User reviews

It's true: this movie is disturbing and will shock you with some scenes of depravity and torture that you've never seen before, but despite all that it's still just not very good. Among my main complaints: - Some people extol the fact that the production quality was very low, giving it a grim "snuff" film look to the movie. But seriously, I thought it just made every scene look that much worse because of the image quality, shaky camera movements, and muffled sounds.

• The acting, though pretty good at times (the female lead whose name I forget must've gone through hell to make this movie) is still suspect throughout much of the movie. They try hard but in the end... it's just not very good.

• The special effect. I know a movie with such a small budget can't be expected to have Hollywoood quality special effects, but seriously, a lot of the corpses and body parts looked like discarded parts from Halloween costumes.

The premise of the movie was great but the execution was just bad. Blame it on the small budget, the neophyte actors, or whatever, but in the end it boils down to this movie just not being very good. There are much better, scarier, gorier, "shock-ier" movies out there. Don't get taken in by the hype.

It's nice to see a serial killer flick skip the fluff and get down to the dirty stuff. No determined cop, no police investigation, no extra story to speak of at, just a violent collection of what a serial killer does best, killing.

A deranged killer (are there any other types) kidnaps a young woman and forces her to endure his psychological ramblings and vicious physical assaults. After each event, she is made to chronicle her thoughts on the matter in his scrapbook (hence to name of the movie).

The pretty much sums up the whole plot. The core story is pretty simple, so the filmmakers choose to fill up the screen time with as much (almost all sexual) violence as possible. Viewers are subjected to some of the most brutal rape scenes I've ever seen put to film. Every manner of atrocity is inflicted on the poor girl, and the camera isn't shy about showing every detail.

While the violence certainly packs quite a punch, the rest of the film is mostly a missed mark. The cinematography is hopelessly guerrilla-style; I understand that it's low-budget-shot-on-video, but is all that camera shake really necessary. The writing is pretty bad as well, the killers dialogue is nothing more than dime-novel psycho babble. Not that it matters how empty the dialogue is, because the actors lack the talent to put forth convincing performances, no matter how good the writing may have been.

"Terror is what one person will do to another" is scribbled across the box cover. In terms of portraying that point the film is a rousing success, but it still isn't all that good a movie.

5/10

Wow, what a disappointment. After watching the director's ICE FROM THE SUN, I thought I'd give this one a shot. If you've ever seen ICE FROM THE SUN, feel free to laugh up your sleeve at my naiveté for thinking this one would be even better. SCRAPBOOK is a truly awful pseudo-movie, all the more stunningly awful because the mise-en-scene at least indicates that a modicum of talent resides behind the camera. Tommy Biondo, who "wrote" the "script", plays a serial killer who keeps a scrapbook of all the women he tortures and kills. Why? It's never made clear. He kidnaps a girl and tells her that she must maintain an account of her torture in the scrapbook. Why? It's never made clear. The killer has a deep-seated resentment of women, and is sexually maladjusted. Why? It's never made clear. As a matter of fact, the only thing that's clear from this stupid movie is the filmmakers' desire to "make something really disturbing"; their miserable failure comes from the fact that without subtext, scenes of violence and torture are simply demoralizing, not to mention boring. Maybe the film could've at least been uncomfortable to watch, but all the torture sequences -- the film's bread and butter -- are so ineffectively staged that all their violence is rendered completely useless. The acting in this movie is so bad: how hard could it possibly be to act out blinding pain? The girl in this movie is so stupid; through the whole thing, she simply cries and whimpers, rolls up into a little ball, says "Please" a lot. I'm not ordinarily the type to watch a movie and say, "If I were there, I'd do this...", but in this case we're talking about a dumb weepy girl who isn't even tied half the time, and through all the rape and debasement, never once a raised hand, never a kick, not even a cross word! I know girls who would eat this psycho-killer prick for breakfast. I'm not the sort of person who thinks that gore and graphic sex disqualify a film from greatness. I just find it insulting that this movie is intended to be "thought-provoking". The only thought it provoked in me was "What an idiot I was for spending $25 on this horse-s__t." If you want to see a truly disturbing and thought-provoking horror film that has a point beyond the lovingly-detailed (and poorly rendered) torture of a severely stupid young woman, watch IN A GLASS CAGE, HENRY: PORTRAIT OF A SERIAL KILLER, Texas CHAINSAW MASSACRE, or LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT (that's right, even LAST HOUSE wasn't this bad). Some people here have called SCRAPBOOK offensive and nauseating; I'd argue that this is giving the "film"-makers too much credit. SCRAPBOOK is stupid, boring, and pointless; I wouldn't even do the cast and crew the favor of getting sick at this stupid, boring, and pointless movie. I could go on and on about how terrible it is, but just see for yourself. If you found this movie stimulating, I have three words for you: READ A BOOK!

