When I rated "Pulse I", I had two bad impressions:
1-- Characters I did not care about.
2-- Failure to breathe the expectation of terror into the premise of the Dead coming back through our communications Technology.
Pulse II made a good try. The Characters, this time around, were people the audience was supposed to connect with-- unlike the first movie which focused on a couple of vapid cardboard college students.
This time, it's a family that is caught up in the on-going emergency created by the undead communications plague. A little girl, her mother and father have been separated-- both by the plague and by marital strife.
Problem: the movie begins moving with these long camera shots of a woman crying and whinging through the remains of her shattered life and wondering where her little girl is. Now-- for a guy looking at a horror movie-- we're waiting for the whinging to be ended by something bloody and scarifying. Instead, she goes on and on and on until it becomes just annoying to watch and hear. What's her problem? Is she a Moron? Hello, Lady-- we know about the female penchant to be dazed and Confused and Whiney at the End of the World-- but JEEZ!! THEN we get the picture! OHH. SHE'S DEAD!
That's alright then-- but the movie should have clued us in that TWENTY MINUTES AGO!!!!!
Okay-- mystery cleared up. But the movie fails to pick up the pace. Enter the Father and the equally clueless brat-- Excuse me-- adorable daughter.
In fact, Daddy is clueless as his dead wife. I mean, in the middle of a catastrophe caused by the Dead invading the world through Cellphone and the Internet-- you figure a GUY would know that poking at an email program with your crazy dead wife on the other side is like--SUICIDE?!?!?
Well DOH! Even the tramp girlfriend knew better!!
The failing here, again, was the the inability to create a sense of terror in the notion that the dead are lurking behind every electronic On/Off switch. The sight of a blinking light on a Laptop should instill dread and expectation. Instead-- it's turned on because Idiot Dad humps tramp girlfriend and bumps the table. And Now, it's connecting to the WIFI signal.
The viewer just rolls his eyes. Ooooooh Scary! Pop a finger out your mouth, whirl it in the air and make the appropriate expletive we all know. Besides, even when we're in the City, we WISH we could get a WIFI signal that fast!! SO we KNOW it's unreal fantasy!!
A Half score. A near failure only because the first one was a pure failure. Jamie Bamber was wasted here-- unless the director thought that this movie would click with the Chick-Horror-Flick crowd. Again, in the end, we just don't care.
Pulse III was on the shelf at Blockbuster when I picked this one up-- it will stay there. I won't even bother if I see it for download. Such a waste of a great scary idea!! WASTED!
1-- Characters I did not care about.
2-- Failure to breathe the expectation of terror into the premise of the Dead coming back through our communications Technology.
Pulse II made a good try. The Characters, this time around, were people the audience was supposed to connect with-- unlike the first movie which focused on a couple of vapid cardboard college students.
This time, it's a family that is caught up in the on-going emergency created by the undead communications plague. A little girl, her mother and father have been separated-- both by the plague and by marital strife.
Problem: the movie begins moving with these long camera shots of a woman crying and whinging through the remains of her shattered life and wondering where her little girl is. Now-- for a guy looking at a horror movie-- we're waiting for the whinging to be ended by something bloody and scarifying. Instead, she goes on and on and on until it becomes just annoying to watch and hear. What's her problem? Is she a Moron? Hello, Lady-- we know about the female penchant to be dazed and Confused and Whiney at the End of the World-- but JEEZ!! THEN we get the picture! OHH. SHE'S DEAD!
That's alright then-- but the movie should have clued us in that TWENTY MINUTES AGO!!!!!
Okay-- mystery cleared up. But the movie fails to pick up the pace. Enter the Father and the equally clueless brat-- Excuse me-- adorable daughter.
In fact, Daddy is clueless as his dead wife. I mean, in the middle of a catastrophe caused by the Dead invading the world through Cellphone and the Internet-- you figure a GUY would know that poking at an email program with your crazy dead wife on the other side is like--SUICIDE?!?!?
Well DOH! Even the tramp girlfriend knew better!!
The failing here, again, was the the inability to create a sense of terror in the notion that the dead are lurking behind every electronic On/Off switch. The sight of a blinking light on a Laptop should instill dread and expectation. Instead-- it's turned on because Idiot Dad humps tramp girlfriend and bumps the table. And Now, it's connecting to the WIFI signal.
The viewer just rolls his eyes. Ooooooh Scary! Pop a finger out your mouth, whirl it in the air and make the appropriate expletive we all know. Besides, even when we're in the City, we WISH we could get a WIFI signal that fast!! SO we KNOW it's unreal fantasy!!
A Half score. A near failure only because the first one was a pure failure. Jamie Bamber was wasted here-- unless the director thought that this movie would click with the Chick-Horror-Flick crowd. Again, in the end, we just don't care.
Pulse III was on the shelf at Blockbuster when I picked this one up-- it will stay there. I won't even bother if I see it for download. Such a waste of a great scary idea!! WASTED!