Death Valley
Overall Recommendation
Recommendation?
What the hell, give it a watch. It’s not bad. It doesn’t have enough zombie in it for me, but the forest battle scene itself is worth watching. I can’t suggest this on the strength of anything other than “If you liked the Resident Evil video games and have a high tolerance for monotony, this will help waste an afternoon.” Even though it was shot quite well, great at times, the plot itself kept relying on “briefings” to give us info. The movie itself was like a bunch of battles with talking filler expanding on plot lines or explaining occurrences, and then we go back to running aimlessly through the same set being chased by brain face. I’m guessing here, but I bet this started off as Resident Evil fan fiction before someone decided they could sell it. I question the wisdom of who bought it, but it’s an able and capable telling of what it is, which is the “man creates a monster who kills man” story. Think a really methed out spun up version of Frankenstein viewed through the eyes of a video game designer having a seizure. My main quibble, as it often is, is that there just weren’t enough zombie. And that’s a hard pill to swallow after seeing how well they can do zombie. I feel like all the passion in this movie is invested in the forest battle scene, and then when they were done filming that, they had to go and film all the drudgery indoors warehouse scenes. After the open expanses of the forest, the secret facility felt like a small set, or even a mash up of sets. They run through rooms of advanced computers and next are shoving up against rusted iron doors. It felt like the ending of this was rushed, or more like we rushed to the ending. When we did take a break from the rushing and action (brain face screaming into our face) it was so the characters could quickly talk their way through a plot point or device, and then brain face would find them again and it’s off to running through the set. I’m not saying anything here was particularly bad. The two leads had decent chemistry, nothing Tango and Cash though, and thankfully, for most of the shooting it was blanks and not CGI. I just can’t shake the feeling of video game.
Plot Autopsy
Plot Autopsy
- We meet the Bros. These guys are besties. But one has a secret.
- There’s a videogame briefing
- Super cool battle in the forest. Unfortunately, no zombies.
- Down in the secret bunker, we’re attacked by Resident Evil copywrite infringements
- Running and crawling in circles around the same set repeatedly for filler
- Everyone ends up dead
Zombie Description
Zombie Description
The zombie, since we only really get introduced to one, is fucking awesome. The rest of the movie, the bad guy is brain face. We have a couple “almost made the full change to zombie” actors, but they get bullets before we get to the good stuff. The zombie we saw was fast and violent, but not very bulletproof. Watching Jr fight off a zombie in a morgue cold slab in blue light was nice. I appreciated the icky wetness of the zombie. Unfortunately, brain face is the star. He’s on the cover. Turns out he’s the male love interest. He’s also just the same fucking roaring thing over and over. It could have been a cybernetic tiger; equally science fiction, equally worth running from, equally hard to kill, equally ineloquent in articulating it’s rageful bellows. You should have made this movie about zombies, or left zombies out of it and just left it at brain face. Did you add those two zombies just to get the genre inclusion? They’re sure not there out of love.
Where the money went
Where the money went
Cameras and professional camera work. This was well shot, they knew what they were doing. Even if they did choose to shoot far too much of the movie in “run-away” mode, meaning it’s really dark and lit by flashlight and I couldn’t see shit. But when the lighting was up, this was good. Especially the forest battle scene. I think more money went into that extravaganza than the entire secret facility, and that’s unfortunate, since the battle is inconsequential to the plot. They even spent the money for drone footage, something nice and pleasant, but not usually found in zombie movies. I feel like someone worked for below their pay grade as a favor or something like that. The special effects were great, and brain face looked like brain face.
Best Weapon
Best Weapon
Once again, this was so uninspired that there wasn’t the introduction of anything new. The tape player trap was a good one, if already done many times. Throwing your zombie-changing self down a well to hang the evil mutant lady worked well too. Maybe the best weapon was the love the two bros shared, as evidenced by their repeated fist-bumps.
Can I get a hand?
Can I get a hand?
