The story has some recognizable elements that will be familiar to horror fans from other films in this style of horror. There is a hint of Whedonism and Alan Ball that seem to influence aspects of Brandon's story telling in "Live-In Fear". At least to me, watching certain scenes and hearing some of the dialog, my first thought was a Whedon and Alan Ball influence. The thing about this flick is that so many different subgenres and decades of horror are noticeably influencing this mash-up nightmare. It keeps with a dark, depressed tone from the beginning to the very end.

The special effects are pretty effective and thankfully practical. I didn't recognize any major use of CGI on the paranormal aspects. This is a lower budgeted indie horror so the FX is stripped down and minimal in the film with most of the chills coming from the characters on dark personas and a collision of tragic back-stories that come to the surface and cause "Live-In Fear" to become a layered, dramatic collection of train wreck personas finally dealing with their baggage. The soundtrack stays as creepy and depressed as the characters and subject matter.

Overall "Live-In Fear" is a decent horror film that could easily become a modern cult classic. It has some flaws, I heard some dialog that comes a bit too close to other past material. Some is delivered in the same style for the same dramatic effect. Not sure if it was intended and meant for a sort of homage but it kind of drags the originality and creativity down just a tad. That being said, "Live- In Fear" has a cool, complex story with a great mix of stylized concepts that pull from several classic subgenres. And the added visual, almost psychedelic transitions were impressive. "Live-In Fear" is worth checking out.

Late at night... the movie said the Utah mountains... I grew up in Utah so I thought, what the heck, I would give it a try. Halfway through I turned it off, thinking what the heck was that all about. I then saw somebody gave it 7 stars with spoilers. Perfect, I thought. Maybe a clue as to what it's about. The reviewer had over 500 reviews. After troweling through 300 without finding the one I wanted, I gave up looking. Thought to myself, this poor soul needs to find a life.

So, my view of the movie. To begin with I doubt the two lead males could have possibly hooked up with the female leads. The girls were attractive and... well I'll leave it at that. Second, the IMDb review said the movie had a budget of 3 million dollars. Come on. Maybe $600.00 dollars to rent the mountain condo. Another $300.00 for a rental car and a hundred bucks for gas. Miscellaneous costs couldn't have been but a few thousand at most. So if this thing cost 3 million, and I was an investor, I would definitely want to see all the receipts.

In all honesty... the movie was horrible.

Four 'young friends' travel to the snowy Utah mountains so they can be alone to argue, make up and argue a little more. As things go, this low-budget horror is something of a roller-coaster. Normal conversations are punctuated with sudden moments of sullen anger, which immediately disappear, allowing the conversations to continue as normal. The outbursts, and reactions to them, come and go and then vanish. Such disjointedness is either an inconsistent script, or director/writer Brandon Scullion trying to persuade us that, out in these freezing wastes, evil lurks.

So these kids: Mallory (Arielle Brachfeld, probably the best performance here) self-harms, Eric (Chris Dorman) is an alcoholic, Becca (Sarah Greyson) might be pregnant and the other? Seth (David Lautman) has secretly come all this way to bury to dismembered body-parts of his mother. That he returns to the cabin to find his mother (Maria Olsen) alive and well and waiting for him is a good scare.

This eerie tale is cursed by some typical low-budget trappings - often stilted acting and sound issues resulting in dialogue being drowned out. The locations are excellent however, the snow adding an extra degree of isolation so important in conveying the levels of danger the characters find themselves trapped in.