Die letzte Fahrt der Demeter

Just saw the critics ratings for this film on Rotten Tomatoes. Eh? Please ignore them. This film was atmospheric, thrilling, well acted and brutal. The set design was amazing also, so much detail. I can't believe the reviews. Go watch it and make your own mind up. Excellent little creature feature with a great premise and I had a great time.

The critics gripes are that they knew what was going to happen at the end of the film because it was derived from a chapter from the Dracula novel. So this doesn't make it an interesting watch anyway? That is also just a straight up false assumption. Film reviewers have really lost it these days. I have learned a lesson through watching this film first and then looking at reviews afterwards.

'The Last Voyage of the Demeter' ended up being a lot better than I expected. I haven't seen a good vampire film in such a long time that I was really starting to suspect the genre had very little left to offer. Naturally then, I went into this film with rather low expectations. The film pleasantly surprised me though.

The film is very well made. We start with a scene from later in the movie. I'm not always the biggest fan of this, but in this case it was needed as there was a lengthy time of set-up at the beginning of the film, where if there wasn't promise of excitement to come, it could've lost some audience members.

Once the horror begins it was reasonably effective. The ship in the middle of the ocean is a truly great setting for a horror movie. There are a lot of night scenes too (vampire movies naturally always have a lot of those) which added to the suspenseful atmosphere.

And outside of the horror there was some decent stuff going on too. Some character's who were actually fairly likeable (unheard of in a modern horror film, right?). Also some very well written dialogue helped flesh things out and kept the less interesting scenes afloat.

The film wasn't afraid to break some boundaries too. Often in films like this you can tell at the start all the characters that are 100% going to be safe, but that wasn't the case here. I was pleasantly surprised by that.

All in all this did about as well with the concept as could've been expected. It's not a film I will likely ever watch again. But it passed two hours for me in reasonably enjoyable fashion. 6.5/10.

Rogue One is based on a small snippet of a larger story, but managed to expand that small snippet into a fun adventure. This movie does the same thing, but with an R rating. It takes a chapter out of Bram Stoker's Dracula, and turns it into a summer, thriller/suspense movie. I enjoyed this movie for what it was, I would recommend it as a good time.

This is a decent, popcorn summer film. If you go in expecting more or less, you will be disappointed. I went in with low expectations as the movie was not doing well critically. Some critics were lamenting it adds nothing new to the dracula mythos, it doesn't subvert expectations, it doesn't reinvent the wheel. C'mon guys, not every movie needs to be an Oscar contender, can't we just have some fun with Dracula? Critics were too harsh on this movie and are slamming it for what it isn't rather than commenting on what it is. It's a solid 7/10 movie.

I enjoyed The Last Voyage of the Demeter. It's a cool stand-alone movie in a subgenre I frequently enjoy. There are a bunch of cool scenes and powerful moments. It does a good job creating unique characters. The performances are fairly good all around, with the standout being Liam Cunningham of GoT fame.

The movie also has a bunch of issues. I couldn't understand a lot of the dialogue. This is partly due to the accents, but more to do with sound mixing. I wasn't as engaged as I should have been. And not everything works.

But the biggest thing holding it back is that it's slow. It takes a while to get going. It's a full hour into the movie before you see anything. Now this could have been enjoyable if we didn't know what to expect. We would have been wondering what's happening, what's causing all of this. But of course the trailers give it away.

And even for people who avoid trailers like me and went in not knowing, the movie tells you in text right at the start. Instead of filling you with curiosity, you already know and are just waiting to get to it. And even after that, it doesn't pick up the pace all that much.

I still had a pretty good time with this movie, although I don't really see myself watching it again. (1 viewing, opening Thursday 8/10/2023)

Interesting premise that made me imagine something along the lines of Alien. And they managed to create a great atmosphere through quality set decorations and lighting. Unfortunately that atmosphere never evolved and the horror elements never really materialized. The vampire makeup reminded me more of the now, rather familiar, orcs from Lord of the rings - and not the terrifying creature it should have been.

The feeling of dread and the possible cat-and-mouse-hunts during the night segments never materialized. And what was there were too often lost in darkness and ultra-fast editing. Alien on a sailing vessel, this was not.