Lost Signal

Many people have made the experience that they were staying in a foreign city and went out in the night for a drink into an inn only 10 or 15 minutes foot-distance remote from their hotel. And although they were not drunk and thought that they did memorize the way from the hotel to the inn, they did not find their way back again. Somebody to whom this happened in Vienna has told me that for his great luck he finally found a taxi that brought him back to the hotel. When he entered the taxi, the cab-driver laughed and said: Are you sure that you don't want to walk? It's just around the next corner. When they arrived there, the cab-driver showed him on a map that the man must have walked more or less in circles for about an hour - and every time turning into the false last street before the hotel, as if he had been magically attracted by "an evil force".

The colleague who told me this episode also described that from minute to minute his fear was increasing. Now, imagine he had been drunk. Then, it could have happened that he would not have been able to wave a cab towards him, as busy as Vienna is during the night. He might have ended up on a parking-bench, or even worse in the Vienna-river or in a Danube canal. Orientation means the semiotic mechanism to move our body safely through a labyrinth of contradictory information which has first to be deciphered in order to serve to reach the goal of our movements. If this semiotic mechanism collapses, which means that the signs cannot be deciphered anymore, we are not only lost in the outer, but also in our inner world.

"Lost Signal" (2007) shows this complete loss of information step by step, caused by LSD or a related drogue which seems to paralyze practically wholly the capacity of orientation of the two protagonists. Their own visual perception starts to create monsters, the words heard at the cell phone have completely changed their meaning and sense. When orientation is gone, the human is no longer a semiotic being, because with the orientation he has lost its environment. Therefore, he becomes his own environment, projecting demons created by his brain into the vacuum of where the environment used to be. Although I cannot judge if the world of appearances caused by LSD is correctly depicted, I can tell that the movie does a magnificent job. This movie did not go out of my head (as many thematically related films did), it has this "mystical" glue that sticks to your brain.

This movie sucks! The acting is a joke. The screenplay is horrible. The real-life story was unnecessarily altered by preposterous details such as the couple had been given LSD when, in fact, they had taken a ton of meth. This is one of those movies you watch to make fun of. What a waste of 2 million dollars. It could have been made so much more interesting if the writers would have stuck to the facts and not made it a "horror" film. It was like a bad lifetime drama. Do not watch unless you have an hour and a half of your time that you don't mind wasting and you know in advance what you're getting yourself into. You have been warned.

Dead of winter, also known as Lost Signal, follows Santos and McCoy, a young couple who are unknowingly slipped a high dosage of LSD at a New Years Eve party. As the drugs start to take effect, and the couple leaves the party, they start to become paranoid that someone is out to get them. After a car accident leaves them stranded in the woods, their trip continues gaining momentum as does their fear.

I found this movie by total accident in the wee hours of the mourning. I was bored and needed some background noise while I was studying for finals. Before I knew it I was drawn in and hooked, not able to take my attention away from the movie. I've seen quite a few movies with the "Bad Trip" scenario, and hated most of them, but what makes this movie stand out from the rest is there is no madman, no monster, you are simply viewing two people who have no clue that they are having an extremely strong LSD trip. The actors who play the two mains do an excellent job of portraying this terrifying situation as well, both are very believable during the entire movie. I really had a good time watching this film. It turned out to be one of those random "it came from Netflix" gems I find now and then when sleep isn't an option. I highly recommend giving this movie a chance, it is very much atmosphere driven so don't expect ton's of story or over the top special effects. If it wasn't for the super cheesy special effects, that caused me many times to be reminded that what I was watching was only a movie due to how silly they were most of the time I would of given this film a bit higher of a score. But none the less I feel its worth your time.

6/10 - Ritualistic The Liberal Dead http://liberaldead.blogspot.com

This movie is not a slasher-horror which is what I like about it. Instead of just hacking up a bunch of teens, the filmmakers actually made a story about how bad drugs are and how scary it can be to be messed up on them.

I thought the movie looked way bigger than 2MM and the acting was great. I would recommend watching this movie if you see it on TV or on DVD. It is better and more original than most movies I have seen lately.

I also thought Brian McNamara from the show Army Wives was great as the sheriff and as a director. I look forward to seeing his next directorial project.

I wish I could choose a number lower than 1 = awful. Whom ever is responsible for this garbage...go kill yourself. Its over.

2 million budget my left nut. It makes Blair Witch Project look like Ten Commandments.

Try making porn dude. You don't need to have creative talent for that.

See if they need a gopher on a real movie and try to pay attention to how they do things.

I don't want to be rude. But seriously, it really really sucks. Do they have a "movie making for dummys" book? It might be a little above your head but give it a try. Seriously, you have nothing to lose. Or maybe get an internship at IHOP.