The Passion of the Christ

This is going to be difficult to do without getting preachy or arguing over which aspects of history are true.  Everyone already knows that historically speaking, Jesus of Nazareth actually existed.  He was born in 4-3 BC and lived until 30-33 AD at the time of his crucifixion.  Jesus was one of the most important historical figures ever to live.  Why?  Because of what he brought to the world: Compassion.  Forgiveness.  Love.  Not necessarily religion, but how we should treat ourselves and each other.  So, I'm not going to get into which aspects of his life are true or not.  I'll leave that for everyone else to decide.  There have been a number of movies based on Jesus Christ.  From the original King of Kings in 1927 to Son of God here in 2014.  But one of the most controversial films about the historical figure was released in 2004.  Directed by Mel Gibson, The Passion of the Christ was released to mixed reviews and controversy.

The film opens in the middle of a garden with Jesus(Jim Caviezel)praying to God for guidance, all the while his friends have dozed off and Satan(Rosalinda Celentano) is nearby trying to tempt Jesus.  Meanwhile, one of Jesus' flock, Judas, has betrayed him to the Jewish authority who eventually arrest him violently.  At this point, everybody knows what happens from here.  He gets brutally tortured and beaten almost to death by the Romans. 

This movie is violent.  VERY violent.  A lot of that violence happens when Jesus is being scourged and beaten with sticks.  It's very graphic, but it's also very powerful.  It's powerful, because even though the man is being put through the worst kind of pain, he doesn't lose his faith in God or his friends and family.  I think because of that, he was able to survive that for as long as he did, where the average person couldn't.  Throughout his punishment, you get to see the people who he's affected, both while being punished and through flashbacks, especially his mother, Mary(Maia Morgenstern).  This gives us a glimpse into his life as a simple carpenter before he becomes the teacher that he's known to be.

One of the things that's unique about this film is that all the dialogue in the movie is spoken in Aramaic, Latin, or Hebrew.  That would've amounted to quite a challenge for many of the actors including Jim Caviezel.  Speaking of Jim Caviezel, his performance is off the charts.  He's not over the top, but rather humble and soft-spoken.  His performance has been universally acclaimed, as one of the best portrayals of Jesus Christ.  Everyone else does a fantastic as well.  Mel Gibson really brought out the best in everyone involved.

I'm going to address some of the controversies surrounding the film.  Some critics have, unfairly, labeled The Passion of the Christ as anti-Semitic.  That has no basis in fact.  If you actually read the stories, Jesus was persecuted by the Sanhedrin, a Jewish judicial body, not all the Jews.  That's pretty much fact.  The other is the level of violence in the film.  As I said before, this really is a violent movie.  But Mel Gibson wanted to show how it all went down, and it really does no good to sugarcoat the brutality.  However, Mel Gibson later re-edited the film for a re-release to cut out some of the more extreme violence so that the film could be shown to a wider audience.

This movie packs an emotional wallop.  It really does.  Because of the performances involved, it really does help you get behind Jesus as a man and teacher, and his persecution and beatings are particularly difficult to watch.  This is NOT an entertaining movie, but rather, a glimpse into the final hours of his life.  I think even if you aren't a Christian or a believer of some sort, you can still get something out of the movie.  I'm not going to get into certain aspects of Jesus' life that don't make sense to me.  And I'm not necessarily a believer, but I'd rather focus on the positive messages he was trying to send the world, which these days seem to have gotten lost.  But that's a topic for a different day.  For now, I highly recommend that everyone watch The Passion of the Christ at least once.  It's a powerhouse of film held high with great performances and amazing direction by Mel Gibson.  This one gets a 10/10.

Noah

Over the past several decades we have seen many movies based on stories from the Bible.  Hence the term: Biblical Epic.  Movies like King of Kings, King David, Samson and Delilah, The Ten Commandments, and Mel Gibson's The Passion of the Christ.  In December of 2014, Exodus: Gods and Kings will be released to theaters, starring Christian Bale.  Earlier this year, one of the most famous stories of The Old Testament was released to theaters: Noah.  Directed by Darren Aronofsky, Noah is a thrilling and action-packed story with emotional impact.  This is not the Sunday School version of Noah's Ark.

