Directed By:
Rich Mallery

Starring:
Kristine DeBell, Lisa London, Mel Novak, Vida Ghaffari, Kelly Reiter, Bogdan Szumilas, Jesse Hlubik, Scott Butler, Joseph Kelbie Williamson

Storyline:
“Believing the strange disturbances in their home are their deceased son reaching out from the other side, Molly [Reiter] and Tom [Hlubik] ask a medium [London] to make contact. But instead of their child, the three accidentally invite a vengeful demon to cross over. After the demon violently possesses Molly’s younger sister [Olson], the couple enlists the help of a disgraced priest [Butler] and his mentor Sister Catherine [DeBell] to attempt a dangerous exorcism.”

HOLY TERROR opens up with a bloodcurdling scene of Father Murphy (Mel Novak) and Sister Catherine (Kristine DeBell) performing an exorcism on Halley (Vida Ghaffari).  Satanic exorcisms typically frightens most and Halley’s exorcism did just that as it set the eerie mood of the film.

Ghaffari’s role as a possessed Halley was intense her acting provided the perfect amount of evil coming out of her to make her the scene spine-chilling.  “I did my research by watching countless real exorcism videos and reading about it,” tells Ghaffari about her role as Halley.  She was also thrilled to work alongside a couple veteran actors in her scenes, “I was honored to work with Mel Novak, who is a real legend, from Bruce Lee’s ‘Game of Death’ and Chuck Norris’ ‘An Eye for An Eye’ and countless other films. It was also great to work with iconic actress Kristine DeBell, from ‘Meatballs’ with Bill Murray and ‘The Big Brawl’ with Jackie Chan.”

After the traumatizing and tragic exorcism opening scene, we then meet Molly (Kelly Lynn Reiter) and Tom (Jesse Hlubik) a married couple that is in obvious sorrow and suffering.  It’s soon learned that they lost their son Joshua at a young age and they struggle to move forward in life.

At this point in the film, Director and Writer Rich Malleryhas adequately set up the story.  He raised the main question and set up Tom and Holly’s goal while including moments of tragedy, evil, and heartbreak all within the first ten minutes.

As Tom and Holly struggle with the loss of Joshua, Tom tries to keep himself together and help Molly keep her sanity.  However, he’s obviously hiding his pain, but won’t show it in front of her. Strange incidences happen in the house and Tom keeps dismissing them and coming up with logical explanations.  Soon the occurrences become more frequent and aggressive, which includes injuries to Holly’s sister Billie (Nicole Olson) who is staying with them.  The evil presence apparently in Billie is tough for Tom to believe due to her drug addiction and both Tom and Holly believe Billie’s sickness is due to severe withdrawal symptoms.

Holly then starts to thinks that Joshua’s spirit is still in the home.  Once Holly physically starts seeing Joshua and experiencing more frightening happenings she believes her son is stuck in a bad place and she needs to help him. It’s time for Holly to bring in help and Tom and Holly attempt to contact Joshua with a séance led by Janice (Lisa London).  Janice tells them that it’s not their son and that there’s an extremely evil and dangerous presence in their home.  After the séance the drama, conflict, terror, and even seduction raises the stakes in the film significantly.

It’s time to bring in Father Murphy and Sister Catherine (now just Catherine) to help Tom and Holly.  Father Murphy and Catherine are reluctant at first due to the tragedy during their last exorcism.  Knowing they’re Tom and Holly’s only hope, they agree to perform the exorcism, but proceed with extra caution and fear.

During the climax the exorcism is exhausting as the possession brings out the worst, including it exposing a little secret of Billie and Tom, which more than likely will put a little hamper on Tom and Holly’s marriage.  The battle with evil continues and the violence escalates.  Will the exorcism outcome end better than how it did for Halley and what sacrifices will be made to rid the evil in their house?

The acting, directing, eerie settings, and nature of the film makes HOLY TERROR an entertaining, and scary film.  It does have a bit of a 70s/80s feel to it as Mallery did a good job implementing some of that era’s style into the film.

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