Sunday, November 6, 2011

After 'Blair Witch': Seventh Moon

Eduardo, do you never change?  This film is Sanchez's third film and...is pretty much his first film.  It should be called The Blair Witch Project, But... instead of this.  It's The Blair Witch Project, but it's in China.  It's The Blair Witch Project, but it's focusing on only two people.  It's The Blair Witch Project, but it's got a fairly-famous star in it, thus killing the potential realism of it.  It's The Blair Witch Project, but there's no excuse for the terrible camerawork this time.  You see, there's no conceit that the movie is being filmed by the actors- thank God.  No, it's just shitty, in-your-face camerawork for no good reason.  Imagine if Godzilla was shot like Cloverfield, essentially.  The movie has a kind of neat premise, if you can get past the execution.  To see what that is, read on...
Our heroes are a young, married couple who are spending their honeymoon in China.  Who needs an introduction when we can get awkward, shaky cam of them in the city?
As they are getting a taxi back to their Hotel that night, something goes awry.  By the way, normal films can shoot inside of cars without nearly rubbing the lens on the actors' faces- I'm just saying!
While on the drive, some strange, pale thing runs in front of the car.  World's worst streaker or one of the film's monsters- you decide!
Uh oh, all is not well.  After wandering for a bit- when the driver abandons them- our heroes find this wounded man.  What did this to him?  I wonder.
I hope you don't like seeing the action, because this film is in love with 'natural lighting.'  Translation- no lighting.  Joy.
Who are the weird, white creatures?  Why are they loose during this Moon?  Will our heroes escape?  If you want to know, see the movie...if you still care to.  The End.
Hold the damn camera straight and turn on a bloody light!  The plot of this movie is alright.  Essentially, two people get forced into a dangerous situation, wander around and react to danger.  There's nothing new here.  They spice the blandness up with the Chinese setting and folklore surrounding what amount to zombies/cannibals/crazed killers, etc.  Other than that, you've seen this movie.  Speaking of 'seeing this movie before,' this movie, as stated above, is a Blair Witch knock-off.  It's by one of the two Directors- the other of whom would rip it off the following year- but it still counts.  It's the equivalent of Rumplestiltskin, a film by the Writer/Director of Leprechaun.  It's almost worse when you do this!  I didn't want to hate this movie, but I have no choice.  It's really hard to follow, the characters are either dull or unlikable and the whole thing is just disorienting.  If this movie was not shot like Blair Witch and was a bit more competent, I might have given it more of a chance.  Try again, Eduardo!  Take us away, combination of no lighting and super-close-up...
Next up, a week of infamously-bad movies (as opposed to my normal stuff).  First up, the film that pissed off an entire generation of Nintendo fans.  Stay tuned...

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