The only points I can give this film are for lead actress Emily Haack. She must have gone through hell making this.

Actor/writer Tommy Biondo, on the other hand, fails at doing everything vaguely movie-related. Nothing good can be said of his writing, because there just doesn't seem to be any writing beyond "in this movie I get to rape a girl." There is some rubbish about the titular scrapbook, which just ends up a half-forgotten plot device for most of the film.

Nothing good can be said of Biondo's acting, either; he delivers middle-school-level improv lines (which I'm sure he thinks are super-scary serial-killer lines) with all the menace of a rubber ducky.

The so-called "violence" is at a Three Stooges level of laughability, with none of the charm. He lightly pats his victims on the face, and despite said victim acting dutifully like they've been slapped by a bodybuilder, it is about as believable as third-rate WWE fights.

The very fact that a slim, squeaky, bandy-armed man with the physical intimidation factor of a stalk of celery is supposed to be able to kidnap, beat up, and rape a woman who looks about three times as strong as him, and later beat a big strong farmer twice his size to death, defies any attempt at suspension of disbelief. This man couldn't physically kidnap a sandwich.

The poor actress suffers though badly-done rape scene after badly-done rape scene, a scene of non-simulated fellatio, and a scene of actually being urinated on, by a bad actor and worse writer who seems to be on a sad wish-fulfillment trip that has no business calling itself a horror film, or even any kind of film.

If you're into horror, get another horror movie. If you're into porn, get another porn movie. This film fails entirely at being either. Hopefully it won't leave too dark a mark on the resume' of Ms Haack, who comes out of this whole sorry mess as the only one with any sort of talent whatsoever.

I wanted to see this, because I like to see films that push at the boundaries, and because it got a surprisingly good review from the DVD Delirium Guide (Vol 2). That review describes the film as "ferocious and highly accomplished", praises the actors' "impassioned, uncomfortably convincing performances", and claims that "Scrapbook is hardly your standard exercise in prurient sadism".

As such, it is at odds with most of the reviews here, and I fear that on this occasion it's the contributors to IMDb who have got it right. Whatever else it is, this film is not "highly accomplished". For example, in its summary of the plot, DVD Delirium explains that "Clara begins to closely analyze the scrapbook, devising a way to prolong her life, explore the mind of her captor, and perhaps even escape." Oh, that's what she was doing, was she? All we, the viewers, see is her leafing through the pages of the scrapbook. Unfortunately, neither the scriptwriter nor the director have any of the intelligence or dramatic sense needed to bring this internal struggle to life. She looks at the book, she pretends to submit to his demands, lulls him into a position of vulnerability, then strikes. The existence of that eponymous scrapbook is irrelevant; she could have devised that strategy even without it, in addition to which I tend to agree with the reviewer here who points out that Ms Haack looks physically well able to take care of a neurotic clumsy beanpole like her captor at much earlier stages in the film.

