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Wrong Turn (DVD)
by GentleGenius
RELEASED: 2003, Cert. 18
RUNNING TIME: Approx. 84 mins
DIRECTOR: Rob Schmidt
PRODUCERS: Erik Feig, Robert Kulzer & Stan Winston
SCREENPLAY: Alan B McElroy
MUSIC: Elia Cmiral
MAIN CAST:-
Desmond Harrington as Chris
Eliza Dushku as ... Jessie
Emanuelle Chriqui as Carly
Jeremy Sisto as Scott
Julian Richings as Three Finger
Garry Robbins as Saw Tooth
Ted Clark as One Eye
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FILM ONLY REVIEW
A young couple is climbing up a rock-face. The guy gets to the top, with the girl underneath asking for a hand upwards, only to see him fall down dead at the summit. He then rolls over and drops down the chasm, already dead before the fall...and it is obvious he was pushed. The girl struggles in an attempt to escape whatever is at the top of the rock, then falls to her own death.
The scene then changes to Chris, who is driving to an important meeting and gets stuck in non-moving traffic. He is informed by one of the other drivers in the traffic queue that the road won't be clear for a couple of hours. Chris then decides to try and take the back roads route, hoping to miss the snarl-up and make his meeting on time. On his way, he stops off at a log cabin to use the phone, but the owner of the cabin - a true blue mountain man - is borderline hostile, and Chris finds the public pay-phone there doesn't work anyway. He consults a map stuck to the cabin's outer wall, and prepares to drive off and find a road which is indicated on the map. On leaving the man in the cabin, Chris bids him to take care, and as he drives away, the man mutters under his breath... "It's you who ought to take care."
Whilst driving along a road which is little more than a dirt-track, leading deep into the West Virginian woods, Chris accidentally crashes into the back of a stationery vehicle which belongs to a group of friends, which had burst tyres caused by a stinger-type object made of barbed wire that had been fixed across the dust road.
After the group accepts Chris's apologies, he, Scott, Carly and Jessie agree to set off and try to find help, leaving their other two friends behind...who, on the group's return, they find butchered to death.
From that point onwards, Chris, Scott, Carly and Jessie have to rely on their wits to avert suffering the same fate as the other pair...as someone or something murderous is on the loose in the forest.
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Just before the first scene of Chris getting stuck in traffic, the open credits to Wrong Turn are quite fast-flashing images of newspaper cuttings and snippets of medical reports about what can go wrong when in-breeding runs rife, such as in places like the very rural parts of West Virginia mountain communities. Right away, that sets a chilling, albeit somewhat predictable scene in that it is obvious the viewer is about to launch into watching a film whereby the 'bad guy or guys' is or are mountain men spawned from in-breeding.
The atmosphere of the film is set very well in that there is a fairly sinister mood present, but it is far too much like the 1972 classic, Deliverance. However, such is acknowledged when Scott refers to it whilst negotiating with Chris, Carly and Jessie as to what they are going to do in order to get help.
Once the nasties get underway, Wrong Turn becomes extremely gory in parts, as Chris, Carly, Scott and Jessie are pursued by a small group of bizarre, flesh-eating mountain men (Three Finger, Saw Tooth and One Eye). The makeup used to create this cannibalistic trio is almost laughable....nobody human really looks like that, no matter how deformed.
The acting is OK by the whole cast, but I found the character of Carly to be intensely irritating. I got almost angry with her constant stupid questions, such as "What's happening?", "Where did they go?", "What are they doing now?" and similar, to the point where I wanted to scream at her to shut the f*** up for five minutes as how the hell would anybody know the answers? She is also a bit dippy, and a whimpering wet rag when that was the last thing the rest of the gang needed her to be. However, in one way I did feel a little bit sorry for her, but to find out why, you'd have to watch the film yourself. Her character is compensated for by Jessie, who overall is a far more together, gutsy young woman.
The music to Wrong Turn is quite percussive, urgent-sounding orchestral, and very dramatic in parts, but it does suit what is going on in the film fairly well.
Similarly to Deliverance, Wrong Turn is a film which contrasts the darker side of the human condition with an absolutely lovely geographical setting, but Deliverance does it so much better. Whereas Deliverance exudes, almost right from the start, a very realistic sinister atmosphere which is true to life, Wrong Turn, although it is sinister to begin with, misses the spot a bit....probably because even early on, you know it is going to rely on blood, guts and gore for its thrills, whereas Deliverance remains realistic throughout, which overall makes it far more sinister than Wrong Turn.
There are a couple of points in Wrong Turn where I jumped a little bit, and although as said above the film is richly splattered with blood and body parts, I have seen much more graphic presentations of flesh mutilation in films than this. However, it is still pretty gory. The parts which made me jump actually had nothing to do with the horror element, being more centred around situations where people had to make sharp moves or when a loud noise crashed through the speakers into my brain.
