The ABC's of Death is a horror anthology in which 26 directors are given a letter of the alphabet, they have to come up with one word starting with that letter and are given creative freedom on how to incorporate that into their 'death' segment. Each short begins and ends with the colour red, the rest is a wild, weird and grotesque trip into some of the demented minds behind horror.

This film is a classic example of interesting idea, poor execution. The biggest problem with the film is how uneven it is. Giving total freedom to 26 different directors is a blessing and a curse. The curse aspects come from how weird some of these are and how lazy the others appear to be. Finishing the film I can only remember a handful of them and even less are ones that I enjoyed. I guess I'll break it down by letter:

A - an exercise in torture with a twist ending that doesn't really serve the story.

B - Here's one that is a lazy attempt at a horrific bedtime story that doesn't end well for the storyteller.

C - Groundhog day with death, a half realized idea.

D - Probably one of the better ones that people like. Well shot, good set ups and executions.

E - I forgot what this one was and had to look it up, which should tell you for forgettable it is.

F - This one had me scratching my head in hilarious confusion. I thought the Japanese were weird before, this one shines a new light on everything.

G - A POV take that bores you to death.

H - Another humorous and odd concoction of giant dogs and foxes during WWII.

I - One of many that leaves you confused about what the director intended.

J - Something Takishi Miike would probably make if he were to take part.

K - A cartoon about a piece of poop that kills a woman...funny? I don't know.

L - Another entry from the Japanese market, another uncomfortable sequence that makes you wonder what they are drinking over there.

M - Ti West's entry, the laziest one of the bunch that runs about 2 minutes.

N - A comedic entry about a bird that should keep his mouth shut.

O - Visually striking, lacking story.

P - Realism about prostitution and the lengths one will go for her family. Icky ending.

Q - A self parody about the filmmakers who are upset they were given the letter Q.

R - From the guy who brought you A Serbian Film...nuff said.

S - A tale about drugs, felt like an Australian entry.

T - Claymation about a poor kid who fears the toilet. I kinda liked it.

U - Second POV, only with a story and more involvement.

V - Seems the director wanted to showcase his skills as an action director more than wanting to have an entry in this anthology.

W - A youtube like entry that should have been given to someone else.

X - Great story, great gore, even if it is predictable, it is one of the better entries.

Y - Odd, weird, gross.

Z - the absolute strangest of the bunch, feels like Japanese parody porn.

So this film has more misses than hits. I can 't really recommend this because of the oddity of the entries being so weird and uneven. I would advise people to simply watch Masters of Horror if you want to watch some horror stories from masters of the genre.

I loved some of the shorts! And while they seem to have different lengths (the only thing they actually had to consider was the money and flexible time frame),they also have major differences in quality. You get shorts from directors from all over the world, which means that there are different languages spoken as well.

So some might require you to read subtitles. Yes even for a short it is important to know what they are talking about. Some have more dialog than other of course and you get animated features and some that break the fourth wall (like the letter Q). From extreme to subtle everything is in here and it's combination something you might like more or less than me. Whatever the case, they seem to have been successful, because a "sequel" is on its way for 2014

A 26-chapter anthology that showcases death in all its vicious wonder and brutal beauty.

Right now, not having seen the second anthology, my thought is that if the bet of both films were edited into one picture and the rest were tossed, this would be a strong anthology. That, of course, will not happen, and we are stuck with this movie as it stands.

The first problem is the length, which is unavoidable when you have 26 segments. But the bigger problem is the sheer number of weak segments. Ti West, one of the rock stars of the genre, creates one of the worst segments. The only one that I can say is objectively worse is "G is for Gravity", which was pretty awful and if the director was truly given $5,000 to make it, that went right into the pocket.

Adam Wingard, another rock star, provides one of the best segments. I found it both clever and amusing, as well as nicely shot. I have been slow to embrace Wingard because I did not are for "Pop Skull", but with a short like "Q is for Quack", he more than makes up for any faults.