[Film] Wolf Creek

[katmeow]

So, seeing as it hasn't been released o/s yet, I thought I'd start a thread in here rather than Film & TV.

Went and saw Wolf Creek tonight. I'd read several reviews ranging from a 'best horror film in ages' to 'I walked out because of the sadistic violence'. Anyway, I tried to put all of that aside and judge impartially, but to be honest, I can't say I'm that impressed.

The dialogue at the beginning felt sort of amateurish, the conversation between the three characters seemed stilted and unnatural. One thing I will give the film marks for was the cinematography - the outback scenes looked awesome and really contributed to the sense of isolation. But overall, the first half really dragged on a bit.

John Jarrat was creepy as hell, but in terms of being a horror film - I think there is so much more you can do in terms of suspense than what this film displayed. I didn't really have any edge of the seat/nail biting moments.

As for the violence, yes it was graphic, but I didn't find it any more shocking than some of the other slasher flicks I've seen. Maybe I've become a bit desensitised, but it didn't impact me that much. From the reviews I thought the violence was going to be constant throughout the film. I'm a bit torn between whether I think it was necessary for the story, or whether the film could have been more suspenseful without it. Some of the scariest films I've ever seen actually contain very little blood and gore.

Even though it was based on true events, I found the plot a little farfetched at times and it just ended really suddenly. I didn't walk away feeling particularly entertained, frightened or disgusted... it was a bit of a non-event really.


I give it 2/5 - I was really expecting more...

Anyone else seen it yet?

 

[breakyaself]

I also saw it tonight ! Lucky I had a sexy boy to bite when things got too gruesome !

Anyway, I thought the film was brilliant. I have heard such bad things about it. Some people have talked about certain aspects of the violence, for example it being unnecessary, and waaayyy too gruesome. I have also heard many people walking out and some critics saying that it didnt have a statement and no storyline.

WELL DUH !

The film was not meant to have a statement. It was pure entertainment, and I believe that any stronger 'storyline' would have destroyed the films stronger points. Its violence was not over the top, yet it was disturbing, because as someone else pointed out in another thread, it conveyed what a serial killer might actually act like. And quite frankly it is disturbing to know that there are individuals out there that act like that. To be so personal with him and see how he manipulated and then mangled those people is really confronting, and disturbing. Because of this I can understand that some people wont appreciate its pleasurable highly artistic and entertaining cinematic value.

And Kat I TOTALLY disagree with you about the first half of the movie. I thought it completely necessary and perfectly timed. The acting was superb, and I really connected with the characters, which was the point in the length of the first half. I remembered similar conversations and situations those tourist had been in and laughed like most of the rest of audience did at a lot of points, because the content resonated with me, more than once! especially the kiss. God that was just perfect, and was not overplayed as a storyline.

This is the best Australian film ever produced.

It is nothing more than a piece of entertainment, yet, it is still a beautiful piece of art.

4.5/5 (losing half a point for expected gore factor not measuring up !)

 

[silvia saint]

i haven't seen it yet, and it's giving me an excuse to leave the house, but i doubt i'll end up saying it's the best australian film, that's a toss up between 'mad max' and 'picnic at hanging rock' for me. i am however pleased to see what appears to be an unpretentious low budget australian film doing so well at the box office in the uk, hopefully the same will happen in the usa when it is released there early next year.

it is what it is, a genre film, and from the sound of things it does what it sets out to do. from the previews i've seen, john jarratt is all too convincing as the killer. check out haute tension (high tension) if you like the hardcore factor that is lacking in horror films of late.

 

[zephyr]

I saw it and was horrified...I had to leave half way through. I didnt know what it was about before I went in so it was a real shock to the system. I think this film went too far. The half of the film I did actually stay in the cinema for I spent hiding under my jacket but I could still hear the screams.

I wasnt the only scaredy cat, about 5 other people practically RAN out when I did.

I th film was well scripted and well acted for sure. It will win awards. It was still unwatchable. I do NOT recommend this film, even on dvd.


BTW- this should be moved to Film and Television, which is an international forum so who cares if its not out in the States yet.

