Portal to Hell

Philip Marinello4.0

“Hey, you sure you don't wanna f**k this guy in the bathroom?”I was pretty sure I was going to like this after hearing about it from some of the people who made it but I was pleasantly surprised at how heartfelt and funny it was along with it being an indie genre film about a portal to hell in a laundromat. And the whole cast was great! Trey Holland, Romina D’Ugo, Richard Kind, and Keith David all bring their A game with each actor having at least one standout scene where they let it rip. If you like genre films and anything about the premise sounds interesting to you, check it out when it’s playing near you and try to go in as blind as you can!

Chandler Levack

1. This is my favourite Richard Kind performance in his pantheon of cinema.2. Romina D'Ugo is my favourite movie star.3. I had never heard that Hot Chelle Ray song before and I still can't believe it's real.

Paul Thomas4.0

While watching Portal to Hell, I was thinking about why so many horror comedies are bad. And the answer is both complicated and very, very simple.The complicated part is what horror is as a genre compared to what comedy is. They’re both genres that get very instinctive, tacit, and reactionary responses from the audience. When you’re in the depths of a horror scene, it’s easy for the brain to want to undermine it. To say: this isn’t so scary, this is actually funny and ridiculous. So as a viewer, you’re very open to the comedy of a moment when the scene is tense or scary. And as a writer, you’re very open to turning your whole scene into a comedic moment and pointing out the absurdity of it all. That’s where it’s complicated, and that’s why we get so many bad horror comedies. Because is the person going for that temptation actually funny? The simple reason why certain horror comedies like Portal to Hell work is because the writer is actually funny. Horror—and especially horror comedies—tempt a writer who isn’t funny to make a joke in a moment that seems to ask for one. At that crossroads of whether to go scary or funny, almost every writer will want to go funny. Even if they resist the instinct and stay scary, there’s still a part of them, at least 20%, that wants to go funny with it. But that begs the question: are you funny, or are you just trying to take advantage of putting a joke into a horror scene?The other problem is that most people think they’re funny. Have you ever been to an open mic? If you have, you know most people are not funny. Portal to Hell is very funny—not because it takes ten scenes and goes for the joke (a lot of writers do that), but because when it does go in that direction, it’s guided by someone who is actually funny.And another reason it works so well is the confidence in the joke. The director doesn't need to score to ham it up. It doesn’t need the whole scene to turn into some whackadoo absurd scenario. The score and imagery can remain horror. But what the characters are saying is very funny. And the filmmakers know this. They don’t need the whole scene turning into a comedy.