Skinwalkers (2007)
Review by Noel
Look at the DVD cover of Skinwalkers right now…because unfortunately it’s the scariest part of the movie. Look at it, a female werewolf with her fangs bared holds so much promise for the rest of the movie…
Yet as soon as you press “Play” all those potential scares and any audience goodwill leaks out like air from tire.
Sigh. Walk away. Walk far away from Skinwalkers. I’m sure there’s some homeless shelter you can volunteer at for the holidays or watch The Mist again…just don’t waste your life watching this…
I suppose I need to write what this is about. Sigh again…
Skinwalkers (aka werewolves) have two warring factions: those that love the werewolf hunger to feed and kill anything in their path…and those that don’t. But there’s a very special boy that can end the Skinwalker curse…or keep it going forever if he is killed by the time of the Red Blood Moon.
Who knows what kind of destruction will ensue if the bad Skinwalkers (those that want to remain werewolves forever) kill the boy? Who cares? I’m sure there are many other things you could be doing with the 90 minutes you’d spend watching this.
What Works About Skinwalkers:
1.) The Skinwalker woman (Natassia Malthe) who spends most of the movie in a leather bikini top…and the other portion of it in a nurse’s outfit.
I’ll be honest, it took me 5 full minutes to think that up as I agonizing played the entire movie in my head again TRYING to find something positive.
2.) Granny sure knows how handle a gun.
3.) A Skinwalker assault on a bar which doesn’t quite go on long enough but shows all the gore a PG-13 movie will allow…which is to say none at all.
4.) A Native American driver that dispenses kindly advice and all necessary exposition.
What doesn’t work:
1.) Jason Behr- he gets top billing and plays a bad Skinwalker named Varek. He looks like a cross between Guy Pearce and Johnny Depp…yet with none of their acting ability or onscreen presence. As much as I pick on Josh Hartnett…he’s freakin’ Olivier compared to this (soon-to-be-out-of-work) actor.
2.) Rhona Mitra taking her cues from the Faye Dunaway school of overacting.
3.) Director Jim Isaac stages a gunfight sequence in an empty street so poorly directed and incoherently cut that you’re almost glad it’s so confusing. It’s one of those gunfights where everybody holds their guns in both hands shooting in two different directions…yet all their shots miss by 10 feet.
4.) Lyriq Bent- You’ll remember that name because he was the obsessed cop in Saw IV. He has a small part in this movie. Now I know to stay the fuck away from any movie this guy is in.
5.) You think I’m kidding, but really, the DVD cover art is the scariest part of this movie…
I will say, that the only suspense generated for me came after this movie ended, because I really couldn’t decide whether Skinwalkers was worse than last January’s other stupid werewolf movie Blood and Chocolate.
But don’t watch Skinwalkers…so you don’t have to make that choice.
If you care, it’s available from Amazon
Popularity: 3% [?]
[ ‹‹ Blood Car (2007) Comic Book Review: Monster by Naoki Urasawa ›› ]
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