Screamers: The Hunting
What's it about?
Sequel to the 1996 sci-fi thriller "Screamers". A distress signal from the mining planet Sirius 6-B brings a ship-load of rescuers to search for survivors some thirteen years after the events of the first movie.
Who would I recognise in it?
Lance Henriksen, and a bunch of people you probably won't recognise from the odd flick you might have seen.
Great/Good/Alright/Shite?
While the first movie wasn't perfect by any means, it had a robust script, a solid premise, and good actors (led by Peter Weller) ... the sequel has none of these things. The original didn't have a massive budget, but it really looked far more expensive than it was - The Hunting (generic enough sub-title for you?) on the other hand, just looks cheap. Really cheap. Despite a handful of grand CGI shots (such as the factory where the screamers originate) and some nice touches in the production design (some spiffing hand-held computer devices), the rest of the movie really feels cheap-as-chips, and this most definitely extends - in abundance - to the, frankly, atrocious script.
Incredibly, Screamers: The Hunting was written by the co-writer of the first movie (the other writer being Dan O'Bannon, he of Alien, and Return of the Living Dead fame) ... goodness knows what happened then, because the script for this sequel is lazy and generic - endlessly so. The characters are weakly drawn, and if they have any motivations at all, they're as done-to-death as the dialogue (which often repeats itself ad-nauseum), and idiotic as the plot. A ham-fisted 'ticking clock' device just makes the rescue team look even more moronic than they initially appear - they seemingly have so little time, yet they're forever bunking off work early to catch yet another nap. Furthermore, if the killing of the only black man on the team right up front wasn't a deliberate piss-take of a genre-convention, then deary me. Deary me indeed.
Click "READ MORE" below to continue reading about just how awful this garbage is...
Showing posts with label hunting. Show all posts
Showing posts with label hunting. Show all posts
Monday, 17 September 2012
Saturday, 21 August 2010
Pentuple Bill Mini Musings: August 2010...
Westworld:
I'd only seen this once before - when I was about 12 - and while it has aged, horribly so at times, it's still an interesting concept. I couldn't help but think as I watched it "I wonder what a modern day remake of this would be like" as there's a lot of ideas that could be wrestled with in an even more in depth manner, with modern techniques, that are somewhat skimmed over or technically limited in the original movie.
The third act is a bit weak, it doesn't strive to fully investigate the subject matter, and it hasn't aged spectacularly well, but I still dig it for what it's worth. However, an intelligent remake that delivered heavily on the ideas as much as technically impressive action, would be something worthwhile. I guess we'll possibly find out in 2012.
Good Will Hunting:
It's another one of those movies where you don't see it until years later (13 years later in this instance), but you're all-too-aware of the numerous parodies and famous lines ("How do you like them apples?"). It was on TV the other day and I figured why not? The script is impressively researched, the 'Boston feel' is convincing, and the characters are interesting and complex ... no wonder it got so much praise.
Final Destination 3:
The first movie was quite good and memorable to boot, even if it did come out in the wake of Scream when horror had become a bit of a smart arse instead of a convincing genre. The second movie upped the ante on deliciously intricate death sequences, and that's really what the whole series is about. However in 2006 when 'Final Destination ... on a roller coaster' presented itself I wasn't interested, but four years later here we are. The deaths aren't intricate or as inventive as the previous movies, and the ending makes you wonder "was there any point in bothering?" but it has some moments.
The fourth movie is on Sky Movies soon so I'll check that out, but I'm not holding out much hope for the franchise now, especially with the abysmal titling of the fifth movie - "5inal Destination" ... so, what, "Five-in-al Destination"? Hmmm...
Revenge of the Nerds:
Old school 80s comedy - with Ted McGinley (who I know from Married With Children) and James Cromwell in it no less. Relatively tame and slow paced by today's standards, and not especially 'jam-packed' with ideas, it does speak of its time and no doubt if I was of the right age when it was new I would have absolutely loved it, but I'm just a bit too young to really see the attraction in this movie - not that I particularly disliked it, I was just a decade late to the party.
Still, I now 'get' the references to it in shows such as Family Guy and Robot Chicken.
Colin:
Much has been made of this being "the £45 zombie film" ... perhaps, but with an awful lot of favours, people, contacts and free work thrown into the mix. It could do with being about 20 minutes shorter and a little more focused and organised in its plotting, but overall I was quite impressed by it.
The film is, it has to be said, let down by the visual presentation - but then again that was part of the charm of it that so enraptured the slow-to-pay-attention mainstream media - but its real strength comes in numerous scenes that are well observed and/or pack an emotional punch. There is a subtlety to the film in the way big emotional situations are played out with little-or-no dialogue and instead with merely looks, careful framing, and an eye for explosive detail - the little visual cues that convey an essay's worth in a moment.
