The Collection (2012)

While the first movie of this series "The Collector" had such a dark toned scenario, story, and cliffhanger ending, I myself felt that it's sequel "The Collection" lacks the amount of both credibility and creativity to make a much better storyline that surpasses the first movie. The movie also counts with an amount of unnecessary gruesome scenes in my opinion. I was also hoping that we'd get to know more about "The Collector" himself, what does he achieve by doing all of this, though we get a little tease at the end with Arkin telling some things about his past. The last scene made it up for just some seconds, though as expected, we got a cliffhanger ending with "The Collector" trapped in his own coffin by Arkin. Not to mention that throughout the whole series there's been more questions than answers formulated. But nice try nonetheless.

Let me start off by saying this has a great concept. The mere idea of it is so chilling and terrifying. However, the nauseating editing and lack of character development really ruin this movie and make it unbearable to get through.There is no reason to care about what is happening. None of the character's have any personality - literally zero. This film should have been thirty minutes longer so we could have had at least an ounce of character development. The characters who get killed are irrelevant and you don't care because you feel no attachment to them whatsoever. The editing - oh man. There are parts where they use slow motion, shaky cam and quick cuts and it is a mess. It is understandable the hotel they are in is a "maze", but the way the film is edited gives off the idea of a labyrinth where the locations make no sense in relation to each other. You don't get an idea of where the characters are in relation to each other and which way is "the right way" to go, so to speak. It doesn't create a sense of isolation - it's frustrating. Characters appear and disappear and it makes NO sense. The quick cuts make it even more confusing on getting a bearing of your surroundings.This is a fun movie that comes across more as a violent action movie than a horror. If you want some cheap thrills then this is a good movie for you. There is a really strong foundation here for a film, everything else is just piled on garbage that distracts from the good concept underneath.

Though this is the sequel to "The Collector" and ties in well with the ending of the first film, it actually has very little to do with the original. For starters, you have to forget the premise of the first as well as The Collectors modus operandi. Like the original, these films work well if you don't think... at all. Once you do you'll start spotting the massive gaping flaws in the story. So in this chapter, The Collector has upped his game and has gone after a club full of young adults. From which one survives. Luckily for her, she has a loving and rich father who will do anything to get her back... so he sends in his own band of mercenaries to get her out... okay, everybody, let's march into the blood-spattered decrepit hotel and chant at the top of your voices, "Let's Go Die, Let's Go Die". And so the carnage continues.The thing which made the previous film so good is the same thing that makes this... the tension and suspense. Dunstan is a maestro at manipulating the pace and atmosphere to get you on the edge of your seat. Every time a trap is sprung you wonder how nasty it'll be... answer... very nasty. That's the second thing keeping the audiences attention, the kills and the action. There is a tonne of gore, enough to keep Hershall Lewis smiling in heaven, and plenty enough for the gorehounds.Stewart is much better as Arkin in this film. It would appear that being the collector's plaything has added an extra depth or two to him. His motivation to escape is evident in every scene he's in. Lee Tergesen does a passable job as the hired killer Lucello. However, the rest of his merry men are ten-a-penny redshirts... proper cannon fodder. So, it would appear that the writers decided not to fill out their characters too much. Then there was Fitzpatrick as Elena, who was okay while she didn't say anything. However, when she did speak she spoke with wooden tongue.The special effects were awesome, the re-breaking of Arkin's arm and the escape attempt is quite nearly sickening. The sewn together body parts is eerie and disturbing. And the traps are gruesome and deadly. Hopefully, all of this should be enough to satisfy, who needs a story, right(?)The story really could have made this into a better and stronger film. In the original, all you had to do was forget that it takes time to jerry-rig a house with all the traps, the collector used - forgivable, for entertainment's sake.The character of the collector breaks into a house and leaves a present for the homeowners. A trunk, inside of which is a tortured person from his previous escapade. This "Present" is for shock value to throw the prey into confusion and fear. Then he sets about torturing and killing everyone, but one, in the house... nobody lives.This is even mentioned on a TV News Broadcast in the sequel. There's been a spree of home invasions with this MO. Even though it's the police being interviewed in the broadcast there appears to be no manhunt for The Collector. No Task Force. No FBI. Then there's a party at a secret location... not too secret as TC's had time to set up a really nasty combine harvester trap, which is rigged to the trunk, hidden away in one of the rooms of the derelict house. Boy, he was really hoping that somebody would be curious enough to go looking through a condemned building, so they'd set the trap off.Then when we get to his hotel it just gets worse. Not only does this killer torture and murder homeowners but he must also be picking up people off the street judging by the number of dismembered cadavers laying around... Not only that, but he now has "The Collection" roaming around the place too. People too scared to try and escape. Most of which are high on drugs. TC must be cooking the stuff or he really is one sick rich dude. However, the strange thing is the traps in this place... a place that's his so he has all the time in the world to construct the best traps ever, but are really weak-assed. One of them is a hallway of plywood with nails knocked through them. They don't even move together. Another is a hallway full of bear traps. Which you can easily get through by just walking to the side of them. Damn this place really needed Kevin McCallister's touch.Then there's the stitched together body parts. Looks, like TC's been watching The Human Centipede, what a sicko... This absolutely breaks with his persona. There is no way that he would do this. And then to arrange them in some kind of fluid inside glass canisters... believability is out the window.Had the writers chosen, not to go down this path but to remain on the original and begin to explain TC's psychosis and background a little then it would have only helped to define the character better. The strongest films give their audience an inkling into the psychopath and his thinking. You know what's eating Norman, what's driving Michael, why Freddy is so evil, and even Jason gets a backstory and motivation. These add to the power of their characters and hopefully the films.If you're a gorehound then this film is definitely for you. If you don't like blood then I'd recommend you stay away.

When Elena (Emma Fitzpatrick) is abducted by the sadistic serial killer known as 'The Collector' (Randall Archer), her wealthy father (Christopher McDonald) hires a team of mercenaries to locate the psycho's hideout, an abandoned hotel, to try and rescue the girl. Helping the team in their task is the only known survivor of the mask-wearing murderer, professional burglar Arkin (Josh Stewart).The Collection, the sequel to gory 2009 horror The Collector, doesn't make a whole lot of sense, with a million and one plot-holes and characters who make the dumbest of decisions—but I don't care, 'cos it delivered precisely what I wanted from a film by the writer of the Feast sequels, the latter entries in the Saw series and Piranha 3DD: namely, tons of gore!It's not long into the film that the nastiness begins, with an outrageously splattery sequence in a nightclub that sees an entire room of ravers reduced to a mass of messy body parts by several ingenious mechanical contraptions (like the Saw films, the killer is a dab hand at building the most complex of booby-traps and presumably has an endless supply of cash to fund his sick hobby).From this moment on, The Collection is a gore-hound's dream, delivering one sickening scene after another, the camera lingering on every disgusting detail. The effects, both practical and CGI, are satisfyingly gut-churning, with one revolting moment involving a broken arm that I found very uncomfortable to watch, and it's not often that I can say that.