Director: Louisa Warren
Year: 2023
Country: United Kingdom
Alternate Titles: N/A
Genre: Creature Feature
Plot:
Trying to study local wildlife, a scientist and her friends head to a small town in the woods that’s gripped in the fever of a series of discoveries regarding a legendary lizard man that prowls the woods, and when they encounter the beast while on their trip must find a way to get out alive.
Review:
For the most part, this was a rather fun if still slightly flawed genre effort. One of the better elements with this one comes from the immensely likable setup that allows the appropriately closed-in community to exist in the range of this mysterious cryptid in their midst. The whole setup here, featuring the family being attacked on the road and sparking the mystery that the town has become obsessed with despite the local officials’ claim that nothing has been definitively proven to exist there, creates a wholly believable small-town urban legend that would exist in such a place. That level of realism, aided by the conflicting news reports, talking head segments, and podcast clips, tries to paint the picture of something living in the woods but getting shot down by cover-up speak that downplays the monstrous nature of the culprit involved in the genuine tragedy. When she tries to get involved by heading out to study the local wildlife and stumbles upon the existence of the genuine creature, the overall setup to this one comes off rather nicely.
With this in place, the second half of this becomes immensely fun as that’s where all the creature attacks come from. After the initial encounter at the beginning, where it attacks the family and forces him into hiding to get away, this one makes it until the second half, where the group is out camping in the woods before the next encounter, as it starts to stalk them one by one through the woods. The first few setpieces, showcasing the creature lurking in the shadows, trying to sneak attack them while they’re off by themselves or sitting alone in their tents when the creature appears and attacks them, provide this with the kind of solid action that leads into the race to capture it in the woods. While all of this is fun enough and has a lot to like, there’s a distinct lack of action present here, with the first hour focusing on getting them to the campground without much in the way of creature appearances, which makes waiting around for the creature problematic.
That leads to the more pressing and obvious issue here with the overlong running time, which feels rather challenging to get through it all. The idea of going in depth with the history of the encounters and backstory of the town with the creature serves this one well enough, but there’s way too much excessive elements here that just drag the film out longer than it needs to be, starting with the utterly unfunny friend who keeps thinking he’s a ladies’ man or comedian so everything he says is some lame come-on or a comment on the situation, making for a really difficult time to want him to be around them. There’s plenty of difficulty in trying to figure out why he’s with the friend group with the way he complains, and a lot of the scenes with him making fun of the locals or trying to start something up with the friends as a result tend to plod along. Other scenes, from the locals trying to get revenge for a slight misdemeanor or the encounter with the hunter spelling out the full history of the creature around the town, creating a longer running time than it should and holding this one back overall.
Overview: ***/5
A likable enough but somewhat flawed creature feature, there’s plenty of fun aspects to be had with this one that make it worthwhile enough to overcome the few flaws present which are present. Those with an interest in this style or who appreciate the style attempted here will have plenty to like, while most others out there should heed caution.
Comments
Post a Comment