Such a frustrating disappointment

Please don't spend money on this.

hyped garbage

The movie turns out to be a little better than the average. Starting from a romantic formula often seen in the cinema, it ends in the most predictable (and somewhat bland) way.

Starts out fairly decent, first 30 minutes is more of a comedy than anything else.The quickly changes after that though and turns into something more in the horror territory.And that's also where the movie starts falling apart.In some aspects it works, it did have a good set-up and a decent enough cast, plus the cinematography was pretty cool and decent atmosphere but it's just the incredibly contrived writing that gets in the way. I'd rather have no reasoning than what we are given and there so many logical loopholes in the characters motives and reactions that you can go hula-hooping with them.

THE LAST EXPERIMENT is a low budget horror outing that has potential but squanders it through a generally overly familiar feel and slightly sub-par execution. It's hard to put your finger on what exactly is wrong with this movie, because the storyline isn't bad at all and the pacing is spot on. But it never manages to be scary or thrilling for a moment, and instead is content to wallow in gross-out scenes rather than moments of genuine exhilaration.The plot is about a group of diverse characters who volunteer as test subjects in a remote research installation. Unfortunately the drugs they're given have all manner of violent side effects which soon become apparent. The plot becomes more and more convoluted as it goes on, until the ridiculous twist ending. Also, THE LAST EXPERIMENT lacks decent actors to bring the characters to life, and you can feel the inexperience from most of the cast. Only a cameoing Eric Roberts reminds you of the calibre of actor who should be appearing in this sort of thing.

Two incredibly stereotypical college buddies (one carefree party-animal and one responsible party-pooper) seek a method to earn fast & easy cash and stumble upon an ad for pharmaceutical guinea pigs. After carefully verifying that nobody will put any tubes up their rectums (because, apparently, that's the only unacceptable condition), they sign up for a two weeks stay at a medical facility and agree with the terms that they cannot have any contact with the outside world and swallow whatever medication Dr. Wilcox and her team prescribes them. Several indicators prove that the testing of Ravenix' new drug isn't kosher, like the decaying state of the hospital facility and the lack of medical staff involved, but the new drug appears to show off positive results immediately. The recovery ratio in case of illnesses and the healing processes in case of physical wounds increase at phenomenal speed and, after a few days, it even occurs that cutting wounds heal instantly. But, like usually the issue with new medicines, the side effects and shortcomings are quite extreme. Most notable is the fact that the human lab rabbits become completely inadvertent to all kind of emotions. And, of course, what to do in case of urgent surgery when the body can't be incised? I watched "Bloodwork" at the annual Brussels Festival of Fantastic Films, where it got promoted as a state-of-the-art and innovative thriller. This isn't quite correct, unfortunately, as far too often the film comes across as derivative and mundane, but it's nonetheless a very entertaining thriller with a handful of original aspects and occasional flashes of sheer suspense. Particularly the unfolding of the drug's side effects is adequately demonstrated. We initially witness how the group indifferently reacts to a rotting animal's carcass in the cafeteria and you actually wonder why they're not repulsed. A little while later, there's even a couple having sex in a cockroach-infested room and remain unbothered. Regretfully however, after a fairly solid and plausible middle-section, "Bloodwork" rapidly descends into a bad spiral of dull clichés and routines. Obviously the project supervisor will stop at nothing to continue the experiments and naturally the tests are all part of a secret government scheme led by one political big shot. None other than Eric Roberts – civilized übervillain #1 – makes a less than 2 minute cameo appearance for this part and presumably also received the largest paycheck. But still, if you manage to switch off your brain functions and look passed all these hopelessly annoying defaults, you'll find a worthwhile thriller perfectly suitable for a lazy Saturday evening in a comfortable couch. As said, the film contains a few admirable ideas and highlight sequences, the motivated acting performances from the ensemble cast are much better than the routine script deserves and supportive actress Mircea Monroe demonstrates that she has beautiful breasts.

It's an interesting idea. Some people take part in a drug trial in a creepy industrial kind of building cum hospital. Of course the drug causes all manner of side effects which end up with people snout deep in gore. In the hands of a decent writer and a bunch of decent actors it might have actually worked. Sadly it has neither so it didn't.Travis Van Winkle, who is probably a relative of Rip, provides some light relief as 'Greg' but the cast are pretty dull and boring. Even the one playing 'Johnny Depp' playing 'Captain Jack Sparrow' could not drag it above the level of DVD bargain bin '3 for £5' tripe. It does have the odd moment that could have ended up interesting but again didn't manage to capitalise on that.The horror stuff was the usual zombie flesh eater type of thing minus the zombies or 'Walkers' as I believe zombies are now known in the USA.Eric Roberts appears for no reason other than the DVD cover can claim to star Eric Roberts. Why? Probably because he had a gas bill to pay or something. The ending was laughable as Eric and his 'less than' elite team come in to clean up the mess and fail miserably enabling the utterly terrifying possibility of a Bloodwork #2 likely starring Eric Roberts.It is beyond me how these awful films even manage to make back their few thousand bucks budget but the DVD racks are full of this kind of useless waste of 90 minutes garbage. Maybe it's because the gullible film audience falls for it every time. I am embarrassed to admit I did once again.