The film opens on a young Noah, participating in a ritual that has his father passing to him the snakeskin from the serpent of the Garden of Eden, when they are interrupted by a young Tubal-cain wanting to turn the hill their sitting on into a mine.  Tubal-cain kills Noah's father and Noah runs off.  Years later, we see Noah(Russell Crowe)as an adult when he catches his son Ham taking a flower from the ground and Noah tells him to take only what they need and God will provide the rest.  Suddenly a single raindrop falls and a flower instantly grows in its place.  Noah see this and takes his family away.  After saving a scaly creature from a group of poachers, Noah returns home.  During the night, he has a horrible nightmare where he is submerged in water and there are human bodies all around.  When he wakes up, he takes his other son, Shem, with him to see Noah's grandfather, Methuselah(Anthony Hopkins).  Noah realizes that the vision he received was a warning from God, that the world would be destroyed by a massive flood because of mankind's wickedness, and Noah must build a vessel to save God's creatures.  Two of every species, to be exact.

Okay, so everybody knows the story of Noah's Ark and how it ends.  It is one of the most famous Biblical stories ever told.  Let's face it:  This is the Old Testament, so God was a bit of a dick.  Every time someone pissed Him off, he would kill them, in various and unpleasant ways.  Noah's flood?  He went kind of overboard with that one.  But it still makes for good reading.  Anyway, how is the film?  Excellent.  Visually, this movie is spectacular in so many ways.  One: Many of the exterior shots were filmed in Iceland.  If you ever want to make a dark, bleak and beautiful film, do it in Iceland.  The terrain there is astounding.  It's vast, it's bleak and it's some of the most unique and beautiful terrain in the world.  The visual effects are incredible as they are done by legendary Industrial Light and Magic.  They have created a world that is both stunning and terrifying at the same time.  Performance-wise?  Solid marks all across the board, with Russell Crowe taking the lead as Noah.  He really sells it as not just a man who wants to save what he can of Creation, but he has to hold on to his family as well and he's willing to kill people to uphold his duty to God.  Ray Winstone is the other stand-out as the king Tubal-cain.  This is a character who is willing to do whatever he can to get whatever he wants.  There's an interesting dynamic here between Noah and Tubal-cain.  Both are descendants of the children of Adam and Eve.  Noah: The descendant of Seth, the third child after Abel was murdered by Cain.  Tubal-Cain:The last descendent of Cain.  The reason I say there's an interesting dynamic, is that Tubal-cain wants to save his people, which seems reasonable, while Noah is more than willing to let millions of people, innocent or otherwise, die to save Creation.  So the question here is: Who actually is the real bad guy here?  Both have reasonable intentions, but their methods are very, VERY different.  Yeah, Tubal-cain isn't exactly a good guy, but he doesn't strike me as completely evil, despite his lineage.

How's the action?  It's pretty good.  Russell Crowe's character definitely means business, but the two big selling points of the film are the battle for the ark, which involves fallen angels encased in stone known as the Watchers, and Tubal-Cain's army.  That's pretty damned spectacular.  The other selling point is the Flood.  This is a story about Noah's Ark, so leaving out The Flood would've been.....unwise.  The folks at ILM have done an exceptional job here.  I will warn you, there is some disturbing stuff in here, especially when the flood hits.  I'm honestly surprised this movie managed to get away with a PG-13 rating given how graphic the violence is.  I mean, it gets brutal at times.  Remember when I said this isn't your Sunday School version of the story?  I meant it.  But it is absolutely thrilling to see all the animals arrive and board the ark, and seeing the Watchers take on Tubal-cain's horde.  It does kind of look like something out of The Hobbit, but these Watchers were in the Bible.  I would have to say, that this is a pretty faithful adaptation of the story.  While I'm pretty sure that the Bible left out the epic battles, I would have to say that the movie is pretty accurate.  With the incredible performances by Russell Crowe and company, this is a film that is both exciting and emotional.  It stays with you long after the credits roll.  The underlying themes of the original story which include obedience to God, mercy, justice, faith and redemption, really give this movie a very solid and satisfying emotional punch.