Other dramatic or psychological opportunities are missed or bungled. For example, the visit by the neighbour could have been an excellent exercise in wracking up tension as he slowly realises that something is not quite right here. Instead he gets one quick look at the photos on the wall, then bang! wallop! it's all, implausibly, over. Similarly, some of the psychological elements in the captor's rants are promising, hinting at his need for control, but the script can't maintain this with any consistency or develop it meaningfully. Even the filmic device of seeing the abuse in the shower through the camcorder the captor sets up is fumbled: who sets up the camera through which we see the camcorder being set up? But if this film is not quite the triumph DVD Delirium claims, what is it? A bold experiment that overreaches its ambition? Or a tawdry piece of torture porn? I was in two minds for a bit. Heaven knows, life's too short to listen to whole commentaries, but I listened to the first few minutes, and they all - director, producer, actress - sound very earnest. There's all sorts of talk about trust, and we learn how lots of the scenes were improvised (as though Mike Leigh was making a horror film!), though not, as is carefully explained, the notorious unfaked urination sequence. Just a week before seeing this, I had by coincidence seen Jean-Luc Godard's Weekend, a famous film that had passed me by, and about a third of the way into Scrapbook there was a sequence that reminded me completely of what Godard was trying to do. The camera takes a long leisurely pan around an empty room and back (the victim is hiding in the cupboard) while from the other side of the locked door the captor recounts a particularly scabrous anecdote of an encounter with a hooker.

But what finally made up my mind was not the film itself, but the extras. I have already mentioned the shower scene, in which the stoical Ms Haack is tied in the shower with her arms over her head, stripped full frontal and abused; well, in case you didn't get enough of that, the DVD thoughtfully provides an extended uncut version of just this scene, conveniently packaged up as a little ten minute short, shorn of any plot or context. Just long enough for... well I think we all know what it's long enough for.

It looks to me like the director's production company was involved in putting together this DVD package. It's at moments like this that we can see (to paraphrase Burroughs) exactly what's on the end of our forks. The director may come on strong as though he was making a cutting edge piece of provocative film-making, and may even have succeeded in persuading himself that's what he was doing. But by their deeds shall ye know them, as it were; when it comes down to it, what they were really making was a sleazy piece of exploitative porn, and barely consensual at that.

Incidentally, this is a review of the 95 minute Region 1 version. The British version is much shorter, I believe, by well over ten minutes. I'm not quite sure what to advise. It's easy to guess at what's missing, but the film doesn't really deserve seeing at either length. But if you must see it, then I think you must see it at its fuller length. Shorn of its shocks, the film would be both nasty and boring I suspect; if you're going to see it at all, you should at least give yourself the opportunity of learning something useful about the psychopathology of bad film-making.

Its a little hard to write a review of a film like Scrapbook. Its not that it has me especially conflicted or unsure (I enjoyed it) its just that its rather difficult to qualify ones enjoyment of what is really nothing more than a near plot free exercise in unpleasantness. Its pretty much a two hander, the tale of Leonard and Clara, Leonard being a jabbering lunatic into the whole kidnap/rape/kill bit, Clara being his latest victim. There are a couple of other folk, but they aren't really around for long and one is superfluous to all intents and purposes. Being a two hander, performances and chemistry are pretty much the essentials and whilst the film has problems in these areas it manages to pull through with one great turn and just about enough nastiness to keep things moving. Emily Haack as Clara is the great performer here, fearlessly throwing herself into her characters plight she is convincing in her degradation and naturally sympathetic. Tommy Biondo is somewhat less successful as Leonard, he nails the brutal and pathetic jerk sense of the character, but is generally too over the top to be much of a figure of fear or especially convincing as a killer, moreover the film itself does little to develop his character. Lack of development is the greatest general problem with the film actually, there isn't anything going on outside of the situation at hand but neither character has any real depth and the most potentially interesting aspect of the film (that would be Leonard's penchant for keeping records via a scrapbook of his victims last thoughts and a few taped in souvenirs) is brought up and more or less let down, becoming important only in the climax. This all combines with the overstretched length to make for a fairly patchy watch, at nearly 95 minutes things simply take too long and a bit of judicious pruning would have really boosted the general effect. The film does somewhat overcome the mentioned problems through sheer force of meanness though, Clara really goes through hell with humiliating nudity, some rough simulated rape shenanigans and a standout scene performed for real. The ending is decently twisted as well, a fine capper. None of which really qualifies Scrapbook as a "good" film, but it does well in terms of down 'n dirty exploitative goods, which were what I was looking for, in fact all I was looking for in watching it. And when a film does what it sets out to do, thats praiseworthy in my book. All in all I had a decent time with this one but I seem to be one of the few, its definitely offputting and pretty hard to recommend. I'd say its worth a look if you dig the cinematic territory as its bright spots are pretty impressive, but still something to approach with a bit of care.

