nate878 Reviews

Wer (2013)

A lukewarm look into lycanthropic lore

[6/10 · 25 October 2014]

There's a lot going on in this horror mystery. It effectively grabs you by the hand, but then loses you half-way through as its focus shifts about towards a traumatic climax. As the title suggests there is an element of lycanthropy afoot, but to what extent isn't fully understood. The film is as equally vague on the subject as its title.

Regardless, while the mystery surrounding the enigmatic Talan Gwynek catches your attention, the film's earnest attempt to provide scares in its second half fall flat. Those green to the horror genre might feel some tension, but for the rest of us, one is likely to feel a strong sense of familiarity.

The acting is quite decent, the atmosphere brooding, and yet things just don't seem to connect. While I understand there may have been a certain theme at play, the almost non-existent special-effects/makeup seemed to be more of a hindrance to the overall experience rather than a punctuation of any themes that the director was trying to convey.

Logorama (2009)

A bitter-sweet satire of our commercial world

[8/10 · 5 February 2010]

Logorama is a simple satire but one that does well to capitulate almost a century of corporate culture. It's brought to life by segments of colorfully animated rotor-style 3D animation which punctuates the style of logos with cell-shading. The film's lack of a coherent story is in itself a nod to brainless blockbuster entertainment as it is filled with a number of over-the-top action movie nuances. In light of this, the short has some entertainment in the form of crude comedy and action, but this is all some-what diluted by the shear intended chaos of the film.

In the end, the film did a decent job of pointing a not-so subtle finger at the potential of social decline due to an inundation of consumer culture that feeds on the one thing it promotes.

Demons (2009)

Somewhat entertaining if not a little brain-dead

[6/10 · 3 January 2010]

The series has a fairly unique look but ultimately follows the same cliché progression as other dark-fantasy vigilante type shows that have aired before. The main difference being that the acting is mostly sub-standard and the characters are hardly compelling - aside from the villainous freaks.

Despite all this, it has potential as its loosely determined universe of "freaks" has the potential to yield some interesting plot scenarios as the Dr. Who universe did. As another plus, the series' cheesiness can be comical if you can let yourself go for a moment.

Hopefully as the series progresses it will enter into more gray territory with the nature of the "freaks" being explored and what appears to be a dark past behind some of the protagonists.

Sayônara, ginga tetsudô Surî-Nain: Andromeda shûchakueki (1981)

Tetsuro's quest continues

[8/10 · 1 November 2009]

This sequel takes off some time after the original film Galaxy Express 999. The film Galaxy Express 999 inquisitively explored the idea of being human through the quest of an adolescent seeking to become an android in an increasingly materialistic world.

As the protagonist learned to cherish his humanity he returned to earth to fight alongside a resistance force against the corrupt cyborg/android empire. That is merely the beginning as he continues off into space once again in the famed Galaxy Express 999 train to re-find the mysterious Maetel only to finally come across the cyborg he'd been hunting all along - Count Mecha (prepare for an uncanny Star Wars reference).

While this film re-explores the themes of humanity and degradation introduced in the previous film through flawed characters such as Metalmena, it is largely an attempt to find some conclusion to the series. Ultimately it ends in somewhat of a cliff-hanger.

The film serves up to be a pretty standard scifi action-adventure affair. As with the original, the animation is fairly good for the time and does a fine job of featuring the interestingly bleak and overtly mechanized future that spans the entire galaxy. If not worth watching for a little bit of entertainment, it should definitely be worth seeing so as to witness the incredible world crafted by Leiji Matsumoto.

Paranormal Activity (2007)

A lacking experience

[5/10 · 1 November 2009]

(minor spoiler in concern to the nature of the ending)

Digged-up from indie-horror is the film Paranormal Activity. Follow a couple who are plagued by a demonic presence and an ever-present camera.

This is, by far, one of the most deceitful little horror films of the twitter-era. Promising scares and mind-bending horror, you are instead served with atypical ghoul pranks and inter-relationship bickering throughout a majority of the film.

While the director does what he can to keep you in the mind-set that this is real, the mockumentary eventually falls flat near the end, especially with the husband's lax response to ever-increasingly unsettling events.

This isn't to say the film is without some tension and suspense alongside perhaps a couple cheap scares. The otherwise invisible demon seems to have a tangible and disturbing presence in the second half of the film, but ultimately the violent ending just didn't justify the dull hour or more of door swinging, wall-banging, possessed sleep-walking and silly arguments between the tormented couple.

At the least, I don't recommend wasting $9 seeing it in theater. Perhaps a cheap rental at best.

30 Days of Night (2007)

Finally vampires with bite! but with little else

[7/10 · 1 November 2009]

30 Days of Night serves as a pivotal rebirth of the vampire-movie franchise with the premise of archaic, zombie-like, piranha toothed vampires that resurface fear in a genre that hasn't scared since Nosferatu. Despite this though, poor exposition and plot progression had minimized what could have been a fully revitalized fear of vampires.

While the film certainly does an excellent job of setting the scene in the otherwise small and isolated town of Barrow, Alaska, locked away in 30 days of night, your more or less presented with a quick blitzkrieg of violence that numbs any perfectly planned tension and suspense that could have otherwise been capitalized.