Are there any negatives?  Not really.  This film is about as solid as they come.  There's obvious controversies surrounding the fact that there seem to be too many white people in the movie given the story's timeline.  That's nitpicking at best.  Darren Aranofsky has crafted an incredible epic that I think will have a lasting impact on audiences.  If you see just ONE Biblical Epic movie this year, make it Noah.  I give this one a 9.5/10.  HIGHLY recommended.

See No Evil

Over the past several decades, we've seen professional wrestlers from WWF/WWE, WCW, and ECW try their hand at actually acting on the big screen.  Andre The Giant, Hulk Hogan, Jesse "The Body" Ventura, David Batista, John Cena, Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson among others.  The only one who as actually managed to successfully transition from pro wrestler to actor is Dwayne Johnson.  Batista's definitely had a few movies, but nothing terribly noteworthy as he doesn't have an eighth of the personality and charisma that The Rock has.  John Cena has just had one flop after another.  But Dwayne Johnson is a runaway success.  His movies aren't Oscar-worthy, and they shouldn't be.  But most of his action roles are immensely entertaining.  One of the most spectacular wrestlers in the sport was Kane, a nearly  7 foot behemoth that weighed over 300 pounds.  When it was announced that WWE Films' first motion picture was going to be a horror movie starring Kane, I could honestly see it happening.  The movie? See No Evil.

See No Evil opens as two cops investigate a run-down house, and find a female victim whose eyes have been ripped out.  Out of nowhere, a giant wielding an axe kills one cop and maims the other, before being shot in the head.  4 years later, the cop that lost an arm is now working at a local jail when a group of criminals are part of a work-release program.  They are taken to an old closed down hotel that is run by a seemingly nice old lady.  Later that night, the group of misfits escape their rooms and explore the hotel, not realizing that there is a deranged psychopath named Jacob Goodnight(Glenn "Kane" Jacobs)stalking them.

Okay, so a slasher movie doesn't really need a story other than to get to the next kill.  As far as horror movies go, See No Evil is kind of "middle of the road."  It's not a terrible slasher by any means of the imagination, it just doesn't really strive to do anything new.  We have a bunch of very unlikable people getting picked off one by one in particularly gruesome fashion, but because they come off very unlikable, it's hard to actually care what happens to these people.  For the most part, the acting is actually not that good.  I'm not expecting them to win any Oscars or anything, but it would certainly help if the actors put forward a little more effort.  Except when they're getting chased by Jacob.  Their reaction seems pretty genuine.  I mean, it would have to be if you're being chased by a 7-foot lunatic wielding a chain with a hook on it.  And that's one of the highlights of See No Evil: Kane as Jacob Goodnight.  Given Glenn Jacobs' personality in the WWE, it's not really that much of a stretch to have him play a gigantic psycho.  He's physically imposing and his facial expressions really make this guy a serious threat.  And yet at the same time, those same expressions also give the character a little bit of humanity, as the character has been manipulated his whole life by his psychotically religious mother, so that allows some sympathy for the character, which is not what I expected from Kane.

So, how are the kills?  Overall, not bad.  Jacob Goodnight has a particular fascination with the eyes, and I'll leave it at that.  It gets pretty bloody.  This is very gritty and violent movie as you would expect a slasher movie to be.  The visual effects are mostly practical, but there definitely some CG used here, particularly in the climax of the film.  Fact of the matter is, is that if it wasn't for Kane, this movie would've been tossed aside, and rightly so, as there are much better films in the genre.  The characters are unlikable and make stupid decisions, some of the CG is used too much and quite frankly, See No Evil is a very derivative film, that rips off much better movies.  It isn't bad for what it is, but for fans of the genre, you can do better.  On a side note, this film was released back in 2006, to mostly negative reviews, but it still managed to be popular enough to warrant a sequel, also starring Kane.  If you're a fan of Kane, like I am, this definitely worth a watch, otherwise, anything else will do.  See No Evil is sufficiently graphic enough to hold my attention, but it's just not what it could've been.  7.5/10.

