Film Review – Camera Obscura

Co-writer/director Aaron B. Koontz has a made a John Carpenter tribute film with “Camera Obscura,” only one that doesn’t celebrate the best the maestro has to offer. A homage to “In the Mouth of Madness” with a touch of “They Live” for flavoring, “Camera Obscura” toys with the unreal, building a supernatural serial killer story that begins with a touch of dark magic and ends in a nightmare realm of insanity. Koontz is determined to remain one step ahead of his audience, messing with grim visions and bloodied victims, but his command of tonality is severely lacking, somehow turning a tale of PTSD into a darkly comic chiller that rests on a bed of Carpenter-esque synth scoring, ultimately crippled by miscastings and a screenplay that’s often caught scrambling for something to do. Read the rest at Blu-ray.com