Reviews

Perhaps this resonated better in the 1960s, at which time this theme would have been cutting-edge. There is not much of a story here. There is a mystery (i.e. The unexplained darkness over the town), but this is not answered in any fashion, other than that the town is filled with hatred which is causing the darkness. (This hatred is seemingly by the white townsfolk against a white dude who killed a racist white dude. And then the killer apparently hated the racist he killed. So this hatred is all a bit odd.) If Sterling wants to say "hatred is bad," then so be it; but we can do that in 3 words, which don't really mean much. (People who hate often don't recognize their own hate, and don't easily change.) And what they describe as "hatred" is in fact meshed with other things such as ignorance and hunger for power; the broader issues the show addresses are not simply explained by hatred. And there was nothing new in the 60s about hatred or ignorance or evil or power-grabbers etc.; that had been occurring for thousands of years. As others here note, this is preachy, and just not much of a twist or ironic ending. It's interesting to watch, and fun to see the evil-Goober, but not getting too much out of this one....

The budget was apparently $4,500, and so perhaps the rating should be adjusted upward by 50%. But the problem in the movie is not special effects or poor scenery etc. The dialogue is simply unrealistic, the acting is poor, and parts of the script are too unrealistic. E.g. When the protagonists are tied up, they demand answers from their captor as if they have a right to them. When they must hide for 8 hours in a stranger's house, rather than sitting quietly, they chat about their past. A protagonist gets hungry and saunters off to the kitchen; ever thought of bringing a Snicker's bar? One protagonist cuts a swatch of cloth from the killer's shirt (rather than stabbing him) to later prove to him that he is a good guy; amazing foresight. The vengeful cop teams up with the known killer, who evades justice, to exact his revenge. The protagonist bonds with the murderous cross-dresser by donning a dress himself. Another would-be murderer unnecessarily brings cash to kill the victims. It's not just that the victims do a few dumb things here and there; these things are just unrealistic and weird. But, the basic plot had potential, and there is a big picture message here about the modern thrill-seeking, voyeuristic world.

This is loosely (but fairly accurately) based on a true story. The true story is of the horrific abuse of a girl by a deranged caregiver. The acting, dialogue and pace are fine. The real problem is simply that this is a bit too realistic, which is perhaps an odd comment to make about a true story. The scenes are rather stark and disturbing. There is evil in the world and horrible things occur, but there is not necessarily a benefit in showing every graphic detail. Some of the depravity in the movie seems to even go beyond the true story. I don't know that we need to see any of the following to grasp that this young girl suffered greatly, her mother was evil, and bad things occur: the beating of a disabled child; etching words into a person's skin; rape of a girl; and "female circumcision." Just a bit perplexed.

Echoing here many of the comments of others. The beginning of the movie is intriguing and suspenseful. The audience wants to know what is going on with the boy and the noises in the walls and what is going on with his parents. The acting and suspense is quite good. The movie drives over the cliff, however, in the ending. As with many movies these days, they don't seem to know how to end it. It seems that the sound in the wall is not in someone's imagination, and is not a demon, but is a real creature living in the walls. This creature was either born resembling a spider, or perhaps acquired spider skills from spiders in the walls; this is all not quite explained (other than a cryptic comment by the wall-girl that she learned from the spiders). She also has some sort of wacky powers (crawling on walls, apparently great speed and strength), which are not explained. She is locked behind a metal door, but there is no explanation as to why she can't break through a wall (at least one of which already has a hole in it). Ending just falls in to cliches of freaky images, jump scares, and gory killings. And a bit peculiar that the movie is called "cobweb" and yet the spidery aspect is supposed to be an unexpected twist, occurring right at the end; the word "cobweb" seems to have no connection to the movie other than the plot-twist at the ending; perhaps this is explained better in the book. It's watchable, just a big let down at the end unless you like the freaky spider-walk and jump scares and gore.

This movie is intriguing enough to watch. It keeps your attention. Somewhat of an action-adventure. The locals turn on some national guardsmen while training in the swampy back-woods. One problem is that the dialogue is very unrealistic. Most of the characters talk in this over-the-top, machismo mode. Everything they say is hyped-up. Then the characters repeatedly do stupid things. Its' like in the horror movies when the victims don't get away from the boogey-man or the stalker. They decide to take/use/steal some of the natives' boats to get down the river; I'm sure that's not in the manual. Then they pretend to shoot at these natives, which predictably draws the ire of the natives. The it's just one stupid thing after another, such as taking a local hostage (prisoner), burning down his house, and lots of in-fighting. And one scene in particular is just bizarre. At one point the trees in the swamp start falling on the soldiers. This really makes no sense. Did the locals know exactly where the guardsmen would be, and then come and cut those trees at the base? Or are these special trees which can be easily pushed over? Perhaps this went over better in 1981. It's OK, and watchable, but just a bit painful to get through thirty years later.