Cowboys & Aliens

Westerns:  An absolute staple of cinema.  What does a Western involve?  Cowboys, Indians, horse chases, mostly within the environment of the Old West.  These are movies that starred some of the most prolific actors of their generation, namely: John Wayne, Clint Eastwood, Gary Cooper, Roy Rogers.  When you hear the word Western, those names are probably the ones that jump to mind.  Westerns have been a staple of cinema since cinema became a thing, decades ago.  Science Fiction is also a staple of cinema, also going back decades.  However, the genre really became popular during the 50s and 60s with movies like The Day The Earth Stood Still, Them!,  Tarantula, and The Fly(original).  Both genres have flourished and produced some of the most amazing movies like The Good, The Bad and The Ugly, High Plains Drifter, The Magnificent Seven, Star Wars, Alien, and The Terminator.  So what happens when you combine the two?

Cowboys & Aliens opens in the middle of a desert, when a strange man with no memory(Daniel Craig) wakes up with a strange device around his wrist and a strange wound on his torso.  After dispatching a group of bounty hunters, he makes his way to the sleepy mining town of Absolution.  He befriends the local preacher Meacham(Clancy Brown) who stitches him up.  The two are interrupted by Percy(Paul Dano) the trouble-making son of the local cattle baron, Woodrow Dolarhyde(Harrison Ford).  After seemingly putting Percy in his place, the two are arrested by Sheriff Taggart.  Before they are hauled away, the town comes under attack by mysterious objects, that end up abducting a number of people, including Percy, the wife of a local bartender and town doctor(Sam Rockwell).  The mysterious man with the strange metal bracelet, Jake Lonergan, discovers that the bracelet is actually a weapon, which he uses to shoot down one of the objects.  The creature piloting the strange vessel eventually escapes.  With the help of a mysterious woman, Elle(Olivia Wilde), and Dolarhyde, they ride off in search of the missing townspeople and the beings that took them.

The performances in this movie are pretty solid across the board, with Daniel Craig in the lead.  His introduction is awesome.  His character is tough, rugged and very much determined to recover his memory.  Daniel Craig is fantastic as he does most of his own stunts.  Paul Dano's character is a bit of a wimpy dirtbag, but Dano pulls that off perfectly.  The one real stand-out in this film is Harrison Ford.  He does a real good job playing a grizzled old cowboy.  Why Ford hadn't starred in more Westerns is beyond me, he's perfect for it.  He did play a cowboy in Star Wars, after all, Han Solo.  He was born to be in Westerns.  He basically steals the show whenever he's on the screen.  So, how's the rest of the movie?

This one is a mixed bag.  It seems like Cowboys & Aliens doesn't seem to know what kind of movie it wants to be.  Does it want to be a Western, or a sci-fi movie?   The problem is that when you hear a title like Cowboys & Aliens, you would at least expect the movie to be as outlandish as its title suggests.  Therein lies the problem.  It's not outlandish enough.  The concept is fantastic.  It should have worked.  One of the problems, is that it takes too long to get to the next action set-piece, and as a result, it feels longer than it is.  Even more so when you watch the extended edition on Blu-Ray.  The action that we do see is fantastic with incredible visual effects and awesome creature design.  The story is unique and Jake's backstory gets filled in along the way and we realize why he's such a good fighter.  Harrison Ford doesn't go over the top with his character, making him more realistic.  The other element that the movie surprises you with is the inclusion of Apache Indians, which adds a new angle to the movie.

