The film’s titular “bad apples” are tween-age twin girls (Alycia Lourim and Heather Vaughn) who share both an inseparable sisterly bond and a giddy appetite for murder. Born under horrific circumstances on Halloween night years before, the twins – disguised in creepy doll-face masks a la The Strangers – decide to take their bloody revenge on a picturesque suburban neighborhood on All Hallow’s Eve, eventually bringing their reign of terror to the home of a young married couple (Brea Grant and Graham Skipper) who moved in just the day before.
That’s the movie in a nutshell, a serviceable if unoriginal setup for what could be a tense, unsettling little Halloween-themed bloodbath. The issues, however, mostly lie in the execution. It’s definitely not a problem that Bad Apples wants to be both a slasher flick and a home-invasion thriller – those two flavors of horror go together like the proverbial peanut butter and chocolate – but tonal confusion and some clunkily choreographed suspense sequences hold it back from being fully satisfying in either of those areas.
“Could be a tense, unsettling little Halloween-themed bloodbath…”
To Coyne’s credit, the chosen aesthetic certainly works in Bad Apples‘ favor. Shot in flat, gritty tones reminiscent of 70s drive-in exploitation movies or the subsequent decade’s shot-on-VHS slashers, it nicely hearkens back to an era of horror before the prevalence of PG-13 ratings and computer-generated bloodshed (the gore effects on display look entirely practical, and decent, at that). Grant makes for an appealing and sympathetic lead, generating some real audience concern especially in the scenes that find her character trapped in the house being menaced by the murderous duo. The twins speak only in maniacal titters and high-pitched “trick or treats” – any villain-monologuing about their backstory is thankfully avoided – and it’s their relative silence that makes them so frightening.
Well, that and, of course, those masks, which are damn creepy.
This movie wasn’t very good lol, the script/ some of the actors sounded very fake and the only part that made me react at all was laughing at the amateur gore definitely preferred “The Strangers Prey at Night”.
I LOVE the movie and me and my twin wants to dress like them for Halloween but too bad that there are no costumes of them????❤????????
I am incredulous that this review said nothing about the piss poor sound quality, terrible lighting, or clunky amateur script. But the glaringly obvious omission in this review is that none of the cast of this steaming turd of a “film” could act their way out of a wet paper bag. It was cringeworthy, and that’s being kind. No one involved deserves to work ever again. Utter trash.
This is the stupidest movie i have ever seen. Im mad i spent my money on the dumb crap. Who ever made this shouldn’t have made this its a waste of a movie no horror to my liking at all. It seems like a 1980 horror movie and it’s lame.