Don't believe the hype. This movie is crap. It tries desperately to be "gritty and realistic" but it just isn't. From the opening sequence, we are disappointed: the acting isn't believable at all, the torture scenes aren't believable (is that how a person would REALLY react to being tortured? come on), the "violence" is seriously lame and the overall affect is flat and 2 dimensional. I felt like I was watching a high school film class project reject. It is really, really bad. As one of the previous reviewers said, I too found myself fast-forwarding through a lot of it and it was still too long. It fails to make a point or a statement. It is simply badly-executed, badly-acted pseudo-violence for it's own sake. And unlike many of the "positive reviewers" (who have apparently posted identical reviews on other sites, such as Amazon), I wasn't shocked by the "violence" or offended by it's depiction or worried I'd "burn in hell just for watching it." I found it utterly unrealistic and totally lame. At times it was laughable and pathetic.

Scrapbook is one of those movies whose fans will claim the naysayers just don't "get" when the truth is, it's not that hard to understand or "get". It just isn't very good. In fact, it's terrible. A complete waste of time.

*And by the way, this is not an original idea for a movie. The concept has been utilized in many other areas first, including an episode of Law & Order and most notably, the 1963 novel The Collector by John Fowles. The Collector was a source of inspiration for real-life serial killers Leonard Lake and Charles Ng, who dubbed their master plan "The Miranda Project" (after the main character in The Collector) and also videotaped most of what they did. After having seen some of these particular tapes and also being a devout (and long-time) crime scene photo, video- and audio recording aficionado, I can tell you that Scrapbook is simply an embarrassingly-amateurish attempt at something the director/writer apparently thinks he understands but clearly does not. The "serial killer's" pathology in this "movie" is wrong to the point of ridiculousness.

This "film's" true target audience, people who appreciate the true crime genre like myself, will walk away laughing and seriously disappointed. Horror movie fans will be even more disappointed. This "movie" is a waste of time. Don't bother.

Eric Stanze's SCRAPBOOK offers no opinions and remains completely objective at all times. Cold, brutal and unflinching this is a chilling look into the mind and life of a psychopath.

Much like HENRY: PORTRAIT OF A SERIAL KILLER this film is a study of a diseased mind. The film is always very real, right from the goosebump enducing credits. This film is not entertainment, rather a bold examination of the abductor/victim relationship from a fly on the wall perspective. The low production values of the film go along way to adding to its authentic feel.

In the same way Clint Eastwood's UNFORGIVEN deconstructed the western, this film goes a long way to demythologizing the serial killer image that has been built up in Hollywood. So many films paint the killers in a glamorous light often supplying them with a form of super intelligence that allows them to allude there captors at every turn. This film is for all those people under the misconception Hannibal Lecter is a believable villain and to be admired and who enjoy tripe like KISS THE GIRLS.

Portraying the serial killer as a frenzy like creature operating on animal instincts alone for self-satisfaction. At every turn this film makes a point of showing the true haneous nature of these acts and the kind of mind that perpetrates them. SCRAPBOOK forces the viewer to acknowledge the disgusting nature of physical dominance and psychological scarring. The dehumanization of a person into a piece of meat and just how wrong society's adoration of these criminals is.

Sure this film is offensive and as I stated before not entertainment. Instead its a glimpse into a world most of us would like to ignore yet is sanitized daily for mass consumption by the media.

Check it out if you dare.

What a waste of time and money this overrated piece of crap was.

