nebk Reviews

The Sacrifice Game (2023)

A Fairly Decent Attempt

[6/10 · 10 December 2023]

The Sacrifice Game is a relatively modest budget Christmas horror movie that doesn't break new ground but is relatively entertaining.

The movie starts off with a group of ritualistic killers murdering a couple in the 70s. Then it continues at an all girl boarding school where 2 teenage girls are left with a teacher and her boyfriend over the Christmas break. Soon the two groups collide with decidedly deadly results when the gang of killers wants to summon a demon in the school on Christmas Eve.

The acting is relatively decent although some inexperience shows at times. The leader of the occult group played by Mena Massoud is creepy enough for the role. And the teenage actresses portraying the schoolgirls are ok for the most part.

The problem with the film occurs mostly in the third act which feels a bit wonky especially where the teenage cast has to carry the film. The depth of the story is not fully explored and it would have been a better movie if it had been. The twist is obvious after a certain point so it's not the biggest surprise. The movie could have also cut about 10 minutes off the run time to make it a tighter production. Overall however it's a decent enough attempt to warrant about a 6 out of 10 rating.

There's Something in the Barn (2023)

A Meh Xmas Horror Comedy.

[4/10 · 9 December 2023]

There's Something In The Barn showed some promise but ultimately it doesn't work as either a horror or a comedy.

An American family moves to Europe when the father inherits a house from his uncle near a small village in Norway. It turns out the barn has a barn elf living in it and in order not to get it mad you have to follow some rules, like in Gremlins. Bad things happen if the rules are broken and the elf calls on reinforcements and they go on a murderous rampage.

The family is for the most part extremely annoying and hard to root for. The rules make no sense. The elves don't like loud noises or bright lights and yet they have a party with very loud music in the third act of the film. A majority of them live in the forest, which begets the question why they are called barn elves if they live in a forest.

The humor is repetitive and gets boring after awhile and some of the decisions the characters make are dumb. After a gruesome murder the family has a conversation that feels completely out of place.

Overall the story is weak and makes very little sense. The comedy is mostly silly especially from the father and falls flat. Do yourself a favour and watch a Finnish film called Rare Exports: A Christmas Tale. It's vastly superior.

Mindcage (2022)

Plagiarism In A Cage

[4/10 · 17 December 2022]

Mindcage should be called "Silence Of The Lambs-Fallen-Seven Mash-Up" as it combines many elements of those three films and the result is a poor copy which doesn't come close to any of the films it is plagiarising from.

The story is about two detectives: Jake Doyle (Martin Lawrence) & Mary Kelly (Melissa Roxburgh) trying to solve a series of copycat killings. The murderer is copying the methods of a soon to be executed serial killer known as The Artist (John Malkovich) who used to display his victims in an artistic way. So in true silence of the lambs fashion, Detective Kelly goes to interview The Artist in order to get his insight onto who could be behind the murders. It turns out that the imprisoned killer knows far too much about the case and the detectives involved. He is willing to share information bit by bit if his demands are met. Conveniently a high profile person is taken by the copycat and a deal is struck with the artist in order to save her.

MAJOR SPOILER AHEAD: When the detectives find the kidnapped woman, it turns out that Detective Doyle was being possessed by The Artist and he was responsible all along. Sort of like in the movie Fallen staring Denzel Washington. Detective Kelly has to shoot him and Doyle is blamed for the copycat killings. The Artist orchestrated everything to get his sentence changed since he has the ability to possess anyone he has made a sketch or drawing of. Which begs the question why exactly he let himself get caught in the first place if he was supernaturally powerful.

While Malkovich is clearly having fun with the role, the lead detectives can not match him. Martin Lawrence trying to act in a serious role is akin to watching someone who had a mild stroke, got drunk and decided to pretend he was a tormented detective. He mumbles and snarls through what he thinks is dramatic acting. Melissa Roxburgh is slightly better but not exactly nuanced in her performance at times as she goes from calm to manic in order to portray the urgency of the situation. It doesn't really work. She looks like she is having some sort of mood swing. Some of the other actors are fine as are the effects but ultimately they are wasted on what is a jumbled up story with little originality and so many inconsistencies that it's not worth watching.