This isn't a bad movie, far from it.  What it gets right, it does very well.  The visual effects are top-notch and the action is thrilling.  The opening twenty minutes feel like a real Western.  Daniel Craig and Harrison Ford feel like they belong in the genre.  This is more of a Western movie than a sci-fi movie, when it should've been equal parts.  When the aliens attack the town for the first time, you feel like, "Oh, yeah, it's going down!"  But after that, it slows down to deliver exposition.  I'm not opposed to that, but as I said before, it just takes too long to get to the action.  This is a surprisingly violent movie, especially the extended edition which is available only on blu-ray.  The extended edition is a lot bloodier, especially in the final battle of the film, but it also fleshes out some of the characters a bit more.  It's seventeen minutes longer than the theatrical version, which unfortunately means it takes longer to get to the action.  When I first saw the film, I thought it was awesome.  But it doesn't exactly hold up after repeated viewings.  It falls apart, at least the narrative does.  Olivie Wilde really doesn't do much than stand there and look pretty, not that I'm complaining.  Overall, this movie is a mixed bag.  If you're going in expecting a Western, it's not too shabby.  If you go in expecting a sci-fi movie, I don't think you'll be overly disappointed either.  If you go in expecting BOTH, it doesn't quite work.  It's also not nearly as outlandish as I was hoping it to be.  Overall, this is a 7.5/10 effort.  It could've been SO much more.

Why I Enjoy Horror Movies

I've had this question brewing in my head for years, and when I tell people that I like horror movies, they look at me like I'm some kind of nutcase........which is probably true.  I bring this up because I think it needs to be addressed.  Horror, particularly in film, has not really gotten the respect it fully deserves.  With all the garbage that's been released in the past 20 years, it's kind of easy to see why.  If you look at it from a fan's perspective, there's more crap out there than good stuff, and it's kind of depressing.  When you look at it from a non-fan's perspective, all you see is "tasteless torture and gorefests."  While that is certainly prevalent in the genre, that's not necessarily what it's about, not from my perspective, anyhow.  Film-making is an art form.  Horror movies definitely still qualify as art, but a lot of people refuse to see it.  I call horror movies art, because it takes a lot of effort to put something together that has an impact.  Art is supposed to have some kind of impact.  It's going to be different from person to person, but the idea remains that these films are supposed to make you feel something.  Saying horror movies aren't art the way romantic comedies are, is like saying Van Gogh's art isn't art like the way Escher's is.  Two vastly different styles, but still art, nonetheless.

I'm drawn to dark stuff.  Dark movies, dark stories, dark novels, and video games.  I'm drawn to darkness.  There is beauty in darkness.  Take H.R Giger's work for example.  His stuff is very dark, erotic, and bio-mechanical in nature.  It's very bizarre stuff.  It was Giger that designed the creature for the film, Alien: A movie that was hailed for being one of the scariest and intense sci-fi/horror films ever made.  The designs of the creature and the sets are unique.  It's definitely artistic.  Violent, but artistic.  I think you can say the same thing for most horror movies....well, the good ones, anyway.  And it's not just the sets or costumes.  You also have to figure in the writing and the effects as well.  The effects in particular can be very artistic in the way that they're designed.  I've had people tell me, "Oh, anybody can make gory, gross-out effects."  And make it look good?  No.  Yeah, anybody can throw ketchup on somebody and call it blood, but it takes an artist to really do something with it to make it stand out.  When horror movies decapitate or dismember people, it's the people behind the scenes that make it work.  Most of the time, anyway.  I've seen some really terrible effects, mostly because they use CGI, and that's the cheap way out.  The best horror flicks are the ones where they use mostly practical effects, i.e. dummies and prosthetics.  CGI has it's place and it can be used to enhance certain scenes in a subtle way.

