The Hunters did have good potential. The cast was decent, and the basic story could have been really interesting if executed well and with nice ideas, regardless of how original or not it is. The big problem however with The Hunters is how it had all this potential, and didn't do anything with any of it.
It has a couple of things that it did do right. The scenery is very nice and exotic. Michelle Forbes brings command and winning energy to her role, the only person in the cast to scrape by with any kind of dignity.
On the other hand, aside from the scenery it does agreed look like it was intended to be a very low-budget TV pilot, and it also feels it. It's drably shot and choppily edited in the action, while the special effects looked unfinished, props were sparse or inappropriate (a lot of the weapons in the action come out of nowhere) and costumes failed to give a sense of time and place. The rest of the acting, despite the talent is poor, especially with the annoyingly amateur performances from the children, while Victor Garber has seldom been more wooden. The movie is flatly directed, generically scored and the action suffers from choppy editing, pedestrian and far from fun or suspenseful choreography and unmotivated performing of it.
The script and story are the biggest failures with The Hunters. The script is paper-thin, and some of the one-liners from particularly Tripp are out of place and irritate more than they amuse. The story structurally is every bit as thin with some very dull pacing as a result of trying to stretch out the running time, and even worse it is disjointed from trying to take on too many elements and doing little with any of them ( especially with the fairy-tale elements). There's no tension, suspense or fun as a result of playing the adventure and suspense too safe and by-the-numbers, which makes the adventure parts as far from thrilling and entertaining as you could go. The characters are stereotypically cardboard, and very hard to care or root for.
All in all, a dull, disjointed mess apart from the scenery and Forbes. 2/10 Bethany Cox
It has a couple of things that it did do right. The scenery is very nice and exotic. Michelle Forbes brings command and winning energy to her role, the only person in the cast to scrape by with any kind of dignity.
On the other hand, aside from the scenery it does agreed look like it was intended to be a very low-budget TV pilot, and it also feels it. It's drably shot and choppily edited in the action, while the special effects looked unfinished, props were sparse or inappropriate (a lot of the weapons in the action come out of nowhere) and costumes failed to give a sense of time and place. The rest of the acting, despite the talent is poor, especially with the annoyingly amateur performances from the children, while Victor Garber has seldom been more wooden. The movie is flatly directed, generically scored and the action suffers from choppy editing, pedestrian and far from fun or suspenseful choreography and unmotivated performing of it.
The script and story are the biggest failures with The Hunters. The script is paper-thin, and some of the one-liners from particularly Tripp are out of place and irritate more than they amuse. The story structurally is every bit as thin with some very dull pacing as a result of trying to stretch out the running time, and even worse it is disjointed from trying to take on too many elements and doing little with any of them ( especially with the fairy-tale elements). There's no tension, suspense or fun as a result of playing the adventure and suspense too safe and by-the-numbers, which makes the adventure parts as far from thrilling and entertaining as you could go. The characters are stereotypically cardboard, and very hard to care or root for.
All in all, a dull, disjointed mess apart from the scenery and Forbes. 2/10 Bethany Cox