H4wke

Played this one in the spooky dark over the course of two nights. It's blatantly terrible in a few areas: the voice acting genuinely resembles 12 year old me in my old Lego stop-motion videos, the character models come close to the quality of PS1 Hagrid (tho not as handsome), the bleak, twisty plot feels like it's written by a teenager.

But the gameplay loop is there, mostly resembling RE1 with its glacial doors and obnoxious hunters. My heart pounded more in the first run of this (yes I got game over thanks to three uggo hunters in one cell) than in any of the previous three games. Ammo initially felt appropriately scarce, only assuaged by it carrying into my second playthrough.

The different routes are sick, went to the arcade one night then the library another, great summation of my life. The atmosphere is weirdly solid; neon lights, grimy metal, areas fading into the black abyss, the game lets the imagination cook. Intent or console limitations? We know the actual answer but if I'm allowed to keep saying fog makes Morrowind cooler then I'll let the devs have a chance here.

The soundtrack pops off. It's got that late 90s weirdness to it (people say that about me too, in private). I was surprised by how dynamic it was sometimes. Zombies appeared in the theatre and breakcore mode kicked in outta nowhere. Almost was more spooked by that than the three dudes tryin to eat me.

The game has a charm to it that I just can't fully badmouth no matter how hard I try.

The only time I got genuinely upset was when two alligators appeared either side of me - it wasn't because of the difficulty, it was more that the alligator sandwich joke my dad never stops saying finally got payoff.

Zombies are boring. Their initial scare value was mostly due to it being a direct confrontation with mortality. These aren't just flesh eaters, they're flesh eaters with human faces - death: mobilised and hungry.

People often want to forget the great uniter. The thing we all (so far) have to face. Forget it, overlook it, hell, quarantine it, it'll make no difference.

Since that initial 60s zombie boom (the zomboom), not a whole lot had been done to make them scarier.

28 Days Later is the best use of them that I've seen to date. People turn in 20 seconds from people with personalities, dreams and memories into murderous rage machines. And they're fast. The speed gives credence to a civilisation collapsing. Great Britain, gone in a month to virus-ridden barbarians.

Our main character wakes up from a coma, a brilliant way to let the audience learn alongside him just what the hell happened. One that surely won't be repeated in a zombie story.

This first third is pretty damn flawless. The grungy, early digital format reinforces the bleak atmosphere on display. The editing stuck out to me especially; shaky cam that actually elevates the action, frenetic montages at the end of built-up music, melancholic intermissions, it's all balanced so well.

The final third does lose energy. There are some interesting ideas being toyed with here, and the build up to eventual conflict is fantastic, even with the kid actor's wooden lines threatening the entire film. It just doesn't deliver on the tension. That, and the ending isn't all that interesting, it felt like a rather rushed and abrupt conclusion.

There's an onslaught of Harrison Ford 90s films that I have yet to wade through. It's funny how modern times have soured any pro-America films (there's a whole heap of em) for the time being; seeing a president set on his way being the way to do things only just works if you happen to look, sound and act like Harrison Ford.

The film is decent enough. I appreciated the blocking a lot, especially in the important people room - not all the blocks were busted by this decade I suppose. The premise is fun, and the action was competent.

Ford is fantastic, dude knows how to act. The chameleon (Oldman) was unsurprisingly fun, though his cronies were a little underwhelming.

My biggest gripe with the plot comes with revealing the traitor extremely early. It took away any suspense with that particular subplot, a great deal of potential tension is evaporated entirely.

So it's pretty ok overall. Glad to check it off the list. I have a hazy memory seeing the DVD in the video store, another movie that I never saw before it closed down. At least kid me will be happy.