Horror Addiction
As a child Brian Carter (Sean Clement) use to watch his mum experiment on patients suffering from addiction at her controversial medical centre. They are memories which not only haunt him but caused a wedge to form between them and after she unexpectedly dies he refused to attend her funeral. But Brian learns that he has inherited the old monastery which was her medical centre and with some friends who think it could be redeveloped they take a trip up there. But it seems that Brian's mother in trying to cure addiction created something evil which puts these friends in danger and with a fight on their hands to stay alive.
A creepy building in the middle of nowhere... tick, a group of people who go to stay there... tick, only a couple of these characters have any depth... tick. I could go on but to put it simply "Hidden" is a tick box movie, a movie made from a list of cliches which always seem to go together which of course makes it ultimately familiar. As such right from the word go "Hidden" had a lot to do to stand out from the countless other horror movies which deliver a similar set up.
Now "Hidden" gets some things right, the camera work is crisp even if it is ordinary and the treatment rooms in the monastery have that mad scientist, torture room vibe going on which at least makes it look right. But the special effects throughout the movie are less than realistic and the acting is as ordinary as the concept which whilst not making the movie stink does fail to make it memorable.
But the biggest disappointment when it comes to "Hidden" is that is wastes the opportunity to do something clever when it comes to the evil which they find. As it is the most original aspect of the movie I won't go in to detail other than to say they revolve around the manifestation of addiction which could have made for a fantastic movie rather than an ordinary one.
What this all boils down to is that at best "Hidden" is only average but sadly often falls below average which makes it frequently hard work and a little disappointing.