Halloween Ends (2022)

Halloween-It Seems Like It Never Ends.

[2/10 · 15 October 2022]

The third and final installment in the new Halloween Frenchise is the worst by far. It is a clichéd mess of a movie in which the appearances of Michael Myers and Laurie Strode are down to a bare minimum and the story is so badly patched together that it makes no sense. It continues 4 years after the last film and Michael Myers has disappeared. Laurie Strode and her granddaughter Allyson are living in Haddonfield and Laurie introduces Allyson to Corey, a once promising engineering student who accidentally killed a boy he was babysitting and is now disliked by most of the townspeople who are deeply affected by the massacres that took place in the earlier films (when the plot calls for it that is-at other times they are chilled out). Corey appears to be a meek guy but ends up running into Michael Myers who is now a weak old man and takes Corey on as an apprentice and they kill a few people together. Then Corey takes the mask from Michael and goes on a killing spree. Micheal gets annoyed and comes to get his mask. Laurie kills him and and then then she and some townspeople dismember him in a car breaking yard.

Things to ponder: Why is Michael who is an indestructible killing machine now a weakling hiding in a sewer? How did he stop himself from killing or being seen in the 4 years he was in hiding? Why is he as an epitome of evil taking on an apprentice? Why doesn't anyone react when they see the famed Michael Myers mask when in the previous film they formed a huge lynch mob to take him out. How did Laurie Strode go from being a main protagonist and a halloween doomsday pepper to being a woman who bakes pies, knits and is writing a book. And how does she manage to kill Michael when 50 people couldn't in the last film. Why does Alyssa have no problem when Corey tells her he killed someone, and how is he being bullied by teenagers not old enough to buy their own booze. The inconsistencies and plotholes continue on and on making this movie which is 1 hour and 51 minutes long feel never ending and yet the story could have been told in 15 minutes. The acting is OK and the end fight is decent but the rest is downright insulting to fans of Halloween.

Jeepers Creepers: Reborn (2022)

An Abomination

[1/10 · 5 October 2022]

Jeepers Creepers Reborn is basically an abomination of a film that has nothing to do with the original or its admitely inferior sequels. It has a convoluted story about a couple called Chase and Laine going to some cheap looking horror festival where it turns out that some locals are sacrificing people to the Creeper by luring them to a supposed escape room. The creeper meanwhile is killing everyone he comes into contact with without trying to get them afraid and smell out whether he needs body parts from them. It turns out he is after Laine because she is pregnant. Why? Because.... No one knows. On top of everything else she is seeing visions which have nothing to do with anything else in the movie. In the end some of the survivors supposedly kill the Creeper and Laine's eyes turn completely dark and in the next scene the Creeper is shown alive again.

The acting is atrocious and the chemistry between the leads is non existent. The supporting cast is mostly terrible as well but given the script this is not surprising. The effects and the cringe worthy dialogue are also atrocious as was the the whole production over all. Truly, a shockingly bad movie.

The Munsters (2022)

Cringy And Barely Watchable Schlock

[3/10 · 27 September 2022]

The Munsters starts off badly and gets progressively worse with a juvenile script that resembles badly written fan fiction by writter-director Rob Zombie who is a self proclaimed super fan of the original show.

The story, what there is of it, is an attempt at a prequel to the 1960s TV series and shows how Herman Munster was created, met Lilly and how they eventually ended up moving from Transylvania to America. But what fans found funny and endearing in the original show they will find annoying in this sloppy poorly edited mess of a film. Some of the make up was decent but the over exaggerated colours don't do the movie any favours. The acting overall is not great even though there are some decent actors in the movie. The biggest letdown is that the script is weak and cringy and the jokes just aren't funny. There are a few infrequent chuckles to be had but the funniest thing is that someone thought this was a good idea.