And yes, there is quite the amount of, at times disturbing, violence. This is reflected in the fact that these vampires, while committing horrible atrocities themselves, aren't taken down with splinters of wood and crucifixes, but with extreme force (i.e axes, shot-guns and even earth-moving vehicles).

Acting is well done for the most part, especially in the case of Ben Foster's take on a mentally-ill vagrant. Otherwise, Josh Hartnett did an otherwise sufficient role as sheriff, but ultimately didn't serve as a very compelling character.

In the end the film implemented the right elements but rushed them on the audience without good use of tension, leading you to be more rattled then actually scared. Perhaps as well, this story was better used as a mini series given the original comic-book it was based on. Somehow covering 30 days over a near-two hour film just didn't pace well.

Dog Soldiers (2002)

A well-done werewolf film executed to terrifying effect

[10/10 · 29 October 2009]

(only mild spoilers involving aspects of the film)

The werewolf genre doesn't usually yield classics but they do come occasionally every decade or so. Finally, Dog Soldiers serves up to being another memorable lycnathropic experience that hasn't graced audiences since the days of American Werewolf in London and The Howling.

It's also among the few films to capitalize on the potential fear factor of the werewolf genre by implementing not one but an entire pack of intimidating wolf-men. Helping this fear factor, is the fact that the squadron of soldiers that play victim throughout the film are not only memorable but likable, adding to the sense of fear as you concern over characters such as the genuinely likable and comedic character Spoon.

Further exaltations could be on the focus on realistic and well-crafted make-up and suit designs over the usually impractical use of cg. The werewolves effectively project all the scariest aspects of a wolf and a powerful anthro-morph with the use of proper design and animatronics, although the head designs were at times easily recognized as being too big in some scenes. No transformation scenes were implemented but they would've slowed down the otherwise fast, action-packed pace of the film.

Ultimately the combination of smart, likable characters and truly deadly beasts presents an otherwise near-perfect action-horror film complete with the themes of comradery and the aspect of humanity that separates one from their savage tendencies.

Wolvesbayne (2009 TV Movie)

Decent but ultimately lukewarm action-fantasy affair

[6/10 · 28 October 2009]

Wolvesbayne is yet another entry in a long series of B-science-fiction movies produced by the now aptly-called scyfy channel. While their films have been getting ever-so-gradually better, albeit at a very gradual pace, this film does some things right and other things wrong. Originally described on an epic level, the film actually felt like a lukewarm introduction to a series.

Enter a world where vampires live alongside humans and the like on a relatively peaceful level but a few vampiric dissenters wish to raise an old vampire goddess to reign-in humanity under vampire rule once again. Fans of the werewolf genre will be interested in knowing that the main protagonists are werewolves but that fact plays little if any part in the progression of the film and little is seen of either character's wilder side. These characters team up with an incarnation of Bram Stroker's Van Helsing to stop the occult vampire clan from taking over the earth, but mostly do so while on the sidelines.

It all sounds good on paper, but the film is ultimately a disappointment with a somewhat disjointed and lengthy progression of the story and characters that don't appeal much to the audience. Jeremy London as the mild-mannered and yet irritably selfish realtor turned werewolf protagonist does a fine job in acting out his role but ultimately turns- out in being an otherwise dis-likable and incredibly uninvolved character. It would've been nice to see more of Christy Romano as the bad-ass lycanthropic vixen Alex Layton but she too serves little in the story's progression.

On the vampire side of things, I actually liked Yancy Butler's cheesy role as vampire queen, and Dacascos' did a sinister but equally cheesy take as the leader of the Germanic vampire clan. Otherwise, the film also featured some minor plot-holes: such as an un-explained werewolf minion of the vampires and other unexplained origins.

In the end the film was well filmed and featured a fair amount of violent action alongside some decent yet brief special-effects, but ultimately barely entertained you as it led to a mostly expected and unremarkable finish that suggested either a sequel or series.

District 9 (2009)

An instant science-fiction classic

[9/10 · 27 October 2009]

Neil Blomkamp's scifi representation of the African-Apartheid couldn't do a better job of mirroring humanity's dark side. While the slimy, dubious aliens serve as the focus of this mockumentary it is the capable abuse that humanity can inflict on itself and like-beings that is the thematic subject of the film, and Blomkamp does a wonderful job of displaying it in the most subtle manner.

While this film follows in a bit of the shaky-film line of docu-drama cinematography, the film stays coherent and the second half of the film could be taken as straight fiction with only minor interruptions in the action. The acting is excellently done by all the actors, with the distinctly dis-likable, flawed and yet pitifully sympathetic anti-hero Wikus Van de Merwe being well-played by Sharpto Copley. Wikus serves well to bring focus to the plot through his own perspective.

While there was plenty of drama and perhaps some well-played dark humor, the film was not short of action-packed scenes that escalated with ever-increasing tension and were amazingly represented by the most photo-realistic cg I've seen in some time. For example, the incredibly realistic looking aliens also carried uncanny human expression. I would imagine the large bulk of the film's small budget was spent on the cg.

Possibly among the most unique aspects of the film was its gripping ending that was genuinely heart-felt and disparate at the same time. Please don't miss out on this scifi-classic. (warning: the film has a fair share of gore, strong language and graphic violence).