Lost Colony

Stumbling upon the 2007 movie "Lost Colony: The Legend of Roanoke" by random luck here in 2025, and never actually having heard about it, of course I opted to watch the movie, on account of it being a horror movie of sorts, and a movie that I hadn't already seen.

Of course I am familiar with the story of the Roanoke settlement, so I did have an idea of what I was in for here, more or less.

Writer Rafael Jordan put together an okay enough script. The movie boasts it is based on real events, yeah, well let's just let the simmer for a bit, shall we? The movie proved to be entertaining enough for what it was, a relatively low budget horror movie, so don't get your hopes up here.

There were a couple of familiar faces on the cast list, with the likes of Adrian Paul, Frida Farrell, Rhett Giles and Michael Teh. The acting performances in the movie were fair.

"Lost Colony: The Legend of Roanoke" looked and felt like a TV movie, for better or worse. The special effects in the movie were okay, but a bit on the cheap and cheesy side.

My rating of director Matt Codd's 2007 movie "Lost Colony: The Legend of Roanoke" lands on a generous four out of ten stars.

This movie is an entertaining flick that one can see once but not more. I would suggest you to loan this movie if you are interested in a short and action filled movie with a few fantasy and horror elements in a beautiful geographical and historical setting. This is a perfect movie if you are looking for a last film to rent or buy to get a special price reduction or guarantee bonus in the usual shops. It's also a perfect movie to watch something relaxing on a lonely night on television before you go to bed as it is no disturbing flick at all where it isn't ultimately important if you close your eyes from time to time. It's the perfect movie too softly switch your brain off at night.

I give already one point to the magnificent landscapes and locations of the flick. The places are well captured and the camera crew delivers a solid job. Another point goes the cultural, historical and mythological background of the movie that is not always that plausible but at least intriguing. The philosophical and moral touch concerning values of friendship, trust, faith and strength adds another interesting level to this low budget movie. A fourth point goes out to the acting. Even though it is not stunning, the rather unknown actors are doing what they can with what they get and I have seen much worse performances. I could maybe give half a point to the ending of the movie that is not ultimately surprising but well chosen.

The problem with this flick is the constant lack of atmosphere. There is no suspense or horror in the air, the most frightening scene is already the opening sequence. As soon as you see what attacks the lost colony, any degree of suspense is erased as the special effects are horrible and make you rather laugh out loud than fear. The whole plot doesn't always seem coherent and intriguing to carry over the whole length of the movie. Concerning the action or slash factor, this one is surprisingly low and the battles are really poor and almost boring. Now, as the story is not intriguing and as there is no true suspense, no action and no horror, there is not much left that carries this movie on to be honest. The movie seems to slightly touch any of the mentioned genres without building up something concrete. Some horror scenes, some fantasy moments, some action sequences, some drama dialogues and from time to time some landscape shots are mixed together to a whole mediocre movie of chilled entertainment.

I wouldn't be so hard on this film. No one has ever been able to give a good account of what really happened, and the whole mystery is there to speculate and to guess and write stories about. Sci-fi channel has had it's good stories and dull ones, and this is not at good as I was hoping for, but I don't believe it was half bad. It could have been better if they had a seasoned director and producer who is use to doing mystery/suspense thrillers, but I don't think that was the case. I wonder what George Lucas could have done with it or someone with a little more imagination. Besides, think about it, we didn't see the entire movie, we saw the edited version and I willing to bet that it would have been a lot more scarier and would have made a lot more reasonable sense if those parts were in there. Sometimes I wish when they came out with movies on DVD, they would give you a choice of seeing the extended version with the deleted scenes or the theater movie.

As for the acting, the movie, just like X-men III, it seemed very rushed and I am sure they were times constraints. However, actors do a better job when they have more time to get into the part and make some suggestions of their own and I am not sure that happened. I think they were just given the part and told to "do it!" which also does not make for a good movie. But, you can't blame the actors who are given a script that they can only do so much with and I think the actors did the best they could and were not able to live up to their talent.

I also think if just a little bit more money was put into it, it would have been a better picture. I hate it when things "happen" and there is a reason why they may be happening, but no one tells or says what it is. You see that in a lot of horror movies. People want to know background history, legends, etc. I thought a halfway descent effort was made for this. But like Eddie Murphy says, "Why do white people stay in a place that is haunted?" I am white but I would have gotten the HE** out.

The whole incident is a bit haunting itself. It is very hard to really know how many Native American nations and tribes there really were. Many died out before the settlers came and some were dying off about that time. But, the word on the tree, "Croatian" (SP) does seem familiar and I do believe it was the name of a Native American tribe that may have befriended the colonist and took them into their tribe and that word was put on their so that the coming settlers would know where to find them. But, instead, the just left it a mystery and may have wanted to on purpose because they may have wanted a plan or something to scare people about in the event of any indigenous people in the area they wanted to get rid of. I mean, look what happened after wards? I believe that those colonist did not want to return and stayed with the Croatians since a lot of tribes were nomadic during the seasons. That is just a theory with no scientific backing. But it beats thinking that they were slaughtered because the Native Americans were blamed for a lot of things they didn't do and we nearly committed Genocide.

this movie is a fictional account of events leading up to the mysterious disappearance of a bunch of English colonists in the 16th century. While I never saw the "Highlander" TV show, I have known the serviceable Adrian Paul from his old "War of the Worlds" series days. The guy still keeps in shape. The video moves along fairly well and contains reasonably high suspense along with a very high slaughter rate among wraiths, soldiers, colonists and a native American tribe. The actors do what they can with what they got. the picture contains good outdoor scenery of the woods. don't expect Shakespeare with this worthwhile two hour time killer.

In 1587, 117 brave men and women set sail from Britain to establish the first English colony in Americas. They land on Roanoke Island, off the coast of Virginia. They build a settlement and plant crops. After a period, a group of colonists finds the local fortress deserted with the corpse of a suicidal hanged in decomposition and a warning written with blood on the ceiling. Ananias Dare (Adrian Paul) is assigned to be in charge of the colony while their leader will bring supplies. Sooner Ananias learns that the forest is haunted by evil spirits that feed themselves of human soul and that they are chasing his new-born daughter that has a pure soul.

"Wraiths of Roanoke" is a lame and boring film with a terrible story, bad acting and direction, awful art direction and costumes and poor special effects. Further, it is too long and repetitive along 95 minutes running time, giving the sensation that the annoying story will never end. This flick is highly recommended for insomnious viewers that do not want to swallow sleeping pills. My vote is three.

Title (Brazil): "Espíritos da Floresta" ("Spirits of the Forest")