Panama (I) (2022)

Bottom Of The Barrel Garbage

[2/10 · 24 March 2022]

Where to begin...from the overdrawn opening sequence to a terrible music score and lazy action Panama doesn't offer much. There are one or two scenes that are done competently but they are few and far in-between. There is a lot of shaky cam and choppy looking editing and poor effects. The acting is also mostly poor.

The story is poorly explained and not well written. An american agent is sent to Panama to broker an arms deal but he has to deal with corrupt officials, drug dealers, unsavory characters and contra revolutionaries.

The story such as it is feels disjointed and the filmmakers do not follow the old adage "show, don't tell" but rely on the narration by Mel Gibson and it gets old very quickly. Overall best avoided as pretty much everything in the movie is done poorly.

Megaboa (2021)

Megabad

[1/10 · 1 January 2022]

Megaboa is so bad It makes Anaconda and Anaconda The Hunt For The Blood Orchid look like oscar winning films written by Shakespeare and directed by Spielberg. Megaboa doesn't even try to change the story of the two previoysly mentioned movies much. An expedition on an island runs into a poacher. The expedition leader played by Eric Roberts gets a spider bite and can be helped by a specific orchid. The expedition team tries to find the orchid but runs into massive snakes. Most get squashed and eaten.

The acting is bad, the soundtrack is terrible, the story incoherent more or less and the effects are so bad they are funny. The only good thing achieved by watching this is knowing that every movie watched this year will be better than this one.

Last Shoot Out (2021)

Boring Last Shoot Out

[2/10 · 3 December 2021]

A predictably simple and poor attempt at a western in which a newlywed damsel is saved by a mysterious cowboy. She overheard her husband and his family bragging about her fathers murder. She runs away on her wedding night and is rescued five days later by a mysterious stranger called Billy and an old acquaintance of her fathers called Red. They all go to a stage coach station outpost and are soon pursued by her husband and his gang.

Some of the good points...hardly anything. Some of the actors try but can't do much with the bad material. There are one or two nice shots of the countryside.

The bad...wooden acting and badly written dialogue in an unoriginal movie. A music score that sounds cheap. Using flashbacks to show the viewers what happened not even a few minutes ago. The fact that some of the characters spend days outside and yet their clothes look as if they stepped out of an air-conditioned trailer rather than a stage coach outpost in the middle of nowhere. The endless talking. Overall this movie is cheap and unoriginal and not worth watching. There are many better choices out there.

Red Stone (2021)

About Avarage

[5/10 · 3 December 2021]

Red Stone is a run of the mill thriller in which a teenager named Motley Adams (Dash Melrose) witnesses his brother's murder at the hands of the crime boss Jed Haywood (Michael Cudlitz). It turns out his brother stole a Ruby from the crime boss and was also cooperating with the FBI. Soon Motley is beeing pursued by an assassin named Boon (Neal McDonough) as well as a law enforcement agent with whom his brother was cooperating. Boon is not too keen on his new job as it takes place on a day of a family funeral and it seems he is seriously reconsidering his career path at the same time.

Overall Red Stone is a watchable if mostly predictable and slightly forgettable thriller. The acting is mostly decent although there is not much character development especially of secondary characters. Certain events are not very well explained and could have been explored in more depth. A 5 out of 10. Not terrible but not great either.

Apex (2021)

Snorex More Than Apex

[2/10 · 12 November 2021]

There are a few movies that deal with humans hunting other humans: The Most Dangerous Game, Hard Target, The Running Man, Surviving The Game etc, and they are all better than Apex. Apex is about hunters who paid a lot of money to hunt criminals on Apex Island or in this case to hunt Malone an ex cop who is now a career criminal and convict played by Bruce Willis.