No, there was nothing of the sort. The best thing we had was an eyeless corpse sitting up. Lame.
That was new!
That was new!
I think the new thing I liked the best was what I believe to be some crazy wire action for the kinetic energy of the explosions during the forest battle. When explosions went off near people (which damn near every-one did- that’s some agile artillery) the person was FLUNG sideways like they’d taken a hit from a 70’s Buick. The incendiary effects were spot on and mixed with people flying horizontally across the screen in slow motion, presented what I can only assume to be a more realistic presentation of a firefight than most. This sorta felt like a “for soldiers, by soldiers” thing. The one thing that would have pushed this over the top into epic would have been if they’d been able to get drone footage of the battle. In regard to zombie type stuff or weapons or whatnot, there really wasn’t very much new. Aside from the forest battle scene, I don’t feel like much imagination went into this movie. It’s closer to a “If that’s the problem, then a common solution would be…” approach to storytelling.
Review Notes
Review Notes
We’re not rated, but I guess that isn’t worth getting excited about anymore.
But more importantly, I want to remember my friend Dredd. I miss you.
The soundtrack kicks in bumping the classic “Lockdown initiated in 30 seconds”, but this is some high energy remix I haven’t heard yet. Where are my glowsticks?
It’s a race! I’m Winning! And.. Well, get to shoot 2nd place as my prize?
So the Russian wrestler from street fighter.. shit.. whats his name? (Pauses to Google) Zangief! I’m not writing that over and over. His name is Z.
Z shot the lady covered in blood. He appeared conflicted about it, especially compared to shooting 2nd place, so he shot her in the leg. I think it was a good compromise. She’s already covered in blood, I’m sure her pants are already ruined. Fuck, I’m high..
The warnings are in Russian, too.
A quick bit of camera fuckery to show us how many lenses they have, then she’s back down the hall in the opposite direction, not to help 2nd place (he’s still alive!) but to try to make it out the other door.
There’s something in the air vent above her.
She’s under the rolling door, but 2nd place wants her shoes!
Whatever is doing that growling, it could be a lion, a dragon, or even one of the sharks from Deep Blue Sea. Whatever it is, it’s got a hold on 2nd place!
And begin the title. Death valley. Didn’t anyone consider that there’s dozens of other “Death Valley” titles out there? How smart is it to name your movie after a widely known geographic locale? It’d be like me writing a science fiction story about a space travelling dandelion and naming it Britney Spears. No one will ever find this. Maybe that’s a good thing. She’s started talking into the camera.
Something about saving her ass or Adam is gone forever. She seems to think an axe is going to help.
It’s first aid time and we got our wine. Ick. Pulling out the bullet, ruined those shoes, YES! She hates pants too!!
And shirts. This is messy. Like truck stop messy. But that could be because everyone died.
Lotta random yelling in the background, this place looks like a mine that got converted into a government facility and then got converted into a movie set of a mine that had been converted into a government facility.
Growls around the red lit alarm strobing blood splashed corner. Let’s advance, yes?
No! We’re gonna hide and cower!
Well, we’ve seen the icky monster and it’s pretty much exactly like the Resident Evil creatures, except it’s walking bipedal. It can’t see her? But it can sense her?
Cut to cool guy walking towards airplane. And answering his phone. With a whiney pregnant…
This is the one last job. He’s gonna secure their future. And he just promised he’d come back, so we know he’s doomed. About as doomed as the media artist who photoshopped this video-call together.
So these two military guys are best friends. But they don’t share everything. It’s complicated. It’s a bro thing. Thang.
This plane looks like WW2 era… painted as such, too.
With… a sassy blonde pilot. Didn’t see that coming. Really. I was imaging Ron Pearlman with a cigar. Thank god he never went the action movie cliché route. I can totally see him kicking ass in The Expendables though. He’s almost as big as Terry Cruze or whatever, isn’t he?