Now, I mentioned horror movies as art, so I can really delve into why I, as a film goer, enjoy horror movies.  I appreciate art in most of its forms, particularly film.  Horror movies, in particular, is where art really comes into play.  I don't enjoy horror movies just on artistic license.  I enjoy horror movies, because of the thrill of the hunt.  A lot of the slasher movies, like Nightmare on Elm Street and Friday the 13th involve the main villain hunting down victims.  It's thrilling.  It's intense.  But I think a lot of people would agree that the hunt may only be as good as it's payoff, i.e, the kill.  If the payoff isn't worth it, then all that tension has been for nothing.  This is why I hate horror movies where the kill is usually off-screen.  You've invested time, money and personal interest in the hunt, only not to see the result?  Rip-off.  Some would say, that less is more, and there's an artistic expression for not showing everything.  In many cases including Alien and Jaws, that is true, but in the Jason and Freddy movies, it doesn't work that way.  People want to see the monster, and they want to see the monster and the kill.  There is creativity in how people dispatched on screen, and if we are not allowed to see it, it doesn't necessarily bode well for the rest of the film.  One kill off-screen?  I can see that.  All the kills off-screen?  PG-13 crap.  Not all horror movies have to be rated R.  Movies like Insidious are PG-13 and they are still pretty damned effective.  But the R-rating allows for not just necessarily more bloodshed, but it also really allows the film to have an edge that it otherwise wouldn't have.  Not only that, but the R-rating also limits the amount of money a studio has to make a movie, which forces the special effects crew to really come up with something unusual and creative.  Take John Carpenter's The Thing for example.  That was a low-budget movie and yet the effects still stand up today after 32 years.  That's because Rob Bottin was given a challenge to create some really gruesome effects for a certain amount of money and he delivered.  You couldn't do that in a PG-13 movie.  Not ever.  Even today, when PG-13 movies are really pushing the boundary of the rating, there is still a limit to what you can show on screen.  The R rating is both limiting and liberating at the same time.

I'm a moviegoer.  I love movies.  I love what film-makers try to bring to the screen.  I just happen to be skewed towards the dark side, as a lot of horror fans are.  We enjoy the hunt and the kill.  We enjoy the intensity of these movies.  But we also appreciate the effort that goes into creating these films.  You really can't knock the effort that special effects crews put into making some of the most grotesque effects you will ever see.  It's a craft: An art form, as I've said before.  Tom Savini, the KNB effects group and others are all artists and masters of their craft.  That's just something I appreciate.  I love how it all comes together on the screen, but I also really enjoy SEEING how it's made.  That's why I love the behind-the-scenes features.  They really show what these people go through to bring you some really gruesome kills.  The horror genre in film has been treated, generally, as the red-headed stepchild of cinema, and it boggles my mind.  Horror is just as legitimate a genre as comedy or drama.  It's just a little bloodier.  Horror fans, in general, are pretty well-adjusted people.....most of the time.  You have a couple of lunatics from time to time.  But there is kind of a psychological part of horror movies that really gets our juices going.  Appreciating a horror movies is almost like appreciating a Van Gogh painting, albeit it's a bit more violent and it moves.

All that being said, I can certainly understand why people don't like horror movies.  They can be frightening at times, gross at others, and generally uncomfortable for most people.  And to tell the truth, I don't watch a lot of new horror movie anymore, because they're shit.  A lot of them are sci-fi channel bad.  Except for Sharknado.  That movie is awesome.  Really bad, but awesome.  The quality of a good horror film lies not just with the visual effects team, but also the writers, the directors and actors.  If a horror movie is really good, then it will be remembered for being good.  It doesn't have to be original, but it does have to be good and have some real effort put into it.  So, those are my thoughts as to why I enjoy horror movies.

Wolf Creek

It's rare that a new horror movie will introduce a new kind of villain.  How could you expect it after the legendary Freddy Krueger, the notorious Jason Voorhees, the cannibalistic Leatherface or the demonic Pinhead?  In 2004, we got ourselves a new psycho: Mick Taylor, and he took the world by storm.  This is a guy that strikes you as a friendly Crocodile Dundee-type.  He comes off as incredibly friendly and helpful.  But that's just the mask he wears.  What he really is, is a monster in human skin.

Wolf Creek opens on three tourists: Two British gals, Liz Hunter(Cassandra Magrath), Kristy Earl(Kestie Morassi)and Australian Ben Mitchell(Nathan Phillips).  Three party-going tourists on their way across Australia to a party, and on the way they decide to stop at Wolfe Creek Crater.  After reaching the crater, the decide to leave, but their car has died, so they decide to spend the night.  During the night, they're visited by a local pig-hunter, Mick Taylor(John Jarratt), who offers to give them a tow back to his camp and fix up their vehicles.  At the camp, they have a good time with Mick before heading off to bed, which is when everything goes terribly wrong.

