moore (Wonder Woman), Emma Louise Webb (The Crown), Radina Drandova (Dawn of the Dead), and Caroline Ward (Stalling It), don’t take any shortcuts in making their performances believable.

Overall, the film really impressed me. To shoot, edit, write, direct, and distribute a 56 minute film in such a short time simply just blows my mind! If you’re a fan of horror, found footage, and have a Shudder account, Host is definitely worth checking out.

 I give it 4 scary British puppets out of 5.