Is it important that half the landing gear didn’t retract? Or couldn’t you afford a fully functional plane rental? Is this important? I feel like I’m following all the wrong clues. Too much coffee. COLD brew.
Jr. is an annoying prick.
“Right. The angry militia trying to get in the front door but they can’t ‘cause it’s nuclear grade? The ULTIMATE cock block!”
So… they’re headed to… Bosvania. I shit you not. They got the CGI budget to set this intro up like a video game, but they can’t think of a better word than smashing up Bosnia and Transylvania? How predictable can you get?
I like the handwritten “Underground bunker”. Cutting edge genome my ass.
Jesus, this is the full video game briefing. Ok, so… uh… bad guys in trees all look like they’ve been on steroids with a live-in barber, and they have, like, artillery or something that limits our options. I think we gotta be quiet. And there’s a ground team, who are good for finding tunnels.
Point is, save that bloody woman who got shot in the leg and her paperwork. Just like in the plot synopsis.
Holy.. ok, there’s also a couple other groups named “Moses” and “Six”, although these are groups of men, but not the names or actual numbers of men… and we do meet a bunch of guys, but we’re not sure where their barbers are.
The map looks like a diagram of an amoeba with herpes by now.
The mission is simple, like she just said. I couldn’t follow it, but I’m high as a kite. Maybe you’ll care to pay attention.
The obligatory “The helicopter leaves at blah blah blah. If you’re not there, you’re a muskrat.”
So as the two shooter guys are wandering the woods, they’re arguing again. The client who hired them is one of their ex’s. But not the pregnant one, I don’t think.
Trained military ninjas that they are, they’re surprised by a guy with headphones on so they chase him until he hides behind the hiding tree.
The biggest problem with eating Toblerone’s is that I keep getting the foil in my mouth.
A really chubby military guy finds the hiding tree and now they might have to kill the kid. We’re not supposed to like the chubby guy.
I got chocolate all over the desk. Crap.
Yeah! I’m feeling this! Got a 2nd cup of coffee and a clean desk and a couple Toblerone left and I’m gonna start’r up again and take another hit!
They ziptie the guy to a tree, but only after he tells them that “Sepiferen” is coming. Or something. I wasn’t listening too intently because they tricked me into thinking that he didn’t speak the English.
Damn, they love their drone shots.
And now the sassy blonde pilot is breaching the compound with a different couple of guys and I just found a sticker I thought I’d lost.
We have a zombie and he’s fucking magnificent! A leathery Russian gulag looking mofo! With an anguished scream he’s off the wall he was banging his head against and charges the team! He’s down! But damn, that’s one of the better zombies I’ve seen in a while. Good effects.
They didn’t emphasize a head shot. Fuck, I can’t type.
Ok, either these guys are making up new teams every 15 seconds, or switching weapons? He didn’t have a bipod before… Is that the guy?
And all hell breaks loose. Bad people begin shooting at them. There’s a great battle scene with what I can only assume to be fantastic wire-effects, combined with great slow motion and incendiary effects. This is a great battle scene (not so much the acting) in it’s production. Very nice.
And… the guy they didn’t kill was the one calling in the artillery on them. Que Live and Let Die.
So it looks like we’re down to just the two bros out in the woods…
One team member is kinda alive?
And the dick friend wants to leave him. What a dick. Thankfully the good guy friend is a good guy.
Here’s a movie making tip. Just because you can attach cameras to gun barrels doesn’t mean you should. Lame narcissism.
The militia just found a hurt team-mate! And shotted him to death seven times! What bad people!
Well, the bad guys got a dog. This isn’t good. Better not get hurt. I’m pro-dog even more-so than pro-zombie.
Shoot and scoot and never stop communicating- this is good team-work. For a jungle firefight. When all the fucking zombies are in a facility underneath! So get there already!
Jr. “You want me to jump off a cliff, that’s your best idea?”
Good Guy “Yes! Yes it is! You got a better one?”
