Eloise (2016) Reviews

• Descent to Death

  dcarsonhagy2017-02-05

  "Eloise" is a film based on the actual Eloise Asylum located in Michigan. Eloise has quite a history and not all of it good. Jacob and Dell are pretty good friends, and when Jacob is advised of his father's death, he is also told by the attorney handling the estate that he is the sole inheritor of $1.2 million--providing he can get the actual death certificate of a former aunt who--you guessed it-- resided at Eloise. He tells Dell of his need and since Dell is also in dire need of cash (to the tune of $20,000) he agrees to help. They should have just waited for the state to declare his aunt officially dead. Along the way they encounter Eliza Dushku and her brother who apparently has a connection AND the blueprints to Eloise. They break in; getting out is the problem. I will not be as critical of this movie as most. I thought the story line was developed nicely (it did actually make sense), and the acting and directing was better than most movies of this genre. There was not an overuse of blood and gore and the director did manage to build some actual tension. That does not mean the movie is without its warts, because it did have plenty. Rated "R" for language, disturbing images, and some violence. This one is a toss-up.

• It wasn't THAT bad.

  stormatsunup2017-06-07

  The movie wasn't THAT bad. The only reason I watched it is because I grew up not far from there and didn't realize this was shot on site. I had never been in there but as a kid was threatened to be thrown in there 50 times (C'mon every town has one of these places that kids know of like "If you don't straighten up we're going to have you thrown in Shady Pines". Well for us it was Eloise). The most horrifying thing about this movie was how they got that black dude to play that 1970s J.J. stereotype then have him stealing the drugs and shooting at everything. Having him nearly drown was the icing on the cake as you know black people are afraid of water too (eyeroll). TRIVIA: Jackie Wilson is buried in a cemetery across the road from this place. It was paupers grave for years until they raised enough money for a proper monument.

• Not a great horror film, even by low budget standards.

  jeremy-david-kuehnau2017-01-31

  Eloise is a movie based on a real world location in Michigan, more specifically a closed sanitarium that was renowned for it's terrible medical practices. The movie centers around a son who discovers he has the opportunity to inherent his Father's estate, which comes along with a hefty amount of money. But there's a catch, he needs to get his Mother's death certificate. Everything seems easy enough until he discovers that his Mother's death certificate was actually moved to a different location and in order to get it, he would need to file go through a lengthy (and expensive) legal process. So instead of going through the legal system and getting the paper work how he should (legally), he decides to break into the now defunct sanitarium with a friend. I am not a lawyer, but the entire concept that the movie is focused on seems kind of sketchy, you'd think all of this would have been handled already. And why would their son need to go to court to get a copy of his Mother's death certificate? Besides being riddled full of weird plot holes, at first glance the movie appears to be your generic haunted sanitarium , but it starts to get really goofy as the film goes on. Frankly, I feel the movie would have been much better if it had went for the generic spooky ghost film instead of what they went with. The acting and cinematography are fine for what it is; I have no complaints. The writing is pretty shaky and the plot of the movie doesn't really make a whole lot of sense. To be honest, I wouldn't even rent this from a RedBox. If it came on NetFlix or Hulu or something and you got some time to burn (the movie isn't even 2 hours), then go for it, but I can't recommend spending actual money to see this film.

• 4 people join forces to locate a death certificate in a closed psychiatric asylum in order for one of them to inherit 1.2 million dollars

  jmitastudios2017-07-24

  First, let me say I am not a horror film aficionado. I do not watch them, period. However I am extremely interested in urban exploration of abandoned mental hospitals. That is what peeked my interest initially. The story line is your basic way to get into these abandoned hospitals, then the visions and hysteria that accompanies infiltration once there. I agree the acting left a lot to be desired, but I think the strength of the movie lies in the depiction of suspended reality. Which is real and which is imagined scenes? The film left me a bit unbalanced as I watched the 4 struggle with their own fears while in the very secret, very restricted annex. Did anybody get the homeless guy? Well, I thought about him for awhile, then concluded he was the infamous Dr. H.H. Greiss in the flesh looking for a part of his life that was taken away from him. Watch this part carefully and see if you don't agree. I thought the plot twist at the end regarding the true relationships from the past was sheer genius, including that of Jacob and Dr. Greiss. Once again, having read the previous reviews, you should bypass the horror aspect and look at it from the perspective of hidden lives that were never fully buried. The beginning shows Pia in some sort of room. Was that a modern version of Eloise? Was it jail, what was it? In the end they go back to the room with Pia. I liked that full circle inference and the parallel to what the patients of Eloise may have experienced. It depicts being unhinged in what seems to be a reality you are lost in, when no one believes what you have seen. Was the whole affair nothing but a figment of Pia's broken brain? Hmm, did she create the sketches, the receipts, the entire story because she was crazy and had been part of Eloise as a child, then locked away in an asylum for life, where she could only create a normal life by living in her head, but not really living it? As horror, it left much to be desired. However, the story told may not be what you think, or maybe it is. You decide.

