Forsaken

A viewer should not spend his time watching a film rated 2.1 in IMDb. Time is irreversible and once lost, cannot be retrieved. However I decided to give a chance and see "Forsaken" to check whether it would be so bad. The film has just ended and it is worse than its rating. I have no idea what the senseless story of exorcism is about and what are the motives of Paul, his wife, his daughter, her friends, the doctor and the locals. Therefore I am incapable to write a plot summary since the story is not possible to be understood. In addition, characters come and go, thrown on the screen without any previous development. The lead character, Paul, is a complete mess and it is impossible to know what he is doing in the film. The conclusion (is there a conclusion?) is a joke so terrible it is. My vote is one (awful).

Title (Brazil): Fortunately it is not available.

I don't know why I'm writing this review. Usually I avoid watching this kind of films. For the last ten or so years, I've been successful at that, but now it happened with a mistake. I thought it was the one with Don Sutherland in it. I did not realise that I'm in a wrong film until I saw someone who was possessed by a demon doing the yoga poses.

I'd already started, so decided to finish it off, but that was a bad decision to regret. Knowing it would be a worst film, sit for it through is what real patience a film fanatic need. But surely I won't suggest any of you to do that, because it is totally a waste of time. Instead, you can re-watch any film you thought is very bad before this one.

For me, this is like an almost worst film ever, though I've seen even worse than this, so it will be one among them that I disliked badly. Honestly, I laughed better during watching it than those real comedies from the recent time. I know there will be people who find it at least a decent, but definitely majority would find it difficult keep watching, so 10-15 minutes would be a great achievement. Recommended to skip it from the miles.

1/10

There was no plot. Ex. When the priest was tied up and then all the sudden was at the burning cross...how did he get there? Why was his daughter having the experiences she did? What did it have to do with the rest of the movie? What really happened to the horse that was supposedly killed? Why was there a cult and what did it have to do with anything? Literally the worst movie plot I've ever seen. The only good thing is that it was kinda creepy and the makeup and effects were done better than the whole entire movie plot line. I'm a huge fan of horror. I watch it enough that it doesn't really scare me anymore, so a good story line is needed to keep me interested. I woke up today pretty hung over and decided to give it a try. At first I was stoked that it was actually creeping me out. It's been a while. I love the scare effect. But then, I was just sad cuz the movie makes no sense. If the producers of this movie see this, please do it better. Cuz it has the potential to really scare the crap outta me.

Possession films are not usually films habitually seen by me. There was something though mildly intriguing about 'Forsaken's' idea. There are examples of good films about possession, and while horror is not my favourite genre of film there is an appreciation for and there are classics in it.

'Forsaken' is far from a good example of a possession or horror film. It is a classic example of how not to do either, is a terrible film on its own and that it's low budget is not an excuse (seeing as there are films out there made on a low budget and still manage to be watchable). It doesn't even have a promising opening scene, nothing unsettling or suspenseful and bordering on the silly, atmospheric set design (the rest of the production values are just too amateurish to make me remotely appreciate it) or a watchable actor in a small role trying to do something with it to make things better.

Visually, 'Forsaken' looks poor. It is so chaotically and self-indulgently shot, sloppily and sometimes confusingly edited, there is such a dreary look to the lighting and the effects and such are a shambles. Whether the set or anything like that was good was hard to tell or appreciate because of bad everything else in the production values looked and when distracted by everything in the film being so amateurishly executed.

The music is often intrusive and inappropriate in mood and placement, generating absolutely no suspense because it makes it so obvious something bad or unforeseeable is going to happen. It and the bizarre sound mixing tend to drown out the dialogue.

Not that the dialogue was worth hearing. When it was not hard to understand (with it being rambling gibberish delivered in never other than mumbling), the dialogue is enough to make even the most childish child feel dumb and it constantly sounds awkward. It rambles and doesn't make sense with a lot of cheese and mawkishness.

Everything about the story execution feels stale and incredibly dull. Even worse is that it's often incoherent, with such aimless and all-over-the-place and sprawling plotting, and then it's too obvious to be scary, too dull to be tense or suspenseful, too cheesy to be fun and too ridiculous to be thrilling. None of those positive attributes are present at any thing and all the negative attributes are plastered all over.

Can't say much positive about the personality and development deprived characters or the flat direction and insipid all round acting where everybody mumbles their lines in an uninterested fashion.

Basically, a mess with few if any redeeming qualities other than it conceptually intrigued mildly. 1/10 Bethany Cox

Despite the mumbling actors, incoherent story-line, and dim lighting this low-budget horror does succeed in portraying a creepy atmosphere. But atmosphere only goes so far, and as the film meanders on, presenting scenes that don't fit together, and way too much blubbering from a grown man, viewers will probably start checking the clock. The director and editor were probably doing the same, because the movie doesn't build up to much and the ending seems rushed despite taking forever to arrive. It's difficult to say whether this is worth the investment of time, certainly the viewer won't be missing much if he or she gives up.