Wolf Creek is an interesting movie.  It comes across as a kind of Australian "Texas Chainsaw Massacre."  Like Chainsaw, Wolf Creek has a documentary kind of feel to it, because of the way it was filmed, so there's an obvious influence right there.  It was kind of an experimental movie of sorts, because it didn't follow the usual tropes that horror movies like Friday, Chainsaw Massacre, and Nightmare on Elm Street generally followed, and as a result, it was a different kind of horror flick.  So, the question is:  Is it any good?  Let's find out.  Generally speaking, the opening of a movie will generally tell you what kind of tone the rest of the film will take, and Wolf Creek doesn't start off the way your average horror movie would.  Nothing actually really happens for about 45 minutes.  We basically follow these three people as they make their way across the country as good tourists do.  This is what a lot of people have problems with, as the horror part of the movie doesn't kick in until an hour into the film.  When it does kick in to high gear, it hits hard.  This is a brutal movie.  Not overly gory, so it is restrained, but the implications of what Mick is doing to these people is monstrous.  The last half-hour of the film is absolutely intense.

The performances?  Overall, pretty good.  The gals playing the British girls do a convincing job, while Nathan Phillips is.....not bad.  John Jarratt however, steals the whole show.  He makes Mick Taylor come across a kind of a cool guy and fun to be around, but when he turns, he's terrifying.  Jarratt's performance as Mick Taylor, basically put him on the map.  He really gets into it.  He portrays one of the most vile and yet compelling villains in decades.  And that's really what sells the movie.  When I said this movie wasn't really gory,  I meant it, I mean you really don't see intestines spilled and brains splattered all over the place, but what is there, is very unsettling.  In fact, the scene that I think really drove people crazy, was the "head-on-a-stick" scene.  That's pretty gruesome.  The film's score is appropriate is it's mostly string-based instruments and really adds to the sense of dread throughout the film.

Are there downsides?  A lot of people thought that it took too long to get the "good stuff."  I certainly understand that, but I also appreciate the risk that the filmmakers took in NOT going full-bore into the mayhem.  The restraint, I feel makes Wolf Creek a better movie, actually.  If people were expecting a splatter-fest bloodbath, you're not really going to find it here.  I meant it when I said it was restrained.  It's obvious what Mick Taylor's been doing to people, but you never see it happen, until the end of the movie, and the violence is NEVER over-the-top.  The other thing I noticed, was that, like the sequel, Wolf Creek claims to be based on actual events.  However, it doesn't specify which events those are, as it's clearly influenced by more than one crime:  The Backpacker murders by Ivan Milat, and the abduction of Peter Falconio and his girlfriend by Bradley John Murdoch.  This is generally the problem I have with movies that claim to be based on true crimes or events, when in actuality, they are based on MULTIPLE events, so there really is no single event that we can tie movies like Texas Chainsaw Massacre to.

Aside from that, this a very solid horror flick.  Good performances across the board, with John Jarratt stealing each and every scene that he's in.  The final part of the movie is extremely intense and brutal.  Issues: Pacing, and the legitimacy of it's true-crime roots seems...awkward.  Before I forget, I reviewed the sequel, which is an entirely different beast of a movie.  I think overall, the second movie is better in some regards, especially in terms of pacing.  But I feel that the first Wolf Creek is the better movie overall, because it really gets under your skin.  With a knife.  9.5/10.  Oh, and for the curious: The information about the actual crimes I mentioned above can be found on Wikipedia.

Wolf Creek 2

Sometimes the best reason to watch certain films is because of the villain: Friday The 13th, Nightmare on Elm Street, Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Hellraiser and Predator just to name a few.  Why?  Because the villain is often extraordinarily memorable and entertaining.  They often leave an indelible mark on cinema and on the audience.  It's a really spectacular thing to see the bad guy do his thing.  It's often gory and unforgettable.  In 2005, an Australian director by the name of Greg Mclean released Wolf Creek onto unsuspecting audiences.  While the film garnered mixed reviews, it was generally well received.  It was a bit of a slow-burner until towards the end of the film.  But the one thing that everybody seems to agree on, was that the villain was nothing short of amazing.  Mick Taylor, played by Australian actor John Jarratt, became one of the most notorious on-screen villains to date.  The film was also loosely based on actual events that involved the murder of backpackers during the 90s.