Jr. “No, I like it, Cowboy!”
I’d imagine you cannot look up and see incoming artillery and then run fast enough to survive. But I wouldn’t know.
With all these drone shots, why didn’t they have any of the battle? Huge miss!!
Jumping into the rapids went about as well as it did in deliverance.
The two bros are separated. He searches the sky, but there is no drone in sight. For once.
The militia has a plan!
The two bros are re-united. The plan now? Run through the woods hiding.
Of course there’s a drone around to cover the soggy retreat.
The bros argue at the cave entrance, but make their peace and secure it with a fist bump.
River Crossing!
The bros are in a cave, it’s kinda Decent-y. They’re still arguing. The good will generated by the fist bump was not strong enough to endure in this adversity.
And under a pile of rocks, the secret entrance. Ta-DAH!
The two? Remaining militia conversate with the wounded guy they left behind. In a very poor accent we learn something about a virus that re-animates a body bag, which gets shot in the head, which upon opening is one of those skinless brain-faces. So this means they should be on the same side. (The good guys and the militia)
The bros make a “This is our last job” pact. They seal this one with a fist bump too.
They’ve made it into the secret facility, and found what looks like where the first zombie bit it maybe? (no pun intended, he got shot before he could bite anyone) but now the body is gone and there’s empty shells and guns and blood everywhere. So the bros have a sit-down.
Re-armed, they begin exploring. They find an official Science Room and there’s creepy stuff, like old black and white photos and X-rays of the brain-face things.
“Are you done playing detective? Because you’re just typing in random passwords.”
A tape recording, just like you’d find in the Fallout games, tells us about subject 10 being found in ice and the virus reacting to warm blood and how some of the scientists think it’s the original being Adam. Makes sense.
A sub-minute paraphrase of the bible leads the bros to understand that the scientists were trying to breed this thing with humans. Screeching in the distance reminds us the clock is ticking.
One good creep right there! Cameo by The Ring girl!
“Hey Marshall, it’s you, from the past. You’re in a bunker with a bunch of dead scientists and maybe some kind of biblical species so, check your life choices.”
The good guy found the scientist, but something’s peeing on his shoulder!
The brain-face monster is about to kill the good guy but is saved by the woman with an axe.
Jr shows up and 2 shots later, the monster leaps up into the ducting.
The scientist is insistent they go somewhere else. Bad things are coming. I hope it’s zombies!
Claustrophobic hallways and claustrophobic hallway sounds…
“Hey, I have an idea. Why don’t we do humans against non-humans?”
The sneaking around continues.
“Does anyone think it’s weird we just crawled into a vent when we saw one go into a vent? No? I’m talking to myself?”
“Are you good? Are you good, Doctor Cloey? ‘Cause we need some fucking answers!” (Dr. turns and throws up into trashcan)
Thankfully, she then explains all the science about how we have these genetic hybrid things.
You can only sit in a room talking intently until the Doctor throws up again.
A quick jaunt through the same set in the other direction to make it look different and a hostile guy in all black is threatening…no, the monster grabbed him and killed him. We’re safe again.
So much crawling through tunnels.
“No, Adam is dead. Olich killed him.” Who the fuck is Olich?? When were we supposed to have learned this? Was this part of that briefing? That was so long ago.
I’m getting tired of the meandering through poorly lit industrial areas.
So much wandering through doorways and passages and red-lit doorways and passages.
After more wandering, they find the sassy pilot, but she’s hurt bad. She doesn’t seem to trust the scientist lady. The scientist lady is acting like maybe they two of them had too much to drink and hooked up one night and they’re both mortified.
Well, that was a really good beginning of a zombie turning scene, but they didn’t show her go full aggression- they focused on the scientist lady apologizing for making the kill shot. I haven’t seen much zombie yet, and what I’ve seen is good, so… c’mon!
Should you wait until the zombie is full turned and dangerous, or shoot mid-turn while still retaining some humanity? That’s the question that they just don’t have enough time to answer.