The tension levels in Wrong Turn are quite respectable, although I would have preferred to see the mountain men element put across far more convincingly, and the taunting that took place to have been something which could possibly happen for real....but then it would veer far too close to Deliverance for comfort.
The storyline is pretty much predictable in that it's a group of people trying to get away from and outwit their pursuers, relying on their wits and strategy...which is nothing new in this movie genre. However, the whole thing is filmed pretty well, with some rather good and imaginative camera shots being used that serve to enhance the atmosphere to a degree.
Wrong Turn is a film which is high on entertainment value, although it does get far too stupid as the action and tension mount. Another film it here and there put me in mind of is The Hills Have Eyes, it overall coming across as a combination of that and Deliverance. The killers are grossly over-portrayed, with lots of grunting, slurping, sucking noises and are more like creatures from early episodes of Dr. Who than the result of small mountain community in-breeds, coming across as laughable rather than scary. However, the man who Chris encounters close to the beginning of the film is far more realistic, being typical of a backwoods West Virginian rural mountain dweller.
If you like slasher-type horror films, Wrong Turn could be something you'd enjoy very much, but I wouldn't recommend that anybody who has an aversion to watching flesh being cut up should watch it. I personally was very entertained, but it isn't something I'd choose to see again, simply because I now know the outcome.
Overall, I'd say that Wrong Turn is a predictable, but high-action and enjoyable (if that is the right word) piece of entertainment which although I'd not file it in the 'bad movie' bucket, wouldn't manage to reach my all-time favourites list. It is over the top and throwaway, but does have some interesting, fairly gripping moments. If you are of an easily rattled disposition though, it might be better to give it a miss.
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At the time of writing, Wrong Turn can be purchased from Amazon as follows:-
New: from £2.51 to £27.91
Used: from 1p to £15.22
Collectible: only 2 copies currently available @ £2.00 and £6.99
Some items on Amazon are available for free delivery within the UK, but where this doesn't apply, a £1.26 charge should be added to the above figures.
Thanks for reading!
~~ Also published on Ciao under my CelticSoulSister user name ~~
Read the complete review |
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The Woman in Black (DVD)
by cha97mw
The Woman in Black is a 2012 film featuring former Harry Potter child star Daniel Radcliffe in the main role. Radcliffe plays a grieving widower, Arthur Kipps. His wife died during childbirth 4 years previously, and he is struggling to hang onto normality. His job is on the line, and he is a man who must pull it all together ... somehow.
Set in about 1916, Kipps is a lawyer who has been sent by his boss to a remote coastal village to deal with the estate of a woman who has just died. Things start to go wrong from the off. He arrives at the local inn where he is supposed to be staying, but the landlord is cold and stand offish telling him their is nowhere for him to stay, and the local lawyer tries to get him to turn around and go back to London. However, Kipps knows if he does this he will be fired, so he perseveres and tries to deal with the paperwork involved in the woman's death.
He manages to hitch a lift to the desolate Eel Marsh House which is cut off by the tide for part of every day. He quickly starts to realise all is not as it should be when he hears strange noises in the house and random things start to occur. On his return to the village, he is further spooked when he is told tales of children who randomly die in suspicious circumstances, and the villagers have a huge superstition about the Woman in Black who haunts Eel Marsh House.
The film was atmospheric from the start, shot in tones that were quite drab and almost sepia like in places. This really set the sombre mood for the piece, and the spooky events that occured in the story. Eel Marsh House was suitably derelict and fitted with furniture and decorations that were suitable for the era. The toys in the nursery particularly were very creepy looking.
Radcliffe looks years older in this compared to his previous roles. I had watched one of the Harry Potter films only 2 nights prior to watching this and I honestly found Radcliffe absorbing as Kipps, and there was hardly a hint of Potter around him. The role was made his own, and I thought he showed a fantastic range in his acting in this piece.
The soundtrack by Marco Beltrami also added to the mood of the piece, adding to the chill as the film progressed.
Other actors in the piece such as Ciarán Hinds (who plays Daily, an important friend and influence on Kipps) are well know actors who you know from elsewhere, but again play the roles so well you forget they have ever been another character.
The plot is sound but for me lacked a little something as the film progressed. I felt there was something creepy there, but any scenes that were going to make you jump just moved too slowly and kind of petered out a bit before they got to the point. You could kind of see where they were before you got there, so although I felt a bit chilled, I never found my heart racing or scared at any point. The chilling was happening in my head following why the characters were acting the way they were, in particular why Jennet (The Woman in Black) had become this vengeful spirit who was terrorising the locals.
Special effects within this were pretty good, but more mechanical rather than CGI based. The perspective of the camera was used very effectively to give the sense that someone was watching Kipps from the moment he first approached Eel Marsh House, and the movement of furniture and toys was disturbing.