 

[swifty]

I'm with you on this one Kat, I thought it was the biggest bag of puss out. The character development was fucken terrible (can't even remember the names of the characters), there was so many cliche aspects of this escape, get caught again, escape, get caught again, and well the graphic violence, pffft, didn't really see any, and I've heard this compared to the remake of Texas Chainsaw Massacre.

I was totally disappointed, thankfully I was given free tix from Triple J so I don't feel ripped off in anyway, but if I'd paid for this I'da been even more pissed about it. As far as horror movies got, it was a little soft in the middle....

 

[hoptis]

I thought it was okay. Saw it on Saturday night.

Being a child of the Internet, I've become completely desensitised to film violence so I didn't find the gore even the slightest bit disturbing.

SPOILER WARNING

I had little sympathy for the characters after they managed to disable the killer and not finish him off. I would have stayed around and taken however much time it would have required to slowly hack his head from his body, even with a little Swiss army knife. I know it's a common horror movie thing to do that but still, it's a tad annoying when it's so obvious.

Mind you, this moofie and Little Fish are great for the local film industry.

 

[[]Tabernacle[]]

Saw it, thought it was ok but didn't really do anything to make it stand out from the literally hundreds of similar films- except be australian. The violence was pretty tame compared to what i expected to see based upon people's descriptions of the film.

Went home and watched the devil's rejects on DVD afterwards not a single nightmare from either- must be completelt desensitised as well

hoptis: i agree with you, that chick should have grabbed john jarrats crocodile dundee knife while he was down and turned him into a 'talking head'- they deserved everything they got after letting him off with a little gunshot wound on the neck and a pat on the back with the rifle!

 

[breakyaself]

^^ I dont think they deserved "everything they got" but do agree that they could have done something else to make sure they actually killed him ! I thought it was pretty (very) silly of them but then again, who knows logic when you are in that state ?

 

[Sevoflurane]

Loved the facial expression of the old man on the highway when he is just staring at his coffee mug, which now seems to be leaking, WTF hehe. What happens to him next wasn't so cool.

 

[MooShiE]

Ive already posted in the movie reviews thread about this film but Id have to say it was really difficult for me to watch. I find it hard to understand that some ppl felt no reaction??? Perhaps im overly sensitive but it was sickening.

My heart was racing so fast, my hands were literally shaking. It was more the realisation that these things are totally real and those kinda sickos are about in society and thats a very disturbing thought.

 

[ButrosButros_Grantos]

I saw this movie last night, I was told by someone it had werewolves in it... It didn't... It could have done with some though.

To start off with, the actors were great. It's a pity about the script that they had to work with. Kat, you are right, the dialogue wasn't realistic at the start, or actually at any point for the first act. The script had trouble deciding who was the protagonist which unless it's done well (which this wasn't) doesn't help the script.

You should never have a scene that doesn't have relevance to the entire picture you're trying to paint... This film had many of them, just time filler scenes, and while the stock footage of the australian landscape was nice, it was time filler and was noticed as such....

The gore factor in this movie is very very low, and I have a low respect for anybody that left during this movie. House of 1000 corpses/ texas chainsaw massacre were much worse...

I always have problems with movies that are funded in Australia, as they always pick bad scripts, this movie was no exception... If you like movies where the main characters are stupid and you have no pity for them as everything that happens is by their own bad desicions then see this movie...

It just frustrated the hell out of me... Bad, bad, bad movie...

1/2 out of 5

 

[Doppelganger]

I saw this movie today with iamtha1... :D

I thought it was pretty good. Typical yobbo movie, no doubt - mind you, I normally don't like them as I find the acting is often poor [or the script is damn pointless].

This movie is actually quite funny! It definately had us and most of the cinema [which wasn't very packed] laughing on several occasions.

It started very sloooooooooowly... and as been mentioned, a lot of pointless scenes. Regardless of these downfalls, I actually never felt bored... which is normally a common event if the movie doesn't entice me immediately. Mad props to this film for doing everything I hate and managing to keep my interest. How? I do not know...

I didn't find it to be a scary movie as I expected... there was sickening scenes, yes... but not really scary. Nothing really came out of left field, it was very predictable therefore probably won't cause you to jump.

All in all, definately worth a watch! Kept me interested and I have to say, it was one of those movies I really didn't want to end...

