The Midnight Horror: 'Door to the Other Side' (2016)

♰ Welcome to The Midnight Horror! ♰

Can you tell by now that I have a deep-seated aversion to modern low-budget horror flicks? It’s not that I wouldn’t love to embrace them; it’s just that they often feel like a collection of hastily written notes strung together by someone more interested in making a quick buck than crafting a chilling narrative. So, with my expectations set firmly at rock bottom, I braced myself for my latest Midnight Horror experience, Door to the Other Side. Originally titled Reclusion, this gem marks the solo directorial debut of Norman Lesperance. For reasons known only to the marketing gods, the title was changed for its 2017 Digital 4 Media DVD release. Oddly, it echoes another horror flick, The Other Side of the Door (2016), which makes it feel eerily familiar—like an unwelcome ghost at a seance.

Now, let’s delve into the plot: "Letting them in was his way out, but he was not alone." Sounds riveting, right? Meet Tim (Mitch Holden), the quintessential shut-in, a soul so isolated he’s practically fused to the walls of his cluttered home. His only interactions are with a neighbor (Nicholas Bianchi, who also penned this head-scratcher), and even those are more fleeting than a shadow at midnight. When eviction notices loom over his carefully crafted sanctuary, the very fabric of Tim’s sanity begins to unravel like an old sweater. Are the strange occurrences he experiences figments of a stressed mind on the brink, or is there something more sinister lurking in the gloom—an insidious presence preying upon those who dare to reach out?

The script is riddled with more holes than that old t-shirt your girlfriend insisted you toss, and I can’t help but marvel at the sheer level of confusion it induces. The atmosphere teeters on the edge of delicious dread, which I found strangely captivating, almost like a moth drawn to a flickering flame. The performances were decent enough to keep me tethered to my seat—at least for the first fifteen minutes, where the tension felt palpable. But the moment the neighbor’s girlfriend—or was she a wife?—entered the scene, my mind spiraled into a maze of questions. How did a recluse like Tim forge a connection with his neighbor if he hadn’t ventured outside in years? Did he have a secret job he was working remotely? And don’t get me started on the hauntings: have they been haunting him for the past nineteen years straight? The script weaves a patchwork of plot holes that could rival the Swiss cheese in my fridge.

Midway through, the film starts to lose its grip, but it clings to just enough intrigue to prevent me from dozing off or gouging my eyes out. There’s a twist lurking in the narrative that caught me completely off guard—it also threw logic out the window and danced with it in the street. And just when I thought I was settling into the tale, the credits rolled, leaving me in a state of bewilderment. What on earth did I just witness?

I have to hand it to the filmmakers, though: they earned an E for Effort. It’s clear they were striving to forge a gripping horror experience from the ashes of their half-baked script. However, without a skilled script doctor stepping in to whip the story into shape, what we have here is merely a flicker of what could have been—a ghastly tale lost in a labyrinth of confusion. ╌★★✰✰✰

〜B.J. Burgess