Day of Reckoning - Hell Will Rise

I've given up on the SyFy Channel. This is typical of all their productions. Terrifying and spectacular scenes involving CGI monsters/aliens/whatever separated by deserts of arid narrative with little or no purpose other than taking the characters to the next scene involving CGI. It's just crap. Some visual engagement but zero intellectual value otherwise. The suits at SyFy either are idiots or venal purveyors of weird trash -- or both. Don't waste your time. There's so little artistic value, other than the yeoman efforts of the put-upon casts, that I honestly believe SyFy is soliciting scripts from middle-schoolers. With a title like "Day of Reckoning" and the very rare religious references made in dialog, one might suspect that some attempt at rationalizing the cause of a disaster threatening the existence of the human race might be made. One would be mistaken in that assumption. There's nothing here. Watching while drunk might improve the experience.

I give this film 3 stars because most of the cast does a very good job in putting a sincere effort to make this work. They did not have much to work with, but they tried! The story line is pure Syfy routine, and the ENTIRE storyline is trite and formulaic, and which has been rehashed in every movie they have EVER made!

The negligent and estranged husband/father is the hero of the day and he and his ex-wife fall back in love like EVERY movie they have EVER made.

The constant flow of plot connivences is hysterical. When a tool is needed SHAZAAM it appears, when someone needs to be found despite chaos and crowds SHAZAAM they are found. Also events not logical to the plot occur to make a point. Example: ALL the demons are gone, but one "last" one appears, in order to kill the bad guy at the end.

People who do not like guns SUDDENLY become sharpshooters, even the mother and teenage son! It is all so contrived that near the end I almost shut it off!

One last point is the fact that the family who become the heroes is all white and the two Hispanic characters are portrayed as the evil and cowardly soldier and the dimwitted boyfriend of the mother!!!

GIVE ME A BREAK!!!!!

Part of me knew what to expect from 'Day of Reckoning' and that it was meant to be not take it too seriously and take it for what it is films. The idea was a good one and the cover looked cool and a little creepy, so while not expecting much part of me wanted to enjoy it.

While there are certainly far worse films than 'Day of Reckoning', even taking it for what it's meant to be it is a major failure and really not a good film at all. There are similar films and low-budget films that have been surprisingly average and above, so actually 'Day of Reckoning' could have been good with the right execution. Instead a good idea is ruined by the terrible way nearly everything is executed and the coolness and creepiness stays in solely in cover and doesn't translate in the film.

'Day of Reckoning' at least has occasional splashes of fun and some semi-decent scenery.

However, while there has been worse acting it is still poor, both bland and forced. None of the characters are easy to get behind or interesting, it's all very flimsy and any attempts to develop them feel like melodramatic padding. Their decisions and behaviours also don't make sense and they show very little emotion to tense or dramatic situations.

Nearly everything severely underwhelms. Not just being visually cheap and poorly acted and written even worse but what seemed like a decent, if very generic, idea was executed in typical fashion, with no imagination whatsoever and only occasional splashes of fun.

Faring worse are the production values, story and writing. 'Day of Reckoning', aside from the scenery, is drably shot and sloppily edited, but it's the truly abysmal special effects that are the worst. As the creatures were made on a low-budget it would have been forgiven a little if it was not great, but when the effects for the sharks look as if no effort was given in making them without looking so goofy and unfinished-looking that is hard to ignore or forgive.

Can say no better about the portrayal of the creatures either. They exude little personality either, no menace, not even any unintentional goofiness. Generally the attack scenes, apart from the odd mild amusement, are sloppily edited, too brief and devoid of suspense or sense of horror. Moreover, there is no attempt to give them any explanation or development so the motivations and such are confused and vague.

It is hard to not take 'Day of Reckoning' seriously, when it itself doesn't know whether to take itself seriously or not. Some parts make earnest attempts to not be stupid but come over as pedestrian and over-serious. Other parts go well overboard on the silliness that one is cringing rather than being entertained.

Really wanted to like the story here because the concept was intriguing slightly, but while it starts nicely the further the movie progresses the lazier, cheesier and more formulaic it gets and it gets stale quickly.

Overall, very poor. 2/10 Bethany Cox

Not quite as bad as those from the 1950/60's, but surprisingly poor CGI for 2016: The monsters are visually obvious additions. At one point, a dog-like creature attacks a man who - instead of trying to use his hands, throws them up! The acting was OK, as was the dialogue. The plot had reasonable promise but only for about a half-hour. The interactions between good and bad guys was believable for the most part. I don't think any interaction between the monsters and anything else - buildings, humans or other monsters - was believable. Shocking when almost all films rely heavily on such nowadays. Perhaps Sc-Fi channel has too rigid production schedules, or lousy quality control?

So you have monsters coming out of a hole in the earth every fifteen years. Salt kills them. And no one thought to dump salt water in the hole? Just wondering.