V/H/S/ Halloween (2025) Review by Phil Newton
V/H/S/ Halloween is the eighth and most recent installment of the ‘found footage’ franchise that showcases multiple tales of terror from upcoming and established horror talent. Since teaming with Shudder in 2021, the revitalised series has now had five successful releases via the speciality streaming platform, all of which have also received physical releases on Blu-ray and DVD here in the UK courtesy of Acorn Media International. After V/H/S/Beyond took the anthology series into space, this latest film, as the title suggests, takes Halloween as its unifying theme this time around.
Regular viewers will know that the V/H/S movies always have a wraparound story; this year we’re presented with Diet Phantasma, written and directed by Bryan M. Ferguson (best known for his boundary-pushing music videos for the likes of Ladytron and Alice Glass). Octagon are a UK-based soft drinks company and under the supervision of CEO Dr Rothschild (David Haydn) are product testing their latest soda, Diet Phantasma. As we return to the tale we witness a succession of test subjects drinking this fizzy treat – but will it pass the taste test, and more importantly, are there any side effects?
Our first story proper is Coochie Coochie Coo, written and directed by Anna Zlokovic (Appendage). Two teens, Lacie (Samantha Cochran) and Kaliegh (Natalia Montgomery), are celebrating their last Halloween before they go off to college. Aware that a cheerleader went missing a year ago the pair throw caution to the wind when arriving at large property that promises mucho candy. Once inside Lacie believes they’ve stumbled upon a haunted house attraction however Kaliegh is concerned it feels more like a murder house… As the pair find themselves trapped and move from room to room they quickly discover that what lurks within is more terrifying than they could ever have imagined.
The next segment is Ut Supra Sic Infra (which translates to As Above So Below), directed by Spanish veteran Paco Plaza (REC) and co-written with his pal Alberto Marini (Summer Camp). We open with a crime scene filled with dead bodies, their bones crushed and eyes removed. Enric (Teo Planell) has confessed to the police, but he’s unsure of what exactly happened and his interviewers are sceptical, believing this must be the work of more than one person. As Enric is taken to walk through a police reconstruction of events, recovered video footage reveals what really happened. Vicky (Maria Romanillos) took a group of friends on Halloween to a deserted house where a medium was rumoured to conduct seances and communicate with the dead via an old rotary telephone. When a phone is heard ringing it’s Enric who chooses to answer the call…
The fourth segment is Fun Size, written and directed by Casper Kelly (best known for his work for Adult Swim). Two couples are out trick-or-treating when they come across a bowl full of unfamiliar branded candy. They’re amused by a dick-shaped chocolate bar that oozes cream when bitten, but things take a serious turn when Austin (Jake Ellsworth) ignores the notice to take no more than one candy bar and is pulled head-first into the bowl! Before you know it the four friends find themselves in some sort of factory being stalked by a couple of characters dressed in candy mascot costumes, and they’ll soon discover to their peril what ingredients really go into those distinctive candy bars!
Next up is KidPrint, written and directed by Alex Ross Perry (Pavements). Tim Kaplan (Stephen Gurewitz) runs an electronics business whose shop specializes in recording video scrapbooks for local kids; Tim believes this is a worthy service providing a record – and protection – for a neighbourhood in which eight children have gone missing. With Halloween celebrations cancelled and the police instead distributing candy to the kids, another child is taken. Recognising the victim as being a recent customer, Tim returns to his store where his assistant Bruce (Carl Garrison) is overseeing the weekend shifts, only to uncover what really goes on at work when he is absent…
The sixth and final segment is Home Haunt, written and directed by wife and husband team Micheline Pitt-Norman & R.H. Norman (Grummy). It’s been a family tradition every Halloween for Keith (Jeff Harms) and his son Zack (Noah Diamond) to construct a haunted house attraction for the local community. Now that Zack is approaching adulthood he’s not interested in participating any longer, but after gentle persuasion from his Mom, the pair head to the thrift store to pick up some new items to help furnish this year’s set. Keith is particularly happy to spy a supposedly cursed vinyl record which he believes will provide the perfect soundtrack, but unfortunately it transforms his home into a real-life house of horror…
After a somewhat mixed bag of short films in the latter V/H/S titles I felt the franchise was starting to run out of ideas and get a little stale. I’m happy to be proved wrong with this, the strongest installment since V/H/S/99. The Halloween theme really works in helping collect together a cohesive bunch of stories, and tonally it works too – with the exception of KidPrint, there’s a mix of gross-out gore and absurd humour that permeates the entire film. Highlights include Coochie Coochie Coo which expertly utilises the found footage format to dial up the tension and reveal some particularly unpleasant inhabitants within its house of horror. I also appreciated the off-the-wall humour of Fun Sized which seemed to take some inspiration from Five Nights At Freddy’s, although with much more successful results than that dire feature film.
Home Haunt is another strong contender, and whilst there are no familiar box office stars in this installment, this segment does feature a cameo from make-up effects maestro Rick Baker as a grumpy customer at Dr Mortis’ House of Horrors. Paco Plaza’s entry is worth mentioning as it stands out by being set in the modern day, with mobile phones clearly evident, thus straying from the traditional VHS tapes that the franchise is built on. KidPrint is also an anomaly in that its one of the darkest entries in the series, a truly mean-spirited tale that really packs a punch. Overall V/H/S/ Halloween succeeds in showcasing a consistently high quality bunch of short films and will likely join the list of horror films that fans enjoy revisiting every Halloween season.
Having premiered on Shudder’s streaming service, the home entertainment release of V/H/S/ Halloween from Acorn Media International features an array of bonus features, including Filmmaker Commentaries, Behind the Scenes of Diet Phantasma and Coochie Coochie Coo, a Deleted Scene from KidPrint, and the Uninterrupted Cut and Commercial for Diet Phantasma. The V/H/S franchise rights have recently been acquired by Spooky Pictures and Image Nation Abu Dhabi who produced Late Night With The Devil and Damian McCarthy’s upcoming feature Hokum. It will be interesting to see what plans they have in store for the series, but with the success of V/H/S/ Halloween one would anticipate further installments to focus on other notable dates, so my money is firmly on V/H/S/ Christmas!