I was pretty excited to see this movie. Most of the reviews I read on the independent horror websites made it sound like it was a new violent and disturbing classic. While it does go out of it's way to be offensive, it fails on every level. The acting and directing is what one would expect from a backyard home video and that kills any chance of getting behind the cardboard characters.

This movie is not below the level of an Ed Wood film like Shatter Dead, Nikos the Impaler or countless other backyard horror videos but it's also no where near the classic that the independent horror websites would have you believe.

Scrapbooking, a hobby that has increased in popularity in recent years, is, according to Wikipedia, 'a method for preserving a legacy of written history in the form of photographs, printed media, and memorabilia contained in decorated albums'. In Scrapbook, a low budget indie horror from director Eric Stanze, serial-killer Leonard (Tommy Biondo) blends polaroids, news cuttings and handwritten journals from his victims to produce a detailed account of his career as a killer: a scrapbook twelve years in the making and a labour of love which he hopes will one day make him famous.

Leonard has only one more victim to document until his project is complete: Clara (Emily Haack), a chubby bird with a very bad haircut. He subjects her to days upon days of degradation, rape and violence, whilst forcing her to add her comments to his sick journal. But Clara plans to survive her ordeal, and plays mind games with her captor, until, one day, she turns the tables on him and wreaks revenge.

Now I've watched a fair amount of 'underground' horror in my time, and witnessed all sorts of celluloid depravity, but in my opinion Stanze's Scrapbook goes just that bit further than most in an effort to shock. A nasty, misogynistic catalogue of torture, it seems that this movie's purpose is to offend, and in that it definitely succeeds. Use it as a yardstick to measure your tolerance to disturbing imagery, but don't ever call it art.

Biondo spends 95 minutes abusing Haack's character in every manner possible, with no detail spared by Stanze's camera. Haack, an 'actress' with obviously no shame, willingly degrades herself at every opportunity; exactly what makes someone want to perform such acts on film, I shall never know.

I tried to view this film as an intense study of psychotic behaviour (ala Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer), but Biondi's Leonard is so OTT, he is hard to take seriously. I tried to view it as a hard-edged 'rape/revenge' movie, in which the viewers sense of satisfaction at witnessing the victim's ultimate retribution justifies earlier scenes of violence—but the payoff is too weak to qualify it as such. And its story and level of acting is not good enough to make it a truly gripping tale about survival against the odds. In the end, I accepted it for what it really is: an effectively repugnant little movie designed purely to illicit a reaction—good or bad—from those who watch it.

Wow....I cannot think of a movie I wasted my time as much as this. I would compare it to a Serbian Film in that the "so-called violence" is so poorly acted/portrayed as to lose any shock value they were hoping for. To quote Sheldon on the Big Bang Theory "this movie fails on so many levels. Script.....was there even an attempt to have a coherent story; soundtrack......nice to see people with no musical talent can still find work; editing....beyond the worse; the only bright spot is the actress - to not burst out laughing when Leonard is "roughing her up" must have taken incredible willpower. If you want to see a movie that shows it could be done, see Martyrs. Avoid this. Still cannot figure out how so many great reviews are given this.

