Thanatopsis123 said:
Well it hardly even felt like a horror movie to me. It had no fucking plot and begged more questions than it had answers for. Both of which would have been fine if it had been scary enough but it wasn't. I loved the idea of having a claustrophobic feeling and for me probably would have been scary enough by itself but it's like they completely abandoned any attempt that conveying that after the scene when they initially got trapped.
They revealed the creatures too fast and too fully. It quickly became a lame action flick with the blonde chick being fucking Conan (covered in blood, bashing them with large bones) and the other suddenly turning into Stalone from Cliffhanger (throwing that climbing axe into the creatures back). What was with the lame action movie-esque posing too?
It was also WAY to easy to figure out who was going to survive. As soon as they had that boat scene at the start I knew it was going to come down to the two chicks that were fucking the same dude and it would end in a confrontation between the two with the blonde winning.
Also, scenes like them getting across that long drop were just to long because they were not suspenseful as was obviously intended.
You know, I couldn't possibly disagree with you any more. What do you mean by 'it had no fucking plot'? What more could you possibly need than what was offered? The movie was claustrophobic and intense throughout - the sparse (but imaginative) use of lighting throughout the film ensured that - or do you need entire scenes with people actually pressed under rocks to convey claustrophobia?
The creatures weren't revealed at all until about halfway through the movie, would you prefer they just did a fifteen-second cameo before the end credits or something? If the women hadn't started standing up for themselves and fighting back, it would have gone against the previous character development setting them up as a group independant, capable thrill-seekers, not to mention plunged the movie into a version of the lame 'dumb screaming blondes picked off one by one until strong male lead rescues them' horror flicks that this was a deliberate reaction against.
I mean, fair enough, different opinions are a good and healthy thing, but it sounds to me like you went in expecting something like fucking Friday The 13th and got pissed off by a film that essentially combines the 'suburbanites fucked up by the wild' movies like Deliverance with the raw claustrophobia of the first Alien movie.
Whatever though - currently watching The Killer on DVD with Bey Logan's commentary - the dude is a living Asian cinema encyclopedia, and his commentaries are always enthusiastic and revealing.
Also - yep, seen Wolf Creek - very good movie, the 'head on a stick' moment is particularly memorable.
It's not that hard to understand.