• Okay… Who forgot to bring the plot line?

  S_Soma2017-01-31

  Of all the elements that go into the making of a movie, by far the most difficult to do well is the plot line. Most of the other elements in a movie (lighting, cinematography, music, acting, etc.) can almost be guaranteed if you have enough of a budget to purchase the appropriate talent. But getting a good story? That's almost always a crap shoot. Certainly there are some writers who have a better track record than others for producing quality stories, but it's never a shoo-in. And nowhere are these truths more apparent than in ELOISE. Overall, the fundamental production values within ELOISE are much higher than they are for the average of this sort of movie. There are at least two "namebrand" actors in the movie: Eliza Dushku and Robert Patrick, both of whom have long and well-established careers and both do a decent job in ELOISE. Brandon T. Jackson is a little less well-established but he certainly does a respectable job with the thin material he is given. Lighting, sound and music are all professionally polished. A particularly interesting element to this movie is that it's not merely BASED upon an actual insane asylum, but almost everything about the asylum is completely real. Even the name of the movie itself is the actual name of the real place, and much of the movie is really shot there (at least what of it is still left standing today). Here's a Wikipedia article about it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eloise_(psychiatric_hospital) Here's a for sale listing if you'd like to buy one of the remaining buildings which appears in the movie: http://www.loopnet.com/Listing/19494723/30600-Michigan-Avenue- Westland-MI/?linkcode=31060 Here's a YouTube video which claims to show images taken at the asylum: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uNbF3FNNXpo , although it's impossible to know if these images are actually from the asylum for a certainty. It's worth a Google search and rooting around the Internet for a while. The history of the place is fascinating and the "insane asylum" part of it is actually only one aspect of something that evolved through many different incarnations and purposes over its overall 145 year existence. ELOISE's reputation as a haunted place is an open question to be answered by those who believe in that sort of thing. There have been many medical advances over the last couple of hundred years but we would naturally view some of the medical practices that historically happened there as horrific by today's standards. The whole field of psychiatry and the treatment of mental illness, and even the definition of mental illness itself, have more or less invented themselves during that same time period. Given the arrogant but popular tendency to judge other eras by our own standards so in vogue nowadays, this certainly provides a context of rich material to draw from. Whatever horrors actually happened at ELOISE are largely a function of insufficient funding, incessant overcrowding and the primitive state of what science was involved. I'm sure future generations will look back upon the present day with similar horror. So ELOISE certainly has a lot of things going for it. And then the whole thing is topped off with one of the worst plot lines EVER, even for the "haunted insane asylum" ilk. ELOISE brings nothing new or original or even interesting to the haunted asylum genre. Fundamentally it confabulates and intermingles the notion of ghosts and some bizarre variation of timeshifting/time travel. It's as if the director said, "It's an insane asylum, right? So let's just throw a bunch of insane, disjointed and disconnected crap at the screen and hope for the best." What ELOISE calls horror is mostly just throwing our heroes somehow back in time and distorting practitioners in bygone eras as monsters gleefully enjoying torturing people rather than simply doing the best they knew to do at the time. And there are a few more crimes against cinema, in no particular order: Dictated by the plot line, Robert Patrick is woefully underutilized and is clearly a ringer brought in purely for his name and face. I would be surprised if his total on-screen time added up to more than 5 minutes. Brandon T. Jackson, unbelievably, is literally used as the token- black-guy-who-gets-killed-first trope. In a desperate attempt to make an un-scary and tiresome movie more scary, there are constant, blinding strobe flashes (supposed to be lightning happening outside) to create "atmosphere" but only serve to either give you a headache or an epileptic seizure. I wouldn't exactly call GRAVE ENCOUNTERS a top-quality movie, but it's plot line had a lot more going for it in terms of the haunted asylum concept then did ELOISE.