SCRAPBOOK is an over-the-top, viciously violent and twisted film about a girl named Clara who is kidnapped, raped, beaten, tortured, humiliated, etc..etc... by Leonard - an obviously disturbed serial killer who makes his victims record their experiences and feelings in a - you guessed it - scrapbook. Now, if what I just wrote was written by someone else, and I were reading their review, I would be thinking "Man, that sounds great - I need to rush out and check this one out!", right? Well...not exactly. SCRAPBOOK is definitely gratuitous and brutal in it's depiction of rape and violence (bottle rape scene particularly...), but SCRAPBOOK fails on the fundamental level that I just don't believe in the performances of the lead characters. I understand that this is a micro-budget film, but that doesn't excuse the fact that the very mediocre acting (and over-acting in some instances) by both Biondo (Leonard) and Haack (Clara) drop this film down several notches. The story line is pretty simple, so there's no fault there. There are plenty of brutal and explicit scenes - no fault there either. But listening to Leonard ramble on and on gets old after awhile. Clara in most instances doesn't really seem to really care what's being done to her. All-in-all I think this could have been a far more effective and disturbing film if the performances were better. The only reason SCRAPBOOK really succeeds at all is because of the vicious, mean-spirited nature of the production as a whole - It seems that Stanze has chosen to substitute shock value for substance, which works in some films (a lot of the "extreme" Asian horror films have been doing this successfully for years...)but SCRAPBOOK seems to take itself to seriously for me to excuse what I consider very weak performances. I've read the other reviews about this film - some say the acting is great, some say it sucks, unfortunately, judging a persons acting skills is a very subjective thing - this may be a film where you just need to see it to decide for yourself. I'm not a huge fan of any of the stuff that Stanze does that I've seen so far - I admire the guy for pushing the limits and doing low-budget, "extreme" underground films - I just don't feel he really pulls them off that well. He's got some original ideas and definitely doesn't shy away from over-the-top situations or visuals, but I always walk away from his films feeling that something (sometimes a lot more in certain films than others...) is seriously lacking. Plus he tends to use the same actors over and over (none of whom have any real talent in the first place)for all of his features. Anyway...worth a look if you consider yourself an "extreme" film lover and dig depictions of graphic violence and rape, everyone else should steer clear. Check out ICE FROM THE SUN if you like SCRAPBOOK - another STANZE film that has plenty of faults, but plenty of gore as well. 7/10 for SCRAPBOOK

Scrapbook wasn't the easiest of films to watch but I can't say it was a bad film. It was very graphic a lot more than I expected. Most serial killer in films take their victims behind closed doors and leave it to your imagination for these kind of scenes. Its the best 'into the mind of a serial killer' film I've scene.

The acting from Emily Haack was brilliant, it can't of been an easy role to play. The home movie style filming added to atmosphere of the film. It didn't need a big Hollywood if it had one it would not have been so gritty.

I read a few of the reviews on here to help me write this one. Some people say its poor with WWE style violence and there was nothing shocking about it. I dread to think what these people watch with their popcorn.

I thought it was shocking, not just because it wasn't quite what I expected but also because you know that these things happen in real life.

I'm into extreme cinema,but "Scrapbook" totally shocked me.It's so disturbing and hard to watch that sometimes I really had the urge to stop the tape.However I managed to watch the entire movie and this is not an easy thing to do.The plot isn't complicated:a young woman,Clara(Emily Haack)is abducted by Leonard(Tommy Biondo,who sadly died after the film was completed),a brutal serial killer who forces his victims to write about their ordeals in his scrapbook.After her abduction Clara is repeatedly raped,beaten and tortured-the violence seen in the movie is extremely brutal and disturbing.Some scenes like a really graphic bottle rape sequence are truly sickening.The acting is excellent-Tommy Biondo and Emily Haack are extremely convincing here.Very talented director Eric Stanze("Savage Harvest","Ice from the Sun")creates a totally overwhelming atmosphere of dread and fear.This guy is,along with Jim Van Bebber,one of the bravest American horror directors ever.Check out this ugly masterpiece,if you dare.All I can say is that if you want to see an extreme piece of gut wrenching horror and are not easily offended,"Scrapbook" is truly unforgettable.8 out of 10.

I have seen this "movie" OFTEN on "Most Disturbing Movies" lists,and after hearing all of the hype about how terrifying,disgusting and disturbing it is,I thought I would give it a watch...I'm sorry I did. The girl is the ONLY actor in this pile of dog dump that has ANY redeeming quality in this hack of a movie,and I'll bet 100 bucks that she probably regrets doing it. The other "actors" are just plain LAUGHABLE! This TOTALLY RUINS the entire film,because (for me at least) you just can't take it seriously as a disturbing horror flick. If you want to waste 90 minutes of your life,by ALL MEANS be my guest and watch it. If you like "Z" grade acting you'll LOVE "Scrapbook". IMDb REALLY NEEDS to have a ZERO RATING option.