Wolf Creek 2 opens as Mick Taylor is pulled over by the police and wrongly accused of going over the speed limit.  Mick Taylor, being who he is, doesn't take to this kindly, decides to go after the cops and kills them in spectacular fashion.  The film cuts to a couple of German tourists who intended on visiting the Wolf Creek Crater.  After trying to hitch a ride back to civilization, they decide to spend the night in the wilderness.  Mick Taylor sees their campfire and decides to visit the two.  One of the tourists inadvertently offends Taylor and pays for it with his life.  The woman is sexually assaulted(off-screen)but escapes while Taylor cuts up what's left of her boyfriend.  She ends up being rescued by an English tourist, Paul(Ryan Corr).  Mick Taylor finds them and chases them across the Australian Outback.

Sometimes the way a movie opens will determine how the rest of the movie will flow.  The original film started out slow and allowed everything to come to a boil towards the end, and then: BAM!!  It all hits the fan.  Wolf Creek 2 takes a very different approach.  A lot of complaints about the first movie was that it started off too slow and took forever to get to the good stuff.  This movie starts off with a bang, when Mick Taylor murders the two police officers, who honestly have it coming.   The tone of this movie is a bit different.  Instead of a methodical slow-burner, what we have here is an action-packed, blood-soaked high speed thriller that improves on the original film in many ways.  This is Mick Taylor's movie through and through.  It's really centered around him.  While he is still a scumbag, he's one that you end up rooting for, which can be the mark of a great villain.  Not always, but sometimes.  His motivations for doing what he does are a little bit more explained, but not by a whole lot, we do know that he feels that foreign tourists are trespassing on Australia, thinking that they own everything, and he hates them for it.  But it's still not really clear how he gets to that point, at least not in the films, as there are at least two books that explain some of Mick's backstory, and why he's the lunatic that he is.

As I said before, this is Mick Taylor's movie through and through, and John Jarratt once again, delivers an astounding performance of a man that you can actually be drinking buddies with and turn into a monster at the drop of a hat.  The character also has a very dark and twisted sense of humor that just permeates the whole movie.  It's often creepy and yet funny at the same time.  I don't think anybody else could have pulled it off the way Jarratt did.  The other characters in the movie?  Cannon fodder, that's all.  So, how about the gore and the action?  Top-notch.  This is a very gory movie, as evidenced when one of the cops' heads basically explodes at the beginning of the movie.  And the gore is practical, not CGI, which is awesome.  This is a movie that has also been influenced by movies such as Duel, which means: Car chases.  And they are thrilling.  There's even a goofy bit in which Taylor chases Paul in an 18-wheeler through a herd of kangaroos.  Yes, I said kangaroos.  That was the only time I noticed that CGI was used.  Taylor even chases Paul on horseback.  So, yeah, the movie is a thrill-ride from beginning to end.

If there is one complaint I have about this movie, is that like the film before, it claims to be based on true events, and while that may be the case, it just feels that the whole "based on true events" tagline is used like a cliche.  Wolf Creek wasn't the first movie to use this.  A lot of movies, horror and otherwise, have used this as a selling point, and I just don't think it's really necessary.  Is Wolf Creek 2 over the top?  Yes.  Yes it is, and that's part of why it's so damned fun.  I think some people are going to assume that this comes across as an action movie, it really isn't.  It's definitely a horror movie through and through, the pacing is just different than the previous movie and I think that works to film's benefit.  Greg Mclean has definitely crafted an incredible villain and John Jarratt's performance is out of this world.  I know people had problems with the first movie, but I loved it and I loved this one.  Will there be a third movie?  I honestly believe that there will be.  And I hope so.  Overall, I give Wolf Creek 2 an enthusiastic 9/10.  Recommended.