MOVIE REVIEW: Untold – Jodi Sta Maria, Joem Bascon
Here’s my review for Untold starring Jodi Sta Maria and Joem Bascon and directed by Derick Cabrido from Regal Entertainment.
The film follows a reporter, Vivian Vera, with a deep secret connected to her career and something sinister that came after her mega hit coverage of the “Semento Massacre”. She suffers from hauntings that are related to her involvement in the crime she made an expose. As the days grow, the hauntings and zoning out grows worse and Vivian realizes that something must be done. But will she be able to break the curse and stop the hauntings or not?
The film takes on a number of stuff including a bit of mysticism, murder and more and even some visual cues from other horror films. I spotted one that’s similar to “Smile” as well some stuff that’s very reminiscent of “Drag Me to Hell”. And it does a solid of meshing those ideas together. I wasn’t sure if that was going to work but the writing in the film managed to do just that weave in and out of various subplots and major plotlines.
Jodi’s character comes off as a successful reporter with a very dark past and one that comes back to haunt her big time. At the same time she also has to deal with ghosts of a crime she witnessed AND ghosts of her past misdeeds. Untold features a number of nice thrills and scares. There’s one good scene I liked where we get Joem Bascon’s character Benjie kill himself and the succeeding haunting of Vivian. I also have to raise some trigger warnings here especially if you like cats.
Kitty Marie in Untold
The creature designs were OK too in fact, it’s refreshing to see well thought off looks for these ghosties. Sure some of the scares were basic but thanks to the creature make up and VFX they elevated the scenes.
Jodi definitely had some great moments in the film and I tip my hat to the makeup department for showing us different looks for the actress from her deranged look to her haggard look. There were definitely a lot of moments where Jodi’s acting shines especially when it comes to somebody who’s slowly losing touch with reality. Then there’s also JK Labajo who steals the scene as Vivian’s prod assistant Jasper. Wasn’t expecting some really funny moments in the film as well including that one scene with JK and Jodi and coffee. It’s filled with that throughout the film which also makes it an endearing film.
Untold, for me, was a promising horror film which explores a really deep ethical dilemmas while at the same time injecting social commentary and a dash of realism. It’s got a lot of fresh camera works and suspenseful moments that really creep up on you. We also get good shock moments and jumpscares too. It does have some great moments but it’s also encumbered by a number of subplots that were either hastily wrapped out or completely forgotten. Still the suspense is strong in this one.
SCORE: 8/10
