Too much of everything

Simply Perfect

A lot of perfectly good film show their cards early, establish a unique premise and let the audience explore a topic at a leisurely pace, without much in terms of surprise. this film is not one of those films.

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.

I haven't seen a recent slasher film in a while, which is perhaps why I was in a lenient mood when I watched this movie. It's a by-the-numbers blood fest, more about killing off cast members via increasingly violent, grisly ways than anything else, and a combination of a Friday the 13th sequel with the kind of visceral nastiness found in a SAW film. It's also quite a lot of fun.Things get off to an arresting start as cops enter a run down house to discover a girl missing her eyes. One of the cops is speedily dispatched with an axe (a great shock scene) and the other loses his arm before taking down the killer. Things ease off a little as more predictable slasher plot elements emerge: we're introduced to a cast of delinquent teenagers who arrive at a burnt-out hotel with a couple of token adults to clean it up. However, there's not much cleaning going on, as the killer soon shows up again and begins offing the teens in gruesome ways.There's quite a lot to like about this flick for horror fans. It's short and well paced, and porn director Gregory Dark handles the proceedings in a much better way than you'd imagine. Much of the paraphernalia – girls in cages, torture, killing etc. – is familiar from modern day horror, but the special effects are very good and very grisly and hard to watch in places. There's a lot of action, and the chases between the killer and the victims are all very well handled and reasonably exciting.The acting is nothing to write home about, but that's par for the course. I did like Steven Vidler's character. Kane isn't required to act much, but he's a bloody big guy and the sheer size of him alone is enough to give nightmares. There are some inventive moments, like the death-by-mobile-phone scene, or the unpleasant 'dog food' sequence which has some kind of perverse logic to it. There are also one or two decent twists and a fine ending for the villain. Not a lot else to say about this one, other than that it does what it says on the tin.

I'm actually writing this review after my second viewing of 'See No Evil.' The reason being is because I like slasher films and I rented this again because I'd forgotten I'd seen it! That kind of gives you a clue as to the impact the film originally had on me.It's about a bus-load of unusually-attractive young convicts (all girls look like models and all lads are rugged and good-looking) who are allowed out of the youth detention centre for a weekend in order to help clean an abandoned hotel. Naturally, this location just happens to be inhabited by a complete nutter who likes to pluck youngsters' eyes out and keep them in jars (guess it beats stamp collecting?).With modern slasher films, it seems that most try to go either one of two ways: they either play it straight and everything's really dark and serious. Or they go for the over-the-top effect and it's a bit tongue in cheek with blatantly-stupid gore etc. See No Evil goes for the former. It's all dark and gloomy. And, to be fair, the atmosphere is good. It's all very dark and claustrophobic and the sets are nicely foreboding.However, the gore itself is nothing special. There's little more to mention than in your average (original) Friday 13th film.The youngsters who run about the place screaming and generally dying are functional. They do their job well. The adults in the group are pretty much redundant and you'll probably see the twist coming a mile off.But, if you're into slasher films, this one is definitely not down there with the worst of them, but, like I said, I watched it once, forgot I had done and then accidentally watched it again. Not that I regret it, it's just the sort of film that will get lost among the many slasher films any fan of the genre has seen.Special mention to 'Kane' who plays the killer well.

It's not the worst movie known to man, neither is it an award winning horror film; it's average.SCARE: well to be honest it's more of a gory slasher film rather than a horror flick ACTORS: looking at Glen Jacob's "Kane" character in the WWE I'd pretty much say he was good for the role, and probably did the best job here, the other teens are more or less averageStory: The story is average, it's not out of this world like Pulp Fiction or Goodfellas, but it's solid.So overall, as said before, it's and average film with average cast and a solid plot. the reason I have given it 9 out of 10 is because, while I don't think it should be a 8 on IMDb, I do think it's worthy of around a 6, so i wanted to boost up the average rating.Overall: 6/10

Firstly, I would like to mention that See No Evil is not an excellent horror film, but I will say it is not the worst of the bunch of horror films that have come out before and after it. In the year 2006, I believe it was a real step up for horror films and it was one of the best years for it as 2005 brought as CGI-ed uncreativity. The year 2006 however to me brang something more to the genre. Sure, we still had many films about cannibalism, torture, murder, blood, gore and disasters but I believe that it went back to brutal roots. And films like See No Evil, Slither, Black Sheep and the Hills Have Eyes remake were some of the films to do that. A year later, 2007 continued to strive in the same vain.Viewing See No Evil, I cannot thank it enough for actually getting me into the horror genre. I was never a major horror film fanatic until I watched See No Evil. Once I saw this film from 2006 (which I thought was an excellent year for horror films), I instantly engaged with the genre, now having watched many horror films, especially in the slasher category being Halloween, Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Friday the 13th naming a few of the famous slashers.I do See No Evi is quite cliché' and at times re-cycles many of the same formulas we have seen in countless slasher films over the past decades. But overall, I find it to be creepy (don't read on if you don't like spoilers), parts including the girl getting a phone shoved down her throat or when Richie and Ty find a ruffled victim who they realize wasn't killed long ago. I thought even though this film was like those of Friday the 13th or Scream, I still thought there were elements of disturbance and creepiness.Being honest, I thought that the film was paced quite well. We have an introduction to a gruesome massacre and discovery, then we are introduced to the juvenile teens one by one, and then it sets in an isolated, abandoned hotel at night time, where a psychopathic recluse does away with all of them unexpectedly. Same formula of story but I found this film unique for many reasons.Warning, that I don't like WWE or many of their films. This, Walking Tall and The Condemned are the only exceptions. Stuff like the Marine was awful.Back to the review, I thought that Kane or Glen Jacobs did an excellent job at playing the killer, Jacob Goodnight. He really evoked some fear and aggression through his character. I believe he should be chosen to be in many more horror/slasher stalk horror films. He was pretty creepy in this, especially many of the close-up's or his perspective shots. The other actors were alright but Kane stole the show.I thought that setting the plot at a rundown hotel was an awesome idea, something different for once. The music was tense and many of the killers although maybe a bit silly, were pretty decent.Overall, See No Evil is no gold-winning Horror film, but there shouldn't be so much hate on it. It really isn't that bad. Many of the horror films from 2005 were awful. Accept for Feast, but many from that period were horrible. This film kicks ass and I do believe it doesn't intend or even try to cover new ground at all. It was only following the formula. Even Horror films these days have tried following the same ol' slasher formula. See No Evil was unique, and I'd like to see Kane in more horror films. 7 eyeballs out of 10