Surviving Evil is set on Mayaman Island in the Philippines where a crew of TV documentary makers land, there to make an episode of Surviving the Wild with Sebastian 'Seb' Beazley (Billy Zane) as the adventurer host. Local guide Joey (Joel Torre) speaks of the legendary Aswang creatures of myth supposedly born out of the horrors of the Spanish invasion centuries ago but surely mythological Vampire like shape-changing creatures can't exist in reality? Well yes, they do & they particularly like the taste of human flesh & are attracted to a pregnant woman's blood, as they would be. As the Aswang attack can the crew use their survivalist knowledge to beat the creatures & make it off the island alive?
This British South African co-production was written & directed by Terence Daw & one has to say that while Surviving Evil had potential for a nice fun creature film it really isn't very good & to be honest apart from slightly better production values & a bit more blood Surviving Evil is no better than those awful Sc-Fi Channel creature feature films that they make. I liked the idea about the makers of a nature survivalist TV programme getting stuck on an island full of monsters but apart from an excuse to strand several people there the survivalist aspect never comes into play & no-one ever uses any survival skills like building traps or trying to camouflage or tyring to find some secure shelter. No, once the monsters show up there's nothing any more clever or inspired here than 'let's all run & scream'. The opening sequence features a tribe being slaughtered bu something nasty which sets the film up nicely but it takes ages for the action to kick in after that, our TV crew arrive & then spends over an hour just talking & while I don't mind some build-up & scene setting it came to the point where I got really bored with it. At less than 90 minutes long Surviving Evil felt longer as there's only twenty odd minutes of monster action in it, that character's are better than expected with Billy Zane's host Seb coming off as quite likable but he bails well before the end leaving us with two annoying women who scream a lot. The script is also very vague & doesn't make much sense, the guide speaks of these creatures being supernatural somehow & can change shape but during the film they can be killed with spears & behave within the realms of reality apart from when they shape-shift, there's no reason as to why they wait so long to attack the crew or why they waited so long to kill the original tribe & there's a strange climax in which a phone is heard ringing next to a woman who fell down a hole but it was said earlier that there was no signal on the island & so what anyway? I mean is a phone ringing meant to be a twist? It just seemed a very odd way to end the film in the sense to have a phone ring, we don't really know whose phone it was (it could have belonged to any of the crew) or who was calling it & till that point the phone had no significance in the film whatsoever so why that final shot?
Besides a muddled story that can't decide if it wants to be a straight creature feature or a supernatural horror film Surviving Evil has some really bad editing going on. The last twenty minutes are full of attacks but the camera jerks around & the sequences are edited so fast it's almost impossible to tell whats going on or see anything, I have never understood this style of film-making with fast editing & shaky camera movements as it just frustrates & I hate it. There are a few decent gore scenes here, there's some mutilated bodies & limbs, a freaky dead skinned baby mutant thing & plenty of blood splatter. Not scary or exciting or fun Surviving Evil takes itself very seriously but feels unfinished somehow. The special effects are pretty good here, although we never see them for more than a quick flash at any one time the creatures look pretty good & the gore effects are all on-set effects rather than CGI. The scenery & locations are nice enough but apart from the creatures the character's never run into any trouble & the terrain is left underused.
Although set in the Philippines this was actually shot in South Africa. The acting is better than expected & although Billy Zane is slumming it he's quite likable here.
Surviving Evil is a pretty poor creature feature that drifts between styles & inspirations, it's very slow going & the horrible fast editing makes the monster scenes once they begin a real chore to watch. It's just not much fun in any regard. No better than your average crap Sci-Fi Channel creature feature, it just looks a bit better & has a bit more blood in it.
This British South African co-production was written & directed by Terence Daw & one has to say that while Surviving Evil had potential for a nice fun creature film it really isn't very good & to be honest apart from slightly better production values & a bit more blood Surviving Evil is no better than those awful Sc-Fi Channel creature feature films that they make. I liked the idea about the makers of a nature survivalist TV programme getting stuck on an island full of monsters but apart from an excuse to strand several people there the survivalist aspect never comes into play & no-one ever uses any survival skills like building traps or trying to camouflage or tyring to find some secure shelter. No, once the monsters show up there's nothing any more clever or inspired here than 'let's all run & scream'. The opening sequence features a tribe being slaughtered bu something nasty which sets the film up nicely but it takes ages for the action to kick in after that, our TV crew arrive & then spends over an hour just talking & while I don't mind some build-up & scene setting it came to the point where I got really bored with it. At less than 90 minutes long Surviving Evil felt longer as there's only twenty odd minutes of monster action in it, that character's are better than expected with Billy Zane's host Seb coming off as quite likable but he bails well before the end leaving us with two annoying women who scream a lot. The script is also very vague & doesn't make much sense, the guide speaks of these creatures being supernatural somehow & can change shape but during the film they can be killed with spears & behave within the realms of reality apart from when they shape-shift, there's no reason as to why they wait so long to attack the crew or why they waited so long to kill the original tribe & there's a strange climax in which a phone is heard ringing next to a woman who fell down a hole but it was said earlier that there was no signal on the island & so what anyway? I mean is a phone ringing meant to be a twist? It just seemed a very odd way to end the film in the sense to have a phone ring, we don't really know whose phone it was (it could have belonged to any of the crew) or who was calling it & till that point the phone had no significance in the film whatsoever so why that final shot?
Besides a muddled story that can't decide if it wants to be a straight creature feature or a supernatural horror film Surviving Evil has some really bad editing going on. The last twenty minutes are full of attacks but the camera jerks around & the sequences are edited so fast it's almost impossible to tell whats going on or see anything, I have never understood this style of film-making with fast editing & shaky camera movements as it just frustrates & I hate it. There are a few decent gore scenes here, there's some mutilated bodies & limbs, a freaky dead skinned baby mutant thing & plenty of blood splatter. Not scary or exciting or fun Surviving Evil takes itself very seriously but feels unfinished somehow. The special effects are pretty good here, although we never see them for more than a quick flash at any one time the creatures look pretty good & the gore effects are all on-set effects rather than CGI. The scenery & locations are nice enough but apart from the creatures the character's never run into any trouble & the terrain is left underused.
Although set in the Philippines this was actually shot in South Africa. The acting is better than expected & although Billy Zane is slumming it he's quite likable here.
Surviving Evil is a pretty poor creature feature that drifts between styles & inspirations, it's very slow going & the horrible fast editing makes the monster scenes once they begin a real chore to watch. It's just not much fun in any regard. No better than your average crap Sci-Fi Channel creature feature, it just looks a bit better & has a bit more blood in it.