The best thing about the film are some of the goofy facial expressions by Willis, some of the trivia thrown in about Malone and the acting by Neal McDonough. One of the problems (and there are many) is that the so called hunters are mostly dumb and can't spot their pray hiding a few meters away from them even though he is wearing a red jacket. Plus some of them keep on taking each other out with very flimsy reasons. They also talk a lot in order to chew through the short run time. Another thing to note is that Bruce Willis seems not to have spent much time with the other actors as he spends 99% of the film alone and even when he is engaging with the other characters they are not in the same shots making it quite apparent that the actors filmed their scenes separately and these were then edited together to make it seem like there is interaction. There are also continuity errors apparent in certain scenes where in one shot it's a sunny day and in the next darkness is falling.

Overall the acting is bad, the dialogue is juvenile, the story is unoriginal and lame and the movie seems to drag. The story makes very little sense and it is apparent that there was minimal effort. Best avoided.

The Ice Road (2021)

Ridiculous And Bad

[3/10 · 26 June 2021]

In The Ice Road Liam Neeson stars as a down on his luck trucker offered a large amount of money to drive one of three trucks carrying industrial machinery in order to save trapped miners who are quickly running out of air due to an explosion that trapped them in a diamond mine. The mission is sabotaged by the greedy owners of the mine who don't want evidence that they were not following safety measures and are responsible for the explosion and cave in that trapped the miners.

In a nutshell this isn't a good movie in any way. It started off by trying to introduce some weak character development and then it slowly progresses into ludicrous action that makes no sense whatsoever. There are so many things that happen that range from implausible to impossible like one of the villains tumbling down a mountain, getting on a snowmobile, overtaking the protaginists and then setting off an avalanche to kill the protagonists. They survive obviously and there is more fighting. Another trucker gets a tree branch imaled into her chest but she is practically unharmed by it. Two truckers fall through the ice, get out and warm up in the truck as if it wasn't a big deal. And it goes on and on like that until the end. The acting is more or less passable, the CGI is not great but it could be forgiven if the story wasn't so dumb and illogical. Unfortunately it was and it brings the whole movie down. 3.5/10.

Spiral (2021)

Spiral: From Chris Rock's Book Of Overacting.

[1/10 · 3 June 2021]

This movie was seriously bad and by the end insulting to the viewers...it has numerous problems some of which are:

No one ever answers their phone or can get in touch with anyone else when they need to. In fact phones are only useful when the killer wants to set up the protagonist. Almost all of the cops in the film are portrayed as corrupt to some extent. The acting is all over the place and goes from ok to rally bad in certain scenes. Chris Rock seems to think that shouting is equal to a serious dramatic performance. He is also in his mid 50s and feels about 15 years too old for this role.

The traps set by the killer are impossible to escape and make no sense other than to terrify and torture. It also makes no sense how he sets them up in a brief period of time. The killer must also have teleportation abilities considering how quickly he goes from place to place. He also manages to kill not only the police chief but to get her predecessor killed as well. By the S. W. A. T team no less. And no one recognised the legendary ex captain of police or wandered why a man hanging on strings looks like he is about to shoot at them while suspended in mid air. When the current chief of police is murdered no one hears gunshots in the police station. And the lack of logic goes on and on.

The dialogue and line delivery between characters is atrocious at times as well...overall this is the worst movie in the saw franchise and that's saying something considering how many poor sequels there were. The name dropping of other movies in the film like Twilight, The Wire, New Jack City also feels unnecessary and dated as well. This is a badly written, poorly acted unnecessary and forgettable chapter in the Saw franchise.

Endangered Species (2021)

Lacklustre

[4/10 · 28 May 2021]

Endangered Species is unfortunately not a great film. It follows a group of five people on vacation in Kenya and their encounter with dangerous wildlife and poachers in a national park. The acting is not bad as it has Rebecca Romjin playing a diabetic mother Lauren Halsey, with Philip Winchester playing her uptight executive husband Jack. Isabel Basset and Michael Johnston play their children Zoe and Noah and the group is completed by Zoe's easy going hippie boyfriend Billy portrayed by Chris Fisher. On the second day of their vacation they all go to a large game park alone as Jack wouldn't pay for the extras including a guide and guard since he might be losing his job back at home.

