In 1993, at Beatrice High School, the performance of the play "The Execution" was going smoothly until a tragedy struck the audience and all participants: the fake hanging of the play's protagonist turned terribly real and caused the death of young actor Charlie Grimille. Twenty years after the fateful event, students from the same high school decided to stage the same show to honor the memory of their deceased colleague. However, the rehearsals did not go as planned, and the boy assigned to play the protagonist, Reese, seemed to have accepted the role more to impress the girl he loved than out of love for theater. Soon, however, the young man and all his fellow workers will discover that their choice was not one of the happiest and that some stories would have been better kept secret forever.
Although a superficial view might make them seem like two art forms at opposite ends of the cultural and staging spectrum, the world of theater and that of horror have always had a certain affinity and a tendency to contaminate each other. Examples abound, and it is enough to think of the macabre themes present in some Greek tragedies, or better yet, the Grand Guignol shows that spread in France between the late 19th and early 20th centuries, where blood flowed in rivers and the spectacularization of physical violence reigned supreme.
A relationship consolidated also on the big screen with films dedicated to the myth of the "Phantom of the Opera" and, among many examples, "Opera" by our master Dario Argento in which the killer's crimes took place around the staging of Verdi's "Macbeth," a work considered cursed in the film. This time, however, the partnership is revitalized following the style most in vogue in recent years, namely found footage. This happens with "The Gallows - The Execution" directed by the young duo Chris Lofing and Travis Cluff, both discovered through a promotional trailer online posted by the two young authors, by the usual Jason Blum who has made found footage a true trademark of his BlumHouse. The result of this operation is a rather disappointing work, not very effective in conveying tension and fear and approximate in terms of writing and technical department.
The real flaw of "The Gallows" is the now atavistic one of all films of this subgenre, that is, that of revealing, for almost half of the plot, an abundance of long stretches and unnecessary details that do nothing but risk boring the viewer and lowering the level of attention and interest to guard levels. Thus, we witness banal dialogues, images of daily reality that are not very functional, and a presentation of the characters that is, to be honest, very sparse and not very in-depth.
But the script's flaws do not end there. The aspect that most harms the good outcome of the film is the naivety with which the events are chained together, thus contributing to making the viewer always find themselves in the unpleasant sensation of being one step ahead of what is happening in the scene. As if that were not enough, the tension is managed in the worst possible way, and what should be a frightening fusion between found footage and the classic slasher turns into a hybrid that is not very appealing and anything but adrenaline-pumping, aggravated by the fact that the villain of the moment appears very little and when he does, his appearance is not fully shown as would be appropriate in a similar situation where the entire story is based precisely on the ghost of the student who died accidentally. Criticisms that make even unnecessary the unsettling, or at least in some points, soundtrack and the photography tending to accentuate and raise to protagonist of the scene a very bright red color and symbol of blood and death.
In short, a boat that is taking on water from all sides with which even the members of an anonymous cast sink, among whom we can count Cassidy Gifford (God's Not Dead), Mackie Burt (Vanishing on 7th Street), Ryan Shoos (the TV series Pretty Little Liars), and Reese Mishler (Medicine Men), all of whom are not very skilled in giving weight and substance to their characters.
Cluff and Lofing, in conclusion, prove to be mere executors of a mediocre work and conceived with an eye much more on the box office than on quality.
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