The Gallows is a 2015 American found footage supernatural horror film written and directed by Chris Lofing and Travis Cluff.
It was produced by Jason Blum through Blumhouse Productions, Guymon Casady through Entertainment 360, Chris Lofing and Travis Cluff through Tremendum Pictures.
On Blum's advice, Lofing and Cluff invested additional work and in fact, over the next two years, the vast majority of the film (about 80%) was re-shot.
Gifford was recommended by her famous parents, but Cluff emphasized that she won the role on her own merits, and he himself initially did not think she would agree to participate in the film.
On October 29, 1993, Beatrice High School student Charlie Grimille is accidentally hanged and killed after a prop malfunction during a presentation of the play The Gallows.
An old television switches on by itself, playing back a tape with the news coverage of Charlie's death, which includes an interview with his girlfriend Alexis.
They discover that Charlie was not supposed to have performed that day, and was on stage only because he was the understudy for the main actor, who turns out to have been Reese's father, Rick.
The site's critics consensus reads: "Narratively contrived and visually a mess, The Gallows sends viewers on a shaky tumble to the bottom of the found-footage horror barrel.
[10] Geoff Berkshire of Variety gave the film a negative review, saying: "The Gallows isn't without a certain amount of atmosphere, [but] simply feels borrowed wholesale.
"[12] Kyle Anderson of Entertainment Weekly gave the film a C, saying: "This is another found-footage movie that, with a little art direction and some actual cinematography, could easily have been a decent little terrorizer.
"[14] Mick LaSalle of the San Francisco Chronicle gave the film two out of four stars, saying: "The filmmakers needed to set themselves free even more than the characters, but they never find the path out.
"[15] Simon Abrams of The Village Voice gave the film a negative review, saying: "The Gallows is only good enough to make you wish its creators did something novel with its formulaic style, plot, and characterizations.
"[16] Neil Genzlinger of The New York Times said: "The Gallows starts with a decent if improbable premise, and it ends with a pretty good jolt.
There's no real effort or inventiveness here, whether we're talking about the character names, the jokes, the set pieces, or the predictable plot twist.
"[18] Richard Roeper of the Chicago Sun-Times gave the film three out of four stars, saying: "In a quick 80 minutes, we get the back story, we meet the four core characters (all of the young actors do fine work), get the wits scared out of us about a half-dozen times and wind up with a VERY creepy ending.
Club gave the film a D+, saying: "Making audiences care about the characters is always a more effective fear-generating strategy than just knocking off a bunch of dimwits in the dark.