Predictably they veer off the prescribed route, enter an expressly forbidden path and soon find their vehicle rammed and overturned by an angry Rhino mother protecting her calf. Soon they are faced with a pack of hyenas, a leopard, an inhospitable landscape and later a group of poachers. At the same time Lauren needs insulin and the whole family is bringing out all their internal strife and conflict into the open.

While it had promise the film was let down by the lacklustre story and the bad computer effects. The environmental message that poaching is horrible is a commendable one but some of the actions by the characters make little sense and feel contrived just to fill out more screen time and to push the environmental message into the movie as much as possible rather than to make the story exciting. This combined with heavy foreshadowing of events makes the story weak and choppy. Some examples of this are Zoe refusing plastic bottles of water because they are bad for the environment and everyone mentioning how rare it would be to see a rhino. Of course all the glass bottles break in the crash and a rhino overturns their vehicle. Earlier during their drive they see what looks like an antelope carcass hanging from a tree and wander how it got there. Surprise surprise one member of the group is later attacked by a leopard and finds themselves hanging from a tree.

Overall it's a watchable but forgettable film which could have been better if more time was spent developing the story.

Great White (2021)

Great White=Jaws Lite

[4/10 · 13 May 2021]

Great White is not the worst way to spend 90 minutes but it does have issues. In the film seaplane tour operators Charlie and Kaz with their cook Benny take out a wealthy couple Joji and Michelle to Impervious Reef. There they find a victim of a shark attack and head back. On the way back they see an overturned boat, go to check it out and their plane sinks. They end up in a raft and get stalked by a a couple of great white sharks which are hunting together.

There is some tension in the film and the characters don't feel like cheap cardboard cutouts. All of them were fleshed out just enough that the viewer actually cares about what happens to them. The CGI is not great though and this was clearly done on a tight budget. The filmmakers tried to keep the sharks in the darkness and shadows as much as possible and this helps. There are however a few shark scenes that look very poor and this is a problem together with the ludicrous action in the final act as it becomes very unrealistic. Overall the first 30 minutes where the characters are introduced are good, the second act has some suspense but the action in the final third of the film is both unbelievable and predictable at times.

Overall this wasn't great given the story line and the budget constraints but was watchable. The acting is mostly decent. The film is not realistic especially in the final third but overall it is better than many shark themed thriller horrors. There are some cool shots and suspenseful moments but it could have been much better if the story was better developed.

Breach (IV) (2020)

3rd Rate Garbage Fest

[2/10 · 18 December 2020]

Anti-Life is mostly a complete waste of time, space and film. In the 2240s a space ship leaves a plague infested earth carrying the future inhabitants of new earth. 180 days from their destination a skeleton crew is running the ship while the passengers are in hyper sleep. Soon the crew members start dying and killing eachother and the survivors end up battling an alien life form that overtakes and imitates its host and is trying to kill them all.

The movie is badly filmed with terrible sound and poor visual effects which are similar to what bad sci-fi movies had in the late 1980s or early 1990s. The editing is choppy as well. The movie basically borrows ideas from The Thing, Alien, Pandorum and many other superior films and copies some elements poorly. Actors like Bruce Willis, Rachel Nichols, Collin Mullvey and Thomas Jane among others have little to do and have terrible dialogue and story to contend with.

There are a few chuckles but other than that there are hardly any redeeming points to this. Honestly, Leprechaun 4: In Space was more entertaining and better and it was made in 1996.

Spell (2020)

It Won't Put A Spell On You

[4/10 · 31 October 2020]

I was looking forward to Spell hoping it was going to be suspenseful horror but unfortunately it is not very exciting or suspenseful. The movie is about Marquis T. Woods (Omari Hardwick) a successful lawyer on his way to a family funeral in a very distant part of Appalachia. When his Cessna crashes in a storm he is separated from his wife and children and in the care of Eloise (Loretta Devine) and her family who practice a form of voodoo.