Aww, the bros are yelling at each other again.
Brain face has found them again, after a tad bit of shooting, we’re back to running the same sets over and over. It’s like this was filmed in a circle.
The bros have become separated. Good guy has the scientist in a science room, while Jr. locks himself in the morgue. Fucking genius, this one.
Wait, maybe the good guy and the scientist are in a submarine. I really can’t tell from the set.
But… there’s an eyeless corpse who looks ready to (ahem) rise to the occasion!
Pillow to the face, and then about 12 face-stabs with a bayonet. Seems excessive. 10 should have done it.
Jr decides… to hide… in a freezer box with a corpse. Who he can’t stop talking to.
So, while good guy and the scientist are trying to get some privacy, Jr’s corpse wakes up and goes nicely zombie on him. Everything in a blue light puts it nicely. Especially Jr’s bite.
Jr. was perfectly set. On a slab, with a corpse and a virus. Then someone opens his door, grabs his feet, and yanks him out! We know not who or why!
The tape recorder trap… Fuck. For a scientist, this woman knows how to knife fight.
“Prepare to die, right? That’s the line? From Princess Bride?”
I’m trusting this scientist lady less and less.
Jr. got himself tied down on a gurney getting lectured by a Russian about the onset of zombie puberty and the changes and feelings he can begin to expect. “I’m going through changes…”
A lot of disjointed chaotic zombie-ish scenes? Jr. is hallucinating.
The good guy and the scientist make it to Adam’s room. If I haven’t gone into the stuff about Adam, it’s because it’s metadata to the movie’s plot and not worth note. I mean, it explains a lot of what’s supposedly happening, but it’s also hogwash. So I gloss over it.
Brain face just kicked into the morgue and beat up the Russian
The good guy just found a crib in Adam’s room. Cribs in Zombie Movies are bad things. Nothing good ever comes from a crib in a zombie movie.
Good guy just realized that the lady scientist is pregnant with a virus baby? How the fuck did he put that together? Nicholas Cage would be looking at him in bewilderment after those leaps of logic…
Jesus christ, this is a lot of talking. Is life sacred? Are virus babies alive? Why would you lie about being raised in a laboratory your entire life? How was this plot twist even remotely perceived as being plausible?
“Sometimes to beat the monster, you have to become the monster.” Nietzsche gets to slap you when you make it to hell.
The brain monster kills the Russian but not Jr, who manages to find the brain monster beating up the good guy. He threatens to shoot the scientist, who…
Look. In the big fight at the end, the good guy uses a flame thrower to kill brain face, and it’s really like in The Thing. It feels good. I love that movie. Flamethrowers hurt monsters.
She makes it up out of the secret facility and marvels at trees for a while, then runs into Ulich, and they appear to have some history and baggage which, unable to resolve, leads them into a stabbing match that they both lose.
The bros make it up into the forest.
The approach the dead scientist lady who is smart and faking it and she pulls the knife from her belly and sorta stabs and beats them up like Mila Jovovich in the 5th Element.
There’s some damn good hand to hand heavily flavored with jujitsu, but it’s not flamboyant or Ong-Bok all leaping off walls and shit. Just good, simple, realistic moves with resultant injuries. No one is a super hero.
Except Jr. Who takes a dive down the well, managing to strangle the lady scientist with lucky rope.
Back down in the secret facility, Jr is turning, and decides he’s saved the whole world.
The bros have saved the world, but Jr has paid the ultimate sacrifice.
During the credits scene, the rescuers find the Good Guy, but he’s been infected and turns into a zombie and attacks them.
————End Transmission——————–
Introduction
Introduction
First thoughts? Well, fuck pants. This is the 1st time I’ve tried to do two back to back reviews, and I’m feeling a little burnt and stupid in the head. I keep hiding my coffee behind the “other” laptop, and then when I find it I’m back to fucking up which mouse moves which cheese.