This pilot is intriguing and well-acted and directed etc. The major problem is that the plot is way too convoluted. It's almost as difficult to follow as a Bond movie, with twists and counter-twists. The first angel goes in under-cover, then her cover is blown (intentionally apparently) and a second angel goes in also under-cover to impersonate the same person impersonated by the first angel. Then the land at issue (mostly a swamp) has been sold to someone (go figure -- people buying swampy land); so somehow the Angels get onto that house to sell it to the bad guys within a day or so. Then the bad guys go to dig up the dead dude in the swamp which allows the angels to catch them. (Also a bit odd because all the angels know is that a dude has been dead in a swamp for years. There's not likely to be much of a body left after years in swamp water.) Then the angels are miraculously saved because Charlie has called some local dude to come out and help; lucky Charlie had his number and the guy was at home and he was willing to drive out to a swamp at midnight... Not really a bad pilot -- but just very complicated and not very realistic....

The most common theme of these reviews is that the movie is unrealistic, and that is right. The basic idea of the movie is interesting and it could have been a good movie. But the two main characters repeatedly do extremely stupid things. Anyone can make one or two bad decisions in a crisis, but to make 40 really bad decisions departs from any reality we know. The movie could have presented the basic theme that "good people can be pushed to do bad things," and could have been suspenseful, without having intelligent, normal people do dumb things; the two are not mutually exclusive. One example: he has just struck a; woman on roadway who presumably has life-threatening injuries, he calls 911 (GPS not working), then he puts her in his car; so far so good. But then rather than racing her to any nearby town (or to where he has GPS) he spends 30-60 minutes chasing this other girl. At first he says "you need to go to the hospital," but why? She was not injured, and she is running away. For both moral and legal reasons any normal person would leave her behind and race to the nearest town. As for the girl, at one point he says he'll take her to town if she simply agrees to say that his actions were in good faith; rather than accepting this offer and then reporting this to the police, she chooses to argue with him and fight, leading of course to avoidable and tragic consequences. And these are just two examples of many. (Note too that two girls in that area are going to be reported missing, and he was in that area and reported striking a woman in that area, and the police had his cell number (and address). So from his perspective, this would have been easily traced back to him. Their DNA would be all in his car, and the car itself is not consistent with striking a dog.) If we want to watch a movie about dumb people we can watch Dumb and Dumber and get entertained. I really wanted to stop watching this about 60% through, but I stuck it out in hopes that the ending would save it. But the last 40% was pretty much a waste too. The acting is OK and there is some suspense, but the basic plot self-destructs.

This movie is not bad. Basic plot and acting are fine. One extended scene is pretty darn good. But this movies does not seem to have a real plot, other than a very vague visit from space aliens. But as for a space-invasion movie, this was all done 50 years ago. The movie itself clearly references the old Twilight Zone; this would have been a very run-of-the-mill Twilight Zone episode (30 minutes). There are no special effects, no aliens, no spade-ships, no battles with aliens. The movie is more centered on the characters and their reactions to the situation. If this was meant to be a "throw back" to sci-fi stories from the 1960's, then it achieved that. But then again I'm not really sure who wants to watch a re-make of a Bonanza episode, or a My Favorite Martian show. The suspense is good; but I guess the problem is that there is no delivery on the back end. If the point of the movie is "aliens come to earth and take some humans," then we have already seen that better done many times (e.g. Close Encounters). A few devices in the plot seem a bit odd too. For example, that the telephone operator would be so fascinated by that sound is odd. She would just think it's a strange glitch. Certainly in that time period the switchboard technology would sometimes fail or produce static or strange noises. Then, the one guy calls into the radio station to say that he heard that same noise before; but again this noise is not really that distinctive; it's just like radio static and squeaking. But OK: But even then his story does not really make a strong link between that noise and aliens. Then, there is the lady who calls the station to give another story; her story is not related to that noise at all, but is simply a weird story about her son whom she things was abducted (by "people in the sky"--hmm); but this does not in any way tie into previous story, other than that the first caller vaguely suggested an alien-connection with the phone noise, and she has formed an alien theory. This is OK, and watchable, but it seems to be in a no-man's-land and has a somewhat peculiar story line.

Perhaps this movie caters to the Indian audience. But otherwise, it has major flaws. The acting is fine, and directing. But the plot is just odd, and not in a good way. The main character is portrayed as a cool guy, wildly popular at his school, basically a hero of some sort, but his behavior is inexplicable and reprehensible. He viciously assaults another soccer player (beyond a point of reasonableness), slaps his girlfriend, tells other guys to not date the girl to whom he is attracted (can we say "possessive," "controlling"), takes cocaine (while a medical student), refuses to apologize to his professor, gets preferential treatment for his girlfriend, moves her into his dorm room (entirely against the rules, which does cause problems), runs away from the next girl-friend when she says she loves him, seems to insist that his girlfriend leave her family, then continues to pursue the ex-girlfriend even after she is engaged and then married, and on and on. How can his relationship with the girlfriend be lauded? We should be pulling for her to be with anyone else, or even by herself. And what about the girlfriend who gets married and leaves her husband a few days later??? That's completely bizarre; couldn't she have figured that out before the marriage? Not really an understandable romance.