There are some very good shots in the beginning when Marquis and his family are flying to Appalachia as well as a few good scenes with Eloise. The flashbacks however look cheap and character development is mostly non existent for the other characters. The dialogue is not always convincing and gets repetitive at times. What happens is also predictable and the actions of the protagonist don't always make sense. The story does pick up in the last 15 minutes but is is again very predictable and it is barely explained how Marquis picked up the voodoo spells and deals so easily with someone like Eloise who as it is shown near the end of the movie has been practicing those spells for for over a century. In the end this was a watchable but underwhelming film that never really reaches its true potential.

The Witches (2020)

A Lazy Witch Hunt

[3/10 · 25 October 2020]

The Witches had the potential to be an entertaining movie due to Anne Hathaway and Olivia Spencer but it is way too simple with lazy writing and in my opinion it has one of the worst endings seen in a film.

When the parents of a boy are killed tragically in an accident in 1968 he ends up living with his grandmother who tells him that witches are real and are not even women but demons. They go to a hotel in Alabama and they have the misfortune to be there at the same time as a witch coven gathering. The witches have a plan to turn all children into mice and eliminate them. They turn the boy into a mouse and he together with two other children who were turned into mice and his grandmother had to defeat the coven led by the high witch. They do this by feeding the witches the same potion that was used to turn them into mice and it ends up turning the witches into ugly looking rats. And then they leave with a huge pile of money and potion and a list of all witches in the world and plan to turn them into rats as well. About 45 seconds is spent trying to turn the children back into their human form and then they shrug their shoulders and say well it's ok beeing a mouse. The boy even asks how long mice live and the grandmother says that regular mice live three years but that they might live three times that which is ok with the boy who is happy he won't have to go to school and they can die together. The grandmother doesn't seem to be too bothered either which is strange to say the least since the indication is that none of these poor children will see past their mid teens but at least they can have fun with all the money. And then they show us a scene 11 years later with an aged mouse talking to children and sending them out on a mission to eliminate witches. Obviously someone was not good at math since 1979 is about two years past the mice life span according to the film.

Another issue is why does the potion work on witches who are not even human? Why doesn't the grandmother try to find an antidote when she captures the head witch instead of feeding her to her cat familiar. In the beginning it is said that a witch gets the same pleasure from squashing children as a normal person would from eating ice cream. And then 25 minutes later it is said they hate the smell of children since children smell like dog poop... soooo....dog poop ice cream that they get enjoyment out of squashing. Someone should have read through this script more. The good things are the effects and the adult actors although Anne Hathaway changes her accent throughout the movie. She was still entertaining but not enough to improve this movie which has a terrible ending. A 3 out of 10.

The Mortuary Collection (2019)

No Evil Deed Goes Unpunished

[7/10 · 15 October 2020]

Starting off with a girl asking for a job in an old funeral home The Mortuary Collection is a horror anthology consisting of 5 loosly connected stories told by the mortuary owner to his potential new assistant. One is about a thief getting eaten by a monster at a house party, another is about a womanizing playboy getting the tables turned on him when he gets impregnated by a girl because he refused to use protection. The third is about a man who decides to end his ill wife's suffering (and his own) by poisoning her but everything that can go wrong does so and in a spectacular manner. The fourth story is a serial killer/babysitter trope turned on its head and the final story takes place throughout the film and is about the mortuary owner and the assistant who isn't at all what she seems.

In short this is a very good blend of horror and humor with very competent acting all around especially by Clancy Brown who really does well as the creepy mortuary owner Mortimer Dark. The rest of the cast is not that well known but do a great job.

The stories are written and directed well and the effects are competent for the most part other then a few glaring cgi moments which couldn't be avoided. This is highly recommended for horror fans and just in time for Halloween.

Hubie Halloween (2020)

Worst Sandler Movie Ever

[2/10 · 9 October 2020]

There are three problems with this movie. It has Adam Sandler in it, he actually wrote some of it and he is present in most of it. And as a result its an unfunny, unoriginal and terrible movie with the worst performance by Adam Sandler in his whole career. And the voice he uses might make you want to slam your head onto the nearest flat surface. He plays Hubie Dubois who seems to be the most unlikeable and hated person living in Salem and yet he is described as the nicest person by a girl he had a crush on in high school. He appears as somewhat mentally challenged and acts as a Haloween monitor who realises there is a monster roaming in his town on haloween night and people are disappearing.

