Really Surprised!

i know i wasted 90 mins of my life.

Excellent characters with emotional depth. My wife, daughter and granddaughter all enjoyed it...and me, too! Very good movie! You won't be disappointed.

It really made me laugh, but for some moments I was tearing up because I could relate so much.

Not exactly scary, or thrilling; but creepy it is. James and Amy(Nick Stahl & Mia Kirshner)live at 388 Arletta Avenue. Just an average married couple working through a less than happy relationship. But they love each other and this house might just be able to keep them together. They have no idea that a faceless voyeur will begin manipulating them into a cat-and-mouse game, watching through dozens of hidden cameras. Simple little pranks will set tensions at a snapping point. Manipulations will become more mysterious and serious when Amy disappears with hardly a trace. Every time James has a chance to help his own situation a bad decision only prolongs his torment. If he could only identify who is causing the anguish and why.Sad to say the characters are neither interesting or likable. Sympathy is even hard to come by. Others in the cast: Aaron Abrams, Charlotte Sullivan, Krista Bridges, Devon Sawa and Gerry Dee.

"Karma's a bitch," says Devon Sawa's Bill to James, the protagonist of 388 Arletta Avenue.James (played with a nicely dead-on everyman vacancy by Nick Stahl) has just confronted Bill with several disturbing facts: his home has been repeatedly broken into, his computer tampered with, his cat has been "replaced," and now his wife is missing. And that's just the beginning.Turns out James and his friends tormented Bill relentlessly during grade school and James, in his desperation, believes Sawa's character is behind it.Though that's far from the central thesis of Randall Cole's latest feature, it's a very engaging sidebar and probably the most alluring plot point in what seems at first to be a pretty standard found-footage psycho-stalker creeper.Except that 388 is actually a very intelligently-crafted film with an almost diabolically clever script. Stahl is tormented by everything from phantom mix CDs, footage of his wife bound and gagged somewhere, and ultimately set-up for her impending murder (after he actually DOES kill someone). While I was never bored by this film, I does suffer from a low-energy level at times. Stahl is left, quite unfortunately, to carry the film as Kirshner, an enjoyable and underused actress, is MIA (no pun intended) for most of the film. He does a commendable job, playing his ordinariness with an unsettling true-to-life banality, and he's never very likable... which is a very hard thing to achieve and still keep an audience's focus. It also probably contains one of the most creepy, amoral villains you'll encounter on film.Don't expect a traditional thriller, and certainly not something that will make you feel warm and cozy. It's one man's descent into hell for absolutely no reason other than someone's sadistic kicks.

This film is shot from the perspective of a stalker who torments and manipulates a young couple. He installs some sort of monitoring devices in their home, and much of the action is seen from the perspective of these hidden cameras that follow the couple around the house. Thus, the film has the feel of the Paranormal Activity films, despite the different subject matter.The villain breaks in on multiple occasions to set up traps to toy with the couple. Fairly early in the film, the wife (Mia Kirshner) leaves following a heated argument that ensued as a result of one of these traps set by the stalker. The vast majority of the film, then, involves the husband (Nick Stahl) trying to figure out where she went and who the person is who has been messing with him. The sense of danger escalates as the film progresses.The one major complaint is that the film requires some pretty major suspension of disbelief regarding the capabilities of the villain stalker. Specifically, he is almost like an omniscient puppet-master who is able to manipulate Stahl's character to do exactly as he wants. There were numerous times when Stahl could and SHOULD have reacted to some provocation by the villain in a completely different way, but instead reacted exactly as the stalker wanted, thus propelling the plot to its desired end. Stahl's troubles are compounded by some stereotypical inept, unsympathetic police and pesky in-laws who are suspicious of his story.Overall, it's a decent little film, in my estimation certainly better than the low rating here. Just go with the flow and the film will give you some genuine chills.

Finally, a film in the sub genre that actually works. I want to call this a found footage, however, it's not really, and maybe that's exactly why it works so well - there is no pretense that these events are "real", there are no ridiculous "shaky cam" moments that give you motion sickness.Instead, Randall Cole gives us a solid bit of film-making, taking the POV genre to a new level with a well thought out storyline, excellent character development, and solid direction.It's a story that could easily play out in real life, and Cole seamlessly takes us through the gradual break down of a relationship, one that he hints deliciously that has some deeper, darker demons in the past, but one we don't fully(or indeed need) get to see. The psychological turmoil faced by "James", brilliantly played by Nick Stahl, gets more over-powering as Cole takes on his journey into hell, culminating in a shocking ending that will leave you wanting more.There's a definite feel of "The Poughkeepsie Tapes" about 388 Arletta Avenue, but this is a good thing, because whilst the Tapes has been around for several years, it's still somewhat unheard of and still a groundbreaking movie for what the story contains - 388 Arletta takes the premise and brings it right into your living room.388 Arletta Avenue - unrelenting, unremitting. Unmissable.8/10