An American Ghost Story (2012) is a movie I recently watched on Amazon Prime. The storyline follows an author who moves to a haunted house with his family in hopes of experiencing something that jumpstarts his writing career. Unfortunately the paranormal activity increases and while the author gets excited he may be putting his family at risk in the process.

This movie is directed by Derek Cole (Up for Rent) and stars Stephen Twardokus (Let me See your Eyes),Liesel Kopp (Why Women Kill) and Wendy Haines (Dexter).

The storyline was fairly cliche and straightforward. The writing is fairly weak as the author didn't do much research on the house to understand what and why things were happening. The horror elements and special effects were modest at best and relies primarily on some cheap jump scares.

Overall this movie doesn't have many redeeming qualities or a storyline with enough depth to care about. I'd score this a 3/10 and recommend skipping it.

The story is fairly simple. Paul (Stephen Twardokus) and Stella (Liesel Kopp) move into a haunted house so Paul can write a book on it. Turns out the house is haunted, Stella moves out. Paul does not and investigates further.

This is a plain and simple low budget ghost story. It was well scripted and directed. Stephen Twardokus who wrote and produced the film was weakest as an actor. They should of had someone else in that role. The story line is simple without any twists. The intent of the film is to scare, i.e. make you jump. It tries to this a dozen or so times, and actually made me jump once, something I don't normally do in the daylight and sober. Don't expect a great horror tale, just a good ghost movie for the sleep over.

What we know about the ghost: It can throw a basketball, but can't hit the rim. It can stack chairs, but can't decorate. It can turn on a radio, but has trouble changing stations. And it must be a male because it leaves the draws open.

Making its way around Redbox in 2014.

Parental Guide: No f-bombs, sex, or nudity. Lacks heavy violence and blood.

Well, "Revenant" (aka "An American Ghost Story") isn't likely to knock "Poltergeist" of the throne in the haunting/ghost genre. So was it a bad movie? No, I wouldn't exactly call it bad, I would merely call it mediocre and rather uneventful compared to other movies in the haunting/ghost genre.

The story in "Revenant" is about a couple moving into an allegedly haunted house where a man killed his wife, his children and then taking his own life. There is an oppressive tension in the house as they spend their first night there. Slowly, but gradually, more things start to happen, and as the events escalates, it becomes too much for Stella (played by Liesel Kopp) and she leaves Paul (played by Stephen Twardokus) in the house alone. Determined to research into the subject more thoroughly for his book, Paul starts to get into contact with the spirits that is haunting the house.

For a haunting/ghost movie there weren't really anything overly impressive about the movie. There were no dazzling CGI effects. Sure, this was a fairly low budget, and I will say that director Derek Cole actually managed to pull it off quite nicely with the budget. The effects were actually quite good, despite not being those dazzling CGI effects. I especially enjoyed the scene with the bed sheet where Paul was trying to find the haunt in the living room.

There were some good shocks in the movie, not because they were ghastly or creepy, but because they were nicely timed with the build up and the music/sound effects. You will not be scared senseless after having seen the movie, but your heart will skip a beat or two along the way.

Storywise, then "Revenant" wasn't particularly impressive, and it did survive given the build up of suspense and thrills with some great climatic shocks, and also a good music score. But storywise, then it was generic and stereotypical for the haunting/ghost genre.

As far as character build and development goes, then this movie only concentrated about the Paul character. Stella came and went in the blink of an eye, and I wonder how come she didn't call Paul back as she said she would. I was waiting for her to return throughout the entire movie. But she just didn't do so.

And if you are in a haunted house and spooky things are happening around you, why don't you just use common sense and turn on the light in the room? But no, apparently the Paul character didn't possess that kind of logical thinking, better to stumble around in the darkness when there was a malignant entity in the house as well. That just makes sense.

"Revenant" is good fun for an evening where you watch some ghost movies, however, the movie just doesn't have the contents to support more than a single viewing.