Know Fear
“Know Fear” has a lot of elements we’re familiar with, thrown at us in an unfamiliar way. That, in and of itself, makes it worth watching if you’re a fan of horror. It follows a similar story structure that we’ve seen before, but the way it plays with our expectations make it feel more insidious in nature than your average haunted house/possession movie. If that type of thing interests you, “Know Fear” is well worth your time to watch.
The film begins with an obligatory prologue that sets up the house being haunted. A family is dealing with issues of demonic possession and it doesn’t end well. We then cut to a future date, and Donald (David Alan Basche) and Wendy (Amy Carlson) are moving in to the same house. They have relatives that visit them in Charlie (Jack DiFalco) and Jami (Mallory Bechtel), and they settle into their lives. One day, as she’s down in the basement, she finds an unusual old book, and tries to read out of it. As always seems to be the case with such situations, it leads to possession, and trying to save a life before everyone dies.
The screenplay by Adam Ambrosio and director Jamison M. LoCascio knows exactly how it should go about its business from a formal standpoint, but the way the characters go about their business is where the interest really lies- more specifically, how they have to work together when the possession becomes real. Jami is someone interested in the paranormal, so she can understand what is happening as the situation spirals out of control, but one of the interesting things in “Know Fear” is how different characters essentially have different jobs in understanding what the evil is saying to them- one person can see it, one person can hear it, one person can read the book (even though they haven’t understood Latin in their lives), and while that may leave Nancy (Meeya Davis), a teaching assistant to Wendy, on the outside looking in, she’ll have a role to fill also, something she’ll understand by the end.
LoCascio keeps the film moving briskly at just under 80 minutes, and the performers do solid jobs in their roles. This is the third film of Ambrosio and LoCascio’s I’ve seen and another genre they are approaching. In “Know Fear,” they understand the mechanics of the horror genre, and there are moments of this film that pop off the screen with an effective sense of dread, although- as with their previous films- it works best when it’s exploring the dilemmas of their characters. Seeing the moments like that- such as a moment of Jami, alone, exploring a haunted place on her own, and Donald and Charlie having a moment where Donald has to help Charlie calm down and reflect- you see the filmmakers in their element, as they tackle a different genre, and succeed.