Overall there is not a single funny moment when Adam Sandler was onscreen. All the other actors were ok and clearly they did this because they know him and got easy money. Unfortunately whenever they were about to elevate the movie from being utter tripe Hubie shows up onscreen and ruins any humor. And his moronic gag with the thermos that is a flashlight/shovel/megaphone/soup container/yo-yo/grappling hook/etc gets old real quick. What really makes it worse is the fact that the man can clearly act in both dramatic and comedic roles but turning in a performance like this was intentional and insulting to viewers. There are some funny moments with Steve Buscemi, Kevin James and the other cast members as well as with the actress playing Hubie's mother and her tshirt selection. But this doesn't make a movie good. A 2.5/10 and that's generous.

The Doorman (2020)

Another Die Hard Clone

[4/10 · 9 October 2020]

The Doorman starring Ruby Rose as Ali in the titular role is about an ex-marine who faces off against a bunch of criminals lead by Victor Dubois (Jean Reno) attempting an art heist in an almost empty apartment building which is undergoing renovations during the easter holidays. What they didn't count on was a family being in the apartment and an ex-marine with PTSD who is related to them.

The problem is that this is just another in a long line of pale Die Hard imitations where a hero faces of against criminals while trying to save people before the criminals break into a safe and do not need hostages any longer. In fact this movie has a scene where Ali kills a criminal on one of the floors undergoing renovations just like John Mclane did in Die Hard. She also tries to signal for help by setting off the fire alarms just like John Mclane did. Even when the criminals are seen disabling the alarm system one is shown as trying to do it carefully whilst the other takes a hammer and breaks everything up. In Die Hard one robber tries to be careful and the other uses a circular saw to cut the wires.

There are also way too many convenient things that happen in order for the hero to be successful. There are hidden passages all over the building and her nephew knows them all for example. There is apparently an old speak easy where they hide. The teenager shouts and the 2 robbers chasing them hear him. Which makes you wonder what kind of hidden room this was if everyone could hear the noise coming from it. The robbers also make many illogical decisions. This and other inconsistencies and plot holes make this a less then stellar attempt. The acting was nothing special although the movie has good actors in it so at best it is ok for what the movie is. A 4.5/10

The 2nd (2020)

Not Even 2nd Rate...Avoid it.

[3/10 · 2 September 2020]

The 2nd is a bad movie from start to finish. It's supposed to be about the 2nd amendment and the right to bear arms but this is lost in the dumb dialogue, dumber action and the fact that the motivations of most of the characters make no sense.

The head of the CIA decides to kidnap the college going daughter of a supreme court judge in order to make him vote in a certain way. This is because the daughter of the CIA chief was killed by a psychotic gunman in a school shooting and this shouldn't happen again. So he has mercenaries besiege a college on the last day of term. They are led by a man called Driver played by Caper Van Dien and they have no problem killing security guards, or college students or anyone else in their way which makes no sense given their end goal. Their plot is foiled by green beret/delta force captain Vic Davies played by Ryan Phillipe who is at the college to pick up his son. There are gun fights and fist fights and explosions and the action moves to the L.A. port. The bad guys are beaten unrealistically but the CIA chief escapes and Driver ends up killing him because their benefactor wasn't happy and because three can keep a secret if the other two are dead...so does this mean that Driver is going to whack their benefactor as well or maybe himself. Also who is this benefactor mentioned in the 83rd minute of the film. The movie ends with Vic Davies being surrounded by another group of mercenaries and starting to fight them.

This is a cheap action film most of which was badly acted. The plot was convoluted and unclear and the story was just plain bad and borrowed from many better movies. The actions of the characters make little sense like the college students repeatedly doing the opposite when they are told to stay somewhere and hide. The bad guys are inept and the reasoning behind everything is unclear. Definitely not recommended...watch something coherent instead.

