Haunters: The Art of the Scare

Haunters: The Art of the Scare is a documentary about all types of haunted houses, mazes, and events from traditional to extreme and the passionate people behind them. The beginning goes over the history of haunted houses and the inception of theme park haunts (at Knott's Berry Farm). I thought it was hilarious how many haunted house tropes originated in Christian Hell Houses that took you through horrible sins and their repercussions to get people to turn to faith. The documentary follows a variety of figures and their own endeavors in the scare industry, namely legendary scare actor Shar Mayer, Donald Julson creator of a huge home haunt, and Russ McKamey, creator of the infamous extreme haunt McKamey Manor.

Shar Mayer has been working as a scare actor for 35 years in almost every major scare event incuding traditional haunts, extreme haunts, and hybrid haunts with theater. From a young age, she wanted to scare people and enjoyed her first experience scaring classmates dressed as a skeleton on Halloween. Later on in life, Shar almost leads a double life in October when she works very late, takes time off her day job, and leaves her husband, who doesn't really understand her love of the scare, to take care of their home. Her transformation of mannerism and movement is amazing as she gets into character. The coworkers at the haunt are her family with that dedication and love to scaring people binding them together. I could seriously listen to her stories for hours. She's a fascinating person with a unique point of view.

Donald Julson runs a haunt out of his parents house every Halloween called Nightmare on Loganberry. Every year, he works for over a month, spending a large amount of money, for an event that will only be open for 4 hours on Halloween. It's also offered free of charge. His talent for fabricating props shines in his sets in addition to his and his family's dedication to creating this grand event every year. Unfortunately, his wife isn't as thrilled with his passion and even bans Halloween talk the rest of the year. It seemed like they were going to get a divorce any minute as they refused to compromise or discuss or see each other's side. This event is not far from where I live, so I will definitely check it out next year.

McKamey Manor is the most controversial of the haunts shown and it takes up much of the film mostly because no one has ever covered it before. It's also the most extreme haunt representative of a growing movement. The haunt is harrowing to watch as people are subject to what amounts to torture that they can't choose to leave for hours. There is no safe word or ability to walk out of the room. Russ McKamey has many shady practices including having children victimize patrons and then banning children actors after an adult actor acted inappropriately and gave them drugs and alcohol. This is all in addition to making people eat disgusting things including their own vomit, waterboarding them, and otherwise beating, punching, and shoving them. Russ will not go through his own haunt, self admittedly scared of everything, but videotapes every event, actively mocking and laughing at the patrons. It seems like it might have to come to someone dying or being seriously injured to stop this haunt.

Other scare attractions seen are Knott's Scary Farm, Universal Halloween Horror Nights, Blackout, The 17th Door, LA Haunted Hayride, and Delusion. The creators of these events are interviewed as well as Jason Blum and the Soska Sisters. I wish the sisters would have been interviewed about Hellevator since it was a game show that used a haunt format in a new way. I wish we could have seen more of Blackout and The 17th Door. Blackout is another one that's more extreme, but the creators experience everything themselves and have a safe word. The 17th Door slants more extreme and has a theatrical element. Safe words can be used for individual rooms so you don't have to bow out of the whole event over one thing. Delusion was one that I would love to go to. It's a theatrical haunt that takes inspiration from video game RPGs and has the group accomplishing tasks and completing some sort of quest together. All of the events have something special to bring to the scare event format.

Haunters: The Art of the Scare is a well made documentary that shows all facets of the scare industry. Jon Schnitzer creates an emotional story with the main figures featured where they all experience some sort of heartbreak or hardship, which is resolved or overcome by the end of the film. I discovered many local events that I either hadn't heard of or hadn't been to. The only real criticism I have is that McKamey Manor was maybe too prominent in the documentary, but it's the most infamous event that people would typically be most curious about. The deleted scenes are fully realized features on many of the haunts in the film that just didn't fit in with the narrative. I highly recommend this documentary and I hope Schnitzer might make another documentary or even a TV show featuring different haunts.

My rating: 4.5/5 fishmuffins