For me, this film is probably worth around 3.5 stars in terms of how well it achieves the story telling with the plot it has, but the acting within it and the skillful camera work make it feel to me it deserves more like 4 stars. I watch horror films if I want to be scared, and this one kind of let me down a bit through a lack of pace, but it is something I think people should watch just to see Radcliffe's transformation. He has come a long way since he was in Harry Potter and the Philosopher's stone and has developed so much that I felt he was totally believable in this role which should perhaps be played by someone actually older in years. If he were not in the role, I think the film would have suffered.
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The Tortured (DVD)
by GentleGenius
RELEASED: 2010, Cert. 18
RUNNING TIME: Approx. 80 mins
DIRECTOR: Robert Lieberman
PRODUCERS: Mark Bung, Oren Koules, Carl Mazzocone & Marek Posival
SCREENPLAY: Marek Posival
MUSIC: Jeff Rona
MAIN CAST:-
Erika Chistansen as Elise
Jesse Metcalfe as ... Craig
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FILM ONLY REVIEW
When Elise's and Craig's son is kidnapped and murdered by a child-torturing serial killer, they hatch a plan of cold-blooded revenge.
After the killer's trial, Elise and Craig manage to divert a police van which is transporting the killer to jail, and kidnap the prisoner, subjecting him to the same kind of torture that he put their child through.
However, things don't turn out exactly as they planned!
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The beginning of The Tortured shows an obviously very disturbed man in a basement, with a child screaming in another room. The man appears to be reliving parts of his own childhood, punctuating the lullaby he is playing on the record player and his verbal reminiscences, with shouting at the child to keep quiet.
The scene then shifts to Elise and Craig being informed by the police that their six-year-old son, Benjamin, has been found dead in a basement. From the point where Elise and Craig identify their child's body, it all becomes rather crazy.
As the film progresses, a pretty good storyline emerges, but the way it is handled by the whole movie-making team turns it into a ridiculous and repetitive debacle which is only just barely watchable. A lot of the scenes I found quite difficult to concentrate on, partly because the camera work is appalling, sometimes veering away from focusing on the central visual point of what was happening, and sometimes being moved around unnecessarily and unsteadily. This for me came across as so irritating, that it almost stopped me from continuing to watch. However, I forced myself to try and ignore that particular problem, but another arose in that the bulk of the film is shot in 95% darkness. I could just about see what was happening, but concluded that if this was a real event, those participating would have needed more light in order to see what they were doing.
The acting in The Tortured really does leave a lot to be desired, and the characterisation is very uneven in the sense that the likelihood of somebody changing their mind about something to the degree that they do, is highly unlikely. That is a big flaw in the otherwise rather good storyline, but such could easily have been tweaked a bit in order for it to make sense.
The music to The Tortured isn't dissimilar to that used in some Mike Leigh films, but it doesn't suit this one. Also, it is far too loud (orchestral in nature), at times almost drowning out what is an already badly flawed script.
This film needs a huge shake-up, and if somebody competent were, in say five years time tempted to do a re-make, I honestly wouldn't blame them....it is remakes of what is already perfect that annoys me, not attempts to improve upon cinematic disasters such as The Tortured as it currently stands.
There is a twist in The Tortured, but I saw it coming very early on. This twist could have been put across so very much better, because the way it is portrayed in this film is rather absurd...I want to say why, but I can't as it would then count as a definite spoiler.
Although I sat through the whole of The Tortured, at various points I did feel as though my own senses were undergoing some sort of divine retribution, simply because of its awfulness. I must repeat though, that overall the storyline is a very good one....just that it is totally ruined by poor acting, mis-casting, poor direction and production, overly loud music, some scenes being too dark and a lousy script.
If somebody like Hitchock, were he still alive and kicking, had got hold of this story, I'm certain that its potential would have been drawn out, quite likely then turning into a gripping, edge of your seat horror/thriller....but, it didn't happen that way and the result is a damp squib.
In summary, everybody needs to go back to the drawing board and seriously regurgitate The Tortured, in order to turn it into what it is capable of being...a masterful, spine-chilling psychological thriller...but, it just didn't happen, at least not this time around. Perhaps I'm being overly generous with my award of two stars, but those are given for the story itself, no more.
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At the time of writing, The Tortured can be purchased from Amazon as follows:-
New: from £2.20 to £19.35
Used: from £1.28 to £7.40
Collectible: Two copies currently available @ £2.80 and £5.99
Some items on Amazon are available for free delivery within the UK, but where this doesn't apply, a £1.26 charge should be added to the above figures.
Thanks for reading!
~~ Also published on Ciao under my CelticSoulSister user name ~~
Read the complete review |
