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Morris County

Morris County

Movie
Studio(s): 
Director(s): 
Genre: 
On DVD: 
Tuesday, December 16, 2014
Grade:
C
Running Time: 
91 minutes

MORRIS COUNTY:
Three movies, three dark plots, that's what this anthology Morris County contains. Morris County borders the edge of being horror in this hour and a half long DVD directed by Matthew Garrett. The three short movies are Ellie featuring Darcy Miller as a teenage girl who is on the road to self destruction but why would this teenage girl do this to herself? Then there's the Family Rubin that tells the story of one family that seems perfect but in reality this perfect family is a dark and disturbing one. Ending out the three movies is Elmer & Iris, a story that follows a recently retired Iris that looks forward to sitting on the couch with her husband but tragedy will force Iris to decide, be alone or stay with the rotting body.

THREE SHORTS ONE LONG MOVIE:
I love watching independent movies for a number one reasons, the main one being that independent movies usually have more originality to them then big budget movies. Sometimes they can be incredible where you will question why someone with so little a budget could make something so good while there are movies that cost hundreds of millions turn out to be a flop. Then again, there are some that will just make you wish you never knew what a movie was and make you question ever seeing one again. Morris County would fall in the middle of these two extremes, neither extraordinary or mind numbingly bad.
Here's the first thing you should know about Morris County, it's not a horror anthology, even though the description on the back of the DVD case says that the three shorts are horror. Sure the plots are dark, they are disturbing, and they will gross you out some, but they are not horror. Horror is something that is supposed to scare and frighten you, none of these three shorts do that. One is about a girl who is out to punish herself and when we discover the reason at the end, it's more disgusting. The second one is about one very dysfunctional family that is also disturbing and sad but nothing scary about it, well other than the fact that this is actually close to real life for some families that it is scary. With the last short it's gross and makes me feel sad for Iris but does nothing to make me scared or frightened.
What I thought of each of these movies is that they where ok but not that great. Ellie has a plot that tries to make you wonder about what and why Ellie is acting the way she is but there is a huge flaw in that plot, we never get to know Ellie before the start of the short. Is she shy, timid, loud, fun, sad, or any other of many different personalities? I don't know, all I know is that this girl Ellie seems to be trying to forget something and I'm being made to wonder why but without a little knowledge of the girl before this all I wondered about was when will this story get to the point. The Family Rubin turned out to be a little more telling but it also turned out to be just how disturbing humans can be and how easily they can do some sick things. However, Elmer & Iris is the best one out of the three as it looks into the idea of losing someone that you have been with for so long that you might now die alone. It's also disturbing but it's also very sad in how Iris handles her loss. For the most part what helps these shorts is the acting, it's decent, nothing great, some of the actors need a little more polish around the edges, but they are believable in their rolls. The worst aspect of these shorts is how they use the typical independent filming techniques of having a scene where nothing really happens in it other than the way it was shot. Ok, I get they are trying to use the scene to set the emotion but what it also does is give a scene that can slow down the story. It might look good on film but does it progress the story? That should have been the question to use on some scenes but clearly wasn't.

Lee Roberts
Review by Lee Roberts
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