“Ass balls.” [truer words…]

Story: A group of guys and their trusty producer create phony “ghost hunter” videos. That these guys call their show S.P.I.T. (Spirit Paranormal Investigation Team) tells you all you really need to know about these jackasses. So obviously, they’re gonna hit a place that’s actually haunted, right? Right.

Scares: Just the sinking feeling that you’ve wasted precious time in your life watching this garbage.
Splat Factor: All off-screen, with the syrup & red dye shown after the “carnage”.

Subgenre: Boring Found Footage Ghost Chasers
Year Released: 2014
Remake, Sequel or OG (Original Ghoul)?: Original, but it feels like a cut-and-paste of other films in this subgenre.

Trick or Treat?: Grove was such a nothing, I forgot the whole damn thing less than a day after watching it. So I had to watch it again. On Tubi. With commercials. I feel like I deserve a medal. But I’ll take Halloween candy instead. Reeses pumpkins would be awesome.

Hoping for the best, but expecting a hollow rip-off, I poured myself a lovely red, and settled in… But needed a second pour to get through this disappointingly boilerplate clunker. Writer/director Craig Efros definitely needed more folks steering him here; the plot is messy, the characters disgusting, and buildup of suspense is lackluster at best.

I heard lines directly lifted from other ghost hunter found footage movies, and hots seem copied from earlier films as well. A strange wheelchair that feels added on because somebody saw it in another film and thought that’d be cool. The obligatory easy to open window for jumping out of. And, of course, lots of “did you see that” moments that end in a tepid payoff.

Grove‘s back story is fascinating and gross, worthy of a much better plot than what it got. The idea of an orphanage that has a crematorium running constantly due to the deaths of children is horrifying. Sadly, nobody behind the camera could do any better than this boring, derivative slog. 

The guys in SPIT feel like random characters thrown together, rather than actual friends who happen to work together. And the way the fellas act feels like their brains never developed beyond middle school hijinks. Less than 15 minutes in, and I want all of these asshats to die horribly. HORRIBLY.

Producer Julie is the only one who takes her job seriously, however her main job seems to be a PSA for workplace harassment. That the guy who’s come along with SPIT to film a documentary about them never once calls the guys out, makes me just want to take a chainsaw to these cretins myownself. (No, I don’t care about Mr. Cameraman. The film doesn’t either. He’s just the why for the found footage premise.)

To add insult to injury? This is yet another film that touts the presence of a popular horror icon, only for the performance to be barely more than a cameo. As Bill, the team’s practical FX guy, Lance Henriksen is onscreen for less than 5 minutes total. Get your bag, good sir.

The cherry on top of this crap sundae? They kill a cat. The FX of the aftermath looks like a rag covered in ketchup, which would have been almost hilarious in any other movie, but played one hundred percent straight here. Instead, the death is infuriating, as there’s absolutely nothing in the story to justify this needless jump scare.

Skip this one; just rewatch Hell House LLC, Gonjiam: Haunted Asylum, or hell, even Grave Encounters. Grove isn’t scary, it’s annoying.

Score: 1 out of 5 pumpkins. And I’m being generous.