"We got great scenery, nice photography, actual colors (which is very rare these days in horror films), an interesting premise with a city couple dealing with forest gremlins... But let's ruin all of that by turning this into just another braindead home invasion psycho-family thriller. Let's pander to the most idiotic demographic of horror fans."
Instead of placing focus on the goblins, the director chose to politicize this idiotic story with completely unnecessary and very tiresome English-Irish relations "social commentary", as if a silly monster flick needs that kind of rubbish. But every jerk these days shoves politics into his material, whether it be stand-up comedy, comic-books, music movies or novels: everyone is damn "concerned" about the planet, about issues, and they want you to know about it... Goblins should have been the stars of this here wee show, but instead the putz turned this into a psycho-family home-invasion thriller, with goblins only playing a supporting role. They are essentially just a shadow in the first half, making their grand entrance far too late, and in predictable fashion.
OK, this writer-director isn't too bright, I get it. He couldn't devise a smarter, more original story that involved only goblins so he resorted to ripping off various dumb cliches that ruined 100s of very bad movies. I get it, he used the Meaney clan as a plot-device, their entire purpose being to get slaughtered by the creatures. My question though: why exaggerate so much? Why all the idiotic overkill? Are you THAT insecure about yourself and your movie?
This was never a comedy. It didn't start as a comedy, it didn't continue as a comedy, so WHY did the Meaney clan suddenly start doing banter in the 2nd half of the movie as if they were in a comedy? This movie's characterization problem is of epic proportions: the movie is a horror drama, yet the Meaney clan behaves like they escaped from a lunatic asylum situated in a black comedy, hence invaded this movie. Their behaviour is so over-the-top unrealistic, stupid and exaggerated that it completely killed the movie, way before they even started their stupid battle with the goblins.
Plenty of other bad logic too:
1. Hubby actually has the balls to insult the trio gang (the ones who assaulted him and his wife), which predictably leads to the attack. This is stupid, because he later proves to be a total and utter wimp, a mega-coward of the worst sort. This contradiction is staggering, and is another example of oafish characterization.
If anything, having gone through a home invasion ordeal already, AND having done some boxing exercises, should have made Hubby mentally more prepared for the 2nd round of home invasion, not LESS prepared.
2. Wifey says "I'm due any day now", yet despite her pregnancy (which could literally end at any HOUR) she enters the forest - alone - for the first time - and while there is an unruly clan of hillbilly misfits working in and around her house. She goes deep into the forest, just so she can follow around the dog. It doesn't even occur to her to "maybe better call the police because the dog's owner has been missing".
3. Despite finding out that Fatso Hillbilly is really missing, as Wifey had told him (which he didn't initially believe), he leaves the pub WHISTLING, happy. This makes zero sense. He should be stressed out and in panic mode.
4. Colm Meaney sets the house on fire - yet the fire miraculously disappears a little later! No explanation whatsoever what happened to all those flames. Not to mention how DUMB it was that Colm would attempt to burn it BEFORE finding out where the couple is and before locating his son's corpse. Isn't that why he came there in the first place?
5. Who in their right mind wouldn't have fired the Meaney clan already on the very first day? They behave like hooligans, they are beyond rude, act as if the house is theirs, even brazenly claim that the house is theirs at one point (!), break windows by mistake, show great ineptitude, steal food from the kitchen - and yet ALL of this is tolerated by the London couple. Utter hogwash. There is no young couple on this entire planet that would have tolerated these psychos for longer than three hours.
6. Colm's other son escapes the house, despite having been attacked by several goblins earlier. How did he free himself? No explanation. Considering that he had several deep knife wounds already, and that the goblins outnumbered him, I really don't understand how he managed to escape them.
7. The fact that this Irish village has a nefarious clan that's pretty much on par with the "Texas Chainsaw Massacre" family, yet they'd never been arrested for murder, aggravated assault or rape - is a total joke. This isn't 12th century Africa. The cliche of the Irish living like lawless barbarians even now, in the 21st century, is milked here for all its worth, which is unfortunate, not because it might offend the Irish but because it insults our intelligence. If you wanna convince me that the idyllic Irish countryside is populated by savage, uncivilized morons - then you're a moron.
8. Colm's speech to his dying son about being "proud" of him is utterly daft, doesn't suit this film or these characters in the slightest. It's so random. As if a moron copy-pasted a line from a sci-fi film then applied it to a costume drama, or something like that. Nonsensical, amateur writing.
9. Minutes after sobbing over his slaughtered children, Colm suddenly jokes around about the little people. So is this a movie that wants to be a comedy but for some reason can't, so it resorts to thriller mode whenever it isn't trying to be funny? Or the opposite: a comedy that wants to be taken seriously as a thriller, but can't, because the different schizo voices in the script are giving it opposing instructions? Just guessing, trying to understand the schizophrenic nature of this trashy, absurd script.
The "plot-twists" after the home invasion rubbish were so predictable, I don't even know why the director bothered with them. We knew the baby wasn't safe from the goblins. We knew that the abducted baby from 40 years earlier was still alive. And we already knew from way earlier that Wifey was gearing to become new "queen" of the forest trolls. All of this is generic rubbish, yet it's presented as something exceptional and original.
It's more than obvious that whatshisname didn't know what he was doing. This director had evidently seriously devolved since "Grabbers" (which was a decent film). But this is a very typical thing with his generation: whoever does a halfway decent film just goes downhill right after... The worst film-making generation since... ever. Unable to learn and unwilling to develop. Too many millennial writers deciding to direct, and the opposite: they overestimate themselves greatly, narcissistic and deluded as they are.
Besides, why would anyone give a toss about what happened to a character as pathetic as Hubby, who sobbed like a little baby when faced with the "threat" of one dumb hillbilly who wasn't even properly armed. This movie should have had an abortion, just like Wifey did with her first pregnancy. "That relationship would have never worked, it would have been ugly," she says. She may as well have been talking about the need to abort this movie during its 1st trimester, while it was in the pre-production stage, to save the world yet another crap horror film. We kind of have more than enough of those already...
Nice scenery. That's pretty much the only positive. The rest is mostly garbage.
7 out of 15 found this helpful.
Was this review helpful? Sign in to vote.
Permalink
