Reviews

This film makes no sense whatsoever, it doesn't work as a horror movie and it doesn't work as a psychological thriller.

As other s have said, the film takes "Rear Window" and adds roaches. But it's not a very good copy of "Rear Window" and there's no real suspense or horror. And just when it might be getting somewhere, everyone starts acting insanely. The roaches finally appear and I start asking why is he doing that, why is she doing that, what are they thinking.

Two thirds of the film is a "Rear Window" copy, where the main character is restricted to his bedroom due to the after effects of an illness, spending his time photographing everything he can see out of his bedroom window. The problem with this approach is that he CAN leave his bedroom, even going outside at one point. This negates all the claustrophobic tension, what little there is, and reduces the film to voyeuristic weirdness. Over the period of the film it becomes clear t hat there's nothing really wrong with him, but I think this is mainly due to a poor script and bad acting rather than a deliberate plot arc.

When the roaches finally appear the main character suddenly seems unable to use the phone to call the police, having watched two people getting killed on the street. Instead he keeps watching events outside his window. Watching a roach creep up on his sister in the street, he again fails to use the phone to call her and warn her, even though we know she has her cell phone with her.

And, of course, we have the obligatory "all females are useless and just scream their heads off at the first sign of trouble" cliché. Please, the world has moved on from the 1950's.

As a slasher/monster movie this film is a complete failure. There are few deaths, nearly all shown in terrible lighting so there's nothing to see, and you have to wait at least an hour for the first real attack. If want a bit of gore, skip the first hour and watch the rest. You'll still understand what's going on, and still find yourself disappointed.

I would think you could make this film for under a million dollars as you only need two rooms and one outside location, although I could have rewritten the story to only need one room. There's very little SFX involved as most of the film is just two or three people talking, and you could remove several people from the film and not notice the difference, thus saving on actors fees.

Overall this is a poorly conceived, adequately executed attempt at film making from a recent graduate of film studies. As something to watch, I'd stick to watching paint dry.

This movie is a dramatisation of real-life events, about a guy who's darker side takes over and leads to murder. As such, there is no dissection of the psyche to explain the lead character's flaws and proclivities. This is just a collection of scenes strung together by people involved in the events, presenting a portrait of a man just like everyone else but who spiralled out of control.

It seems clear there was no participation from Philip Markoff or his family, so there are inevitable gaps in the story. However, there are enough nuggets presented to allow a clear picture to evolve of a complex character.

Philip Markoff doesn't come over as a monster. Instead he's just like everyone else; a person with multiple facets to their personality, who leads a double-life, who hides aspects of his life from other people - just like everyone does. Don't think everyone hides parts of themselves from others? How many people hide their browsing history from others? How many married people have affairs? How many people are polite to your face and then curse you behind your back. We all have multiple aspects to ourselves, but for some people these aspects can be damaging. This film presents a portrait of a 'normal' man, with no judgements or fake insights.

As part of the portrait of a normal man, Philip Markoff isn't presented as some dark, evil genius; he's actually quite bad at keeping his lives separate, he's no computer genius, and he's obviously never watched CSI. He's a normal guy who gets caught fairly quickly because he doesn't know how to hide his tracks, just like everyone else.

This film is exactly what it tries to be, a simple portrait of events that shocked a nation. There's no huge budget, no intense emotion-wrenching acting, no pop-psych 101, just a simple story about a troubled man. I didn't watch this film expecting Oscar-class movie making. It's a made for TV film that delivers exactly what it set out to, a solid film about the guy next door.

Most people watch zombie movies for the chases, the fight sequences, blood, guts, gore, the infected friend dilemma and the betrayal by Government/Big Pharma. And that's what this film delivers - a zombie movie without all the boring bits. There's almost no back story, no character development, a simple linear storyline, lots of zombies, tons of death, and mountains of blood, guts and gore that'll keep the most jaded teenager happy.

Storyline (such as it is): A group of soldiers goes across the wall to rescue some people and get samples of a new virus. Of course the Government/Big Pharma betray them and the team have to deal with the situation of a member of the troop becoming infected. Thankfully, due to the lack of time for character development, the situations are handled crisply, in a few seconds, without all that shouting and emoting that goes on in Hollywood films.

The whole thing looks low-budget and suffers slightly because of that, but it's a hugely entertaining film that shows more flair than all of the Resident Evil films put together. Give David M. Reynolds a decent budget, an expanded script to include all the usual boring bits, and Jason Statham as the lead character and you'd have a zombie film that'd take the box office by storm.

If you're going to have an evening of beer, pizza and gore, this is a perfect starter before settling in to something more substantial .