Day 262 of the challenge! I watched Trapped Ashes so no one else has to watch it ever again. Seriously, don’t watch it. It’s terrible.
You’d think a horror anthology that brings a bunch of cult-famous directors of the genre together would mark the beginnings of a new classic, one that would be enjoyed for many midnight viewings to come. You’d think that, and normally you’d be right, but there’s a reason no one’s ever really heard about Trapped Ashes (I saw parts of it when I was a kid on a random premium channel). This is easily one of the worst anthologies I have ever seen (or movies in general), and would make the biggest fans of “so bad it’s good” run away as if their lives depended on it.
Feeling like a cheap knockoff of the much better Tales from the Crypt, Trapped Ashes’ frame narrative revolves around a group of strangers, stuck together with a cryptic and suspicious old man that demands each stranger tell the group the story of their most terrifying experience. You can already see where this is going. What follows is a series of depraved and salacious shorts that all drip with poor taste and execution. Imagine all the crazy Cronenberg weirdness you could want, but pointless and written with complexity of something softcore you’d find on late night Cinemax. So unless you’re into vampiric breast implants, hentai, necrophilia, or demonic tapeworms (all looking like it was made with the budget on a late 90’s Goosebumps episode), I’d say stay away.