Arriving in Thailand to become teachers, a group of friends trying to experience the culture finds themselves caught up in the supernatural antics of a dead little girl coming back to seek revenge on the original culprits who killed her and set out to stop her rampage from continuing.This one was a decent enough supernatural effort. One of it's more enjoyable aspects is the rather enjoyable atmosphere conjured up by the whole experience of being in a foreign land. The concept of them being in Thailand being out of their element and trying to figure out what's going on once they wake up from their date night is where this one really starts taking off with some great ideas and concepts. Most of this comes from an incredibly chilling backstory involving the use of necromancy and black magic to detail the steps involved in the creation of the main spirit at the heart of the story and the various rules that go into playing out the different forms of protection or just creating the ghost itself that provides quite an impressive backstory to this one. Tying in the rather creepy and chilling flashback that explains the actions and motivations of the family into undergoing the ritual and how the refusal plays into the manner of haunting against them that turns into some rather freaky moments in the house as they're individually haunted by the ghost in the house all in startling sequences. The final half really puts this into overdrive as well with another big plus in the strikingly brutal and twisted torture games being played throughout here which offers up some shocking sequences. This starts out nicely early on with the dream scene where all three dole out bloody tortures on their dates by literally ripping them to pieces in slow, methodical fashion as the graphic and bloody visuals showing them being showered with blood throughout the process makes for a striking setpiece. The final half, where it really lets loose with them being tortured by the idea of one of them being possessed by the released ghost girl features even more over-the-top bloodshed and gore which does bring this one up quite a bit. This one does have a few minor issues, which comes from the needlessly convoluted and contrived storyline that doesn't make any sense here. This one is way too complex about what's going on with the girl and the witch doctor with the family living there and how it all ties together in the end as it definitely bogs itself down in needing to explore too many angles in order to make sense. As well, the fact that this happens during the parts where the girls become the most unsympathetic makes it somewhat hard to really care as for what's happening which doesn't need to happen at that point. Combined with some minor scenes of dodgy CGI, these here are what hold this down.Rated Unrated/R: Graphic Violence and Language.

Three American fitties, Alex, Julia and Rachel (Ciara Hanna, Emily O'Brien and Jackie Moore), travel to Thailand in order to teach English to children (and to pick up sleazy British guys in bars for casual sex), but find themselves menaced by a Kumari, the vengeful spirit of a young girl who was sacrificed in a bloody ritual.Borrowing heavily from post-millennial horror hits The Grudge and Hostel, James Cullen Bressack's Pernicious is a wholly unoriginal torture porn/creepy girl ghost story that tests the patience from the word go. Its three central girls might look great in a pair of tiny shorts, but they're unsympathetic characters, behaving in an irresponsible manner that is bound to end badly; the torture element is suitably nasty with fine gore effects by Jerami Cruise, but it's nothing we haven't seen many, many times before; and the supernatural scenes are totally predictable and scare free, supposedly nail-biting moments including the old 'it's under the duvet' trick and the tried-and-tested 'bathroom mirror reveal' (yawn!).Just about bearable thanks to the lovely ladies (alas, no nudity!) and the gore (best bit being the shot of a pulsating brain in an old woman's crushed skull), but don't expect Pernicious to deliver anything remotely original.

Pernicious starts off like a rather naff TVM. Three models (supposedly teachers) rent a house in Thailand and experience some weird goings on, before shrugging them off and going shopping/clubbing. This pretty much continues for a good part of the film before they can ignore it no longer.Actually the above précis makes it sound more interesting than it really is. There is no real script or acting to speak of, just by the numbers progression. I thought for a moment the film was dubbed because some parts have badly out of synch speech. After every trauma they remain immaculately presented, with not a hair out of place, and strangely unmoved by their experience.There are a few scenes of Herschell Gordon Lewis style camp ultraviolence, which although obviously fake, is the only redeeming feature of the film. However, they jar with the pedestrian pace and made-for-TV style nature of the rest of the film.Overall, although not terrible, you need to be seriously bored to bother with this one.

PERNICIOUS is a US/Thai horror film with a ridiculous storyline and even more ridiculous execution. It feels a little like the equally sleazy and explicit SICK NURSES, another Thai horror flick that emphasised outlandish gore over the niceties of plot and originality.This film's narrative concerns a trio of American bimbos who travel to rural Thailand to start teaching careers (when you see the characters of these women, you'll know how ridiculous and unbelievable that is). Before long they uncover a spooky golden statue in their rented home, are menaced by grisly dreams, and haunted by the spirit of a ghostly little girl.About the only thing this film has going for it is a fairly novel basis for the spooky goings-on: the use of child corpses in Thai black magic, something that fills real-life newspapers every now and then. It's a chilling premise, but this film soon turns into a silly rip-off of THE GRUDGE, except with really awful CGI effects instead of anything halfway decent. Bizarrely, there are also some extremely unpleasant gore sequences thrown into the mix, including one 'torture porn' dream sequence which is among the most explicit I've ever seen. It smacks of desperation in a film that otherwise struggles with poor acting, scripting, and a totally unmemorable playout.