Kelby gets word that his old man has died, and together with his fiancé he heads to his home town to attend the funeral. Haven't been back home for 13 years, once there he meets two of his former old friends that he share a dark past with. A past that made him move and start his life over, but that is now back and this time there's no escaping it.
Joshua, released by Fangoria/Gorezone, is an indie film with a gruesome plot that is really hard to describe without ruin the movie for those who have not yet seen it. All I can say is that Joshua is a truly creepy movie, that has a story that stays with you long after the movie is over and those types of films are quite rare.
Kelby's father dies while serving time on death row and while Kelby seem like he couldn't care less about his father, he still goes back to his small home town in Indiana, bringing along his new fiancé to go with him. Once there, he gets a visit from an old friend of his and later at the funeral he meets yet another one of his old friends. You can easily tell that things between them are not very good and the further the movie goes, the more is revealed to why. Because together they have a dark childhood secret that now is brought back to life again and makes for a terrifying tale that is quite brutal, not to say frightening indeed.
A lot of indie flicks have this bad feel to them. Often, even if the stories are good, they might still feel too cheap and usually they feature some really horrible acting, something that seems to be quite hard to escape from when it comes to these types of films. It's always fun to see indie flicks though, just to see what people can make out of an extremely small to a no-budget, but the very outcome of most of these films are unfortunately not that great for most of the time.
 
Joshua came like a real surprise, as I was expecting this movie to be watchable at best, but ended up really liking it, especially for the script which is brilliantly delivered. It's a sick and twisted movie and is so not your average predictable horror movie, but there was actually a lot of thought put into this one. Little by little the story is revealed and it just becomes darker and darker as well as more horrifying. It's clever and impressive and at the same time truly dark and sick. It's interesting all the way through and comes out looking really good in the end. (Maybe too good because I know I had problems sleeping.)
When finished watching it, I was actually really impressed. First off, I wasn't really expecting anything and secondly, the fact that it was an indie flick that was so well made with such an interesting and gruesome story just made it seem even more impressive. There are not too many scares, actually there are no scares that would make you jump out of your seat or anything like that. It's more psychological and the plot itself is so sick, it's hard not to be affected by it - I kid you not. It's has this creepy feel to it that constantly grows the longer you watch.
Long after the movie was over, it kinda hit me just how sick the plot really was and thinking about it now does not make me feel too good. It sounds like a negative thing, but is infact the total opposite. Not too many movies succeed with doing this and writer/director Travis Betz should get a lot of credit for his accomplishment. If you liked Ringu, the Japanese film that is, this is something you'd wanna check out.
Joshua is a really impressive indie film with a story that stays with you long after that the film is over. It's truly a clever movie and I can't wait to see what Travis Betz will do next. Truly recommended.
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ALTERNATIVE TITLE:
MOVIE YEAR: 2006
DIRECTOR: Travis Betz
WRITING CREDITS: Travis Betz
GENRE: Horror
CAST: Ward Roberts, Jeremiah Jordan, Aaron Gaffey
COUNTRY: USA
RUNTIME: 95 min
RATING: 9/10
Joshua Website/IMDB Click here
Joshua Trailer Click here
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