Rogue (I) (2020)

Not Good

[3/10 · 28 August 2020]

I hoped this would be something along the line of Prey or even the The Ghost And The Darkness but this was just a terrible and low budget creature feature with mercenaries and a lioness. In fact the lioness was there more as an afterthought and a plot device then a main antagonist.

A bunch of mercenaries led by Samantha O Hara played by Megan Fox are rescuing a daughter of a governor in Kenya. They end up rescuing three hostages instead of the one and when the helicopter which is supposed to pick them up is shot down they need to keep on running from the terrorists who are after them and encounter a rogue lioness on a lion breeding farm. It turns out that the lioness is just protecting her cubs and is attacking anyone who endangers them.

The acting is ok mostly , the effects go from b to c grade to just terrible and there is the annoying blood mist that disappears into thin air when someone gets shot which makes the movie look cheaper and cheaper. The story and script were a major let down at times as well. You could literally tell which person would be attacked by the rogue lioness by certain sentences that were uttered moments before. This took out all the excitement from the movie and just left mostly jump scares. The movie loses the plot with the lioness only attacking the villains of the film the main terrorists who is British turns out to be just a criminal saying his country never wanted him, one of the dying mercenaries saying how beautiful lions are and so on and so forth. There is even a scene where one protagonist says "well that just happened" as if acknowledging that something makes no sense in the movie makes it in any way ok for the audience just because you mentioned it in the actual film. While the end message of how the breeding of captive lions need to stop is commendable, the movie does not draw attention to it properly. A 3.5 out of 10.

The Pale Door (2020)

Pale Bore or Pale Snore...You Decide

[3/10 · 22 August 2020]

The Pale Door has a somewhat cool poster and had a decent idea or two. Unfortunately that's about it in terms of the positives of the review. The negatives far outweigh them. The story takes close to 40 minutes to actually get going and is mostly boring. It's about a group of western outlaws who end up trapped in a cursed town inhabited by witches. They want to capture the youngest gang member who is the brother of the wounded leader and had only joined the rest of the gang in a heist for the first time. He is apparently pure hearted and would sustain the witches for a long time.

The acting is nothing to write home about even though most of the main cast has worked on some very good movies in the past so the problem must be with the bad story, script and dialogue none of which are engaging or exciting. The action is kind of funny at times and so are the effects but not in a good way. More in a cringeworthy way. The sets look very fake and as someone already pointed out the clothes are all too clean. The story has a few similarities to From Dusk Till Dawn but that movie is superior in every possible way. It would be better to watch that instead. Overall this is best avoided or forgotten as soon as possible.

Sputnik (2020)

Very Entertaining Russian Sci-Fi Horror Film

[7/10 · 20 August 2020]

Sputnik translated as travelling companion is a suspenseful sci-fi horror action film from Russia. It takes place in 1983 when a two astronauts or to be more accurate cosmonauts crash land back to earth. One cosmonaut called Konstantin Veshnyakov survived and he is being held in a secret government facility and undergoing numerous physical and mental tests. A psychiatrist called Tatyana Klimova is brought in to assess his condition. It turns out he has brought back a life form inside him when landing on earth. A life form that is able to use Konstantin as a space suit which it can discard for longer periods of time every day. The question becomes is this life form a parasite or a symbiote and how dangerous it is.

Overall Sputnik was a highly entertaining and well acted film. The effects were very good and so was the direction. Fedor Bondarchuck as the villainous Colonel Semiradov was particularly memorable but the rest of the cast was very good as well. The biggest issue with the movie is the somewhat rushed and sort of predictable hollywood ending. However, even though the movie does have similarities to Hollywood movies such as Alien, Life, Appolo 18 and Arrival amongst others i still found it a lot of fun to watch and i particularly liked the score as well as how well the effects were used in what appears to be a tight budget film. A solid 7 out of 10.