 

[breakyaself]

I saw this movie today with iamtha1... :D

I thought it was pretty good. Typical yobbo movie, no doubt - mind you, I normally don't like them as I find the acting is often poor [or the script is damn pointless].

This movie is actually quite funny! It definately had us and most of the cinema [which wasn't very packed] laughing on several occasions.

It started very sloooooooooowly... and as been mentioned, a lot of pointless scenes. Regardless of these downfalls, I actually never felt bored... which is normally a common event if the movie doesn't entice me immediately. Mad props to this film for doing everything I hate and managing to keep my interest. How? I do not know...

I didn't find it to be a scary movie as I expected... there was sickening scenes, yes... but not really scary. Nothing really came out of left field, it was very predictable therefore probably won't cause you to jump.

All in all, definately worth a watch! Kept me interested and I have to say, it was one of those movies I really didn't want to end...

I couldnt agree more !

 

[ButrosButros_Grantos]

Honestly though, the protagonist(s) in the story were frustrating, and you stopped caring for what happened to them as soon as they got stupid. For films like this to be successful you need the villian to be smarter than the heroes, but when the heroes are border-line retarded then it means the villian doesn't have much to overcome, therefore making him less intimidating.

Oh another bitch about the movie was the intro credits, too long into the movie, that was the only suprise the movie threw at me.

 

[Chaos Butterfly]

Given all the hype surrounding this movie, what with reports of people walking out and apparent large amounts of gruesome realistic violence, I wasn't really all that disturbed by this film. As has been said above, there were no "edge of your seat" moments.

It did seem kinda formulaic, I've seen another movie that was very very similar to this except it was set in the US in West Virginia, and the serial killers (yes multiple in this one ) were super strong inbred hicks. I only saw that movie because it started Eliza Dushku (Faith from Buffy). It was called Wrong Turn or something shite like that...

So all in all I wasn't really all that impressed with this film...

CB...

 

[eggman]

The whole "I was so terrified I had to run of the theatre" bit

= Producer/Marketing team hype and bullshit. Kind of reminds me of the blair witch project at the time it was out.

It was Ok and a good watch but really the hype killed it for me. If it was made exactly like it was, had no hype and went straight to DVD; I think it would have become a cult film in years to come.

When you have it rammed into your brain that a movie will scare you to death, one builds sub-conscious preconceptions and when those aren't realised you are just left dissapointed.

also... if you actually walked out on this, sorry but you have to go find a room full of mirrors and have a long good hard look at yourself. I cant understand how you can function in the real world.

 

[Strawberry_lovemuffin]

When you have it rammed into your brain that a movie will scare you to death, one builds sub-conscious preconceptions and when those aren't realised you are just left dissapointed.

.

"Saw" was like that for me. I wouldn't go see it in the cinemas, I waited for DVD. And because I had heard so much about the horrible, sick violence I was prepared with a pillow ready to cover my face during those bits. But I never needed it - it was nothing! And I'm squeamish. Maybe I will be able to see this movie after all?

BTW... I want to know exactly WHAT those horrible scenes in Wolf Creek were about!!! Details! I'm dying with curiosity.

 

[ButrosButros_Grantos]

Fingers being lopped off, stabbings, dis-membered corpses, you know the usual slasher flick standards... Nothing you wouldn't have seen before, it's actually really tame...

 

[swifty]

"Saw" was like that for me. I wouldn't go see it in the cinemas, I waited for DVD. And because I had heard so much about the horrible, sick violence I was prepared with a pillow ready to cover my face during those bits. But I never needed it - it was nothing! And I'm squeamish. Maybe I will be able to see this movie after all?

BTW... I want to know exactly WHAT those horrible scenes in Wolf Creek were about!!! Details! I'm dying with curiosity.

Yeah I guess the hype did kill it, Saw worked for me because I didn't know what to expect, and I was also coming down like nothing on earth when I went to see it, but I still rate saw 1000 times better than this, can't wait for saw 2....

 

[CHiLD-0F-THE-BEAT]

Hated it.

Lacked any kind of impact what-so-ever. The supposed gore consisted of a few [literally three that come to mind] badly set-up situations that displayed some blood and some screaming. No suspense. No face-hiding / hand clutching or rt pumping at all.


I would rate it 2/5. .