Death Valley, a movie that I *think* has something resembling zombies in it, appears to be, like, a Russian movie. I pulled up a movie cover in Google Images and there’s foreign writing that if I had to guess what I said; “Nowhere Memphis”.
Which would be a great blues album name, but since it’s written in sickly pale green directly beneath a picture of what is most probably a copywrite-infringement of one of those long tonged skinned brain creatures from Resident Evil. I got a bone to pick here, step aside and listen.
I thought that those games just had zombies in them. I didn’t get the memo, but the first one I played was Resident Evil 2 on the PS2 and I was so drunk when I first fired it up that I didn’t notice the intro had ended and I was now in control of the character. I couldn’t understand why he was just standing there taking bites.
Then, when I did realize I was supposed to be playing, and I was just getting the knack of it, then there’s these skinned super fast ceiling crawling things that just startled me so badly I spent the evening dumping clips down the hallway between bleedouts.
Look, all I’m trying to say is that I think video games with zombies in them should be about the fucking zombies and not have them be like, the galoompahs of Mario that you face right off the bat. I mean, yeah, you should be fighting zombies from the start, not parakeets, but I seriously have an issue with “Boss” characters that you have to beat to complete the level, or when suddenly you get a better weapon and begin encountering nothing but harder enemies to kill.
I understand the reason behind all this, the philosophy of video games, increasing challenge, freemium isn’t free, but I’m a purist and a romantic, and I say if a video game is about surviving the zombie apocalypse, that should be enough for you. It shouldn’t be “survive the zombie apocalypse, then build a bustling mall economy before raising a sim family.” No.
Darkness, death, running low on bullets and your only friend left alive has a bite that’s festering. That’s what we want from fucking zombie video games.
The first person who paid money for an in-game skin should have their balls removed, filled with helium, and floated out over archery practice. That said, there’s really not a lot to go on here for a description of Death Valley. Like, a eyeless sharp toothed mutant with really long nails is screaming in our face, and our description is “Two hired guns, commissioned to rescue an imprisoned scientist from a secret facility are hunted down by a terrifying creature of unknown origin.”
To begin with, when I think of a commission, I think of someone paying an artist to create something. So this isn’t just a rescue, it’s art-rescue. Interpretive rescue. It’s important we know they’re “Hired guns” too. Mercenaries is just too pedestrian when you’re dealing with commissions.
If a secret facility has a terrifying creature of unknown origin, we know by now that men have been meddling in the land of the gods and now we’s about to get eated as a result. The Adjectives… I think that’s what they are- for a writer I don’t know shit about writing…
Hired, Imprisoned, Secret, Terrifying, Unknown. If those were 5 of the movie topic scrabble tiles I’d drawn, I’d think that I’m actually in for something of value and good here. I have a good feeling about this, though, like that movie with the wrestlers in it that centers around a birthday cake.
I wish I could remember the name of that one. It was like “Working time” or something like that. The zombies had weird neck-dart things, like in Rabid, but the real shine was the two dudes chemistry. They shot that film with $37 and a handshake and it’s amazing. The drunken bum asleep in the car? So good.
So that’s what I’m hoping for. Amazon has 6 people giving this a 2.5 stars out of 5, so, fuck me. This could be anything, anywhere, as long as its secret and far enough from Racoon City that they don’t lawyer up and come after you for skinless monster copywrite infringement.
I’m already yawning. This might go south. Two big yummy hits later, I gotta get this coffee drunk if I’m gonna make it. It’s already late. Can’t let the movie win.
Fucking movie just won. I can’t sign into Amazon on the “Other” Laptop, so I’m gonna try to watch this movie and take notes on this laptop. I’m gonna fuck this up 7 ways from Sunday.
Just pushed play and the internet dropped. WTF? Is this the universe trying to save me from a fate worse than death, or is this the devil placing obstacles in my path in order that my journey to salvation be wrought with the strain of pained effort?