Certain sequences go on too long (such as a battle in a house with a hoard of the undead, and the dangers of someone's cellar), and the camerawork can be annoyingly shaky and dark at times ... but for every niggle or slight downside, there's a fantastic little idea thrown into the mix.
Working well with its low budget station, the zombie apocalypse playing out frequently as nothing but gunshots in the distance and a few newspaper headlines is a great way to sell a lot with very little. The film's full of these things and that makes it stand out. It's a great indie zombie flick, which really takes the subject matter seriously and deals with it in a mostly subtle manner - and what's more, on a few occasions it successfully struck an emotional wallop.
In a way it's a shame that so much attention has been given to the "£45" angle - although I can fully understand it, and condone it, as a marketing and attention-acquiring gimmick - but it does hide the real quality going on beneath the very low budget outer shell. It'll be interesting and exciting, to say the least, to see what the Director can do with a bit of money at his disposal.
I'd only seen this once before - when I was about 12 - and while it has aged, horribly so at times, it's still an interesting concept. I couldn't help but think as I watched it "I wonder what a modern day remake of this would be like" as there's a lot of ideas that could be wrestled with in an even more in depth manner, with modern techniques, that are somewhat skimmed over or technically limited in the original movie.
The third act is a bit weak, it doesn't strive to fully investigate the subject matter, and it hasn't aged spectacularly well, but I still dig it for what it's worth. However, an intelligent remake that delivered heavily on the ideas as much as technically impressive action, would be something worthwhile. I guess we'll possibly find out in 2012.
Good Will Hunting:
It's another one of those movies where you don't see it until years later (13 years later in this instance), but you're all-too-aware of the numerous parodies and famous lines ("How do you like them apples?"). It was on TV the other day and I figured why not? The script is impressively researched, the 'Boston feel' is convincing, and the characters are interesting and complex ... no wonder it got so much praise.
Final Destination 3:
The first movie was quite good and memorable to boot, even if it did come out in the wake of Scream when horror had become a bit of a smart arse instead of a convincing genre. The second movie upped the ante on deliciously intricate death sequences, and that's really what the whole series is about. However in 2006 when 'Final Destination ... on a roller coaster' presented itself I wasn't interested, but four years later here we are. The deaths aren't intricate or as inventive as the previous movies, and the ending makes you wonder "was there any point in bothering?" but it has some moments.
The fourth movie is on Sky Movies soon so I'll check that out, but I'm not holding out much hope for the franchise now, especially with the abysmal titling of the fifth movie - "5inal Destination" ... so, what, "Five-in-al Destination"? Hmmm...
Revenge of the Nerds:
Old school 80s comedy - with Ted McGinley (who I know from Married With Children) and James Cromwell in it no less. Relatively tame and slow paced by today's standards, and not especially 'jam-packed' with ideas, it does speak of its time and no doubt if I was of the right age when it was new I would have absolutely loved it, but I'm just a bit too young to really see the attraction in this movie - not that I particularly disliked it, I was just a decade late to the party.
Still, I now 'get' the references to it in shows such as Family Guy and Robot Chicken.
Colin:
Much has been made of this being "the £45 zombie film" ... perhaps, but with an awful lot of favours, people, contacts and free work thrown into the mix. It could do with being about 20 minutes shorter and a little more focused and organised in its plotting, but overall I was quite impressed by it.
The film is, it has to be said, let down by the visual presentation - but then again that was part of the charm of it that so enraptured the slow-to-pay-attention mainstream media - but its real strength comes in numerous scenes that are well observed and/or pack an emotional punch. There is a subtlety to the film in the way big emotional situations are played out with little-or-no dialogue and instead with merely looks, careful framing, and an eye for explosive detail - the little visual cues that convey an essay's worth in a moment.
Certain sequences go on too long (such as a battle in a house with a hoard of the undead, and the dangers of someone's cellar), and the camerawork can be annoyingly shaky and dark at times ... but for every niggle or slight downside, there's a fantastic little idea thrown into the mix.
Working well with its low budget station, the zombie apocalypse playing out frequently as nothing but gunshots in the distance and a few newspaper headlines is a great way to sell a lot with very little. The film's full of these things and that makes it stand out. It's a great indie zombie flick, which really takes the subject matter seriously and deals with it in a mostly subtle manner - and what's more, on a few occasions it successfully struck an emotional wallop.
In a way it's a shame that so much attention has been given to the "£45" angle - although I can fully understand it, and condone it, as a marketing and attention-acquiring gimmick - but it does hide the real quality going on beneath the very low budget outer shell. It'll be interesting and exciting, to say the least, to see what the Director can do with a bit of money at his disposal.
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