Wraiths of Roanoke

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.

I ended up liking this movie. I liked the spooky atmosphere and the acting from the lead characters the most. It is a loose retelling of the Roanoke colony disappearance and introduces some Viking mystical mumbo-jumbo to the legend.

Adrian Paul does a really good job as the leader of the colony. The other actors in supporting roles seemed to take this movie seriously, which doesn't happen in a lot of Sci-Fi channel movies.

The monster effects aren't the best. They don't really look scary. Also, a few writing choices didn't make sense. The most notable choices were when characters would seemingly just wander off to chase ghosts or fight with natives.

Overall, I recommend this movie.

Lost Colony: The Legend of Roanoke did actually look as though it would be somewhat tolerable. And while nothing great, considering SyFy's dubious track-record it is. This is by far one of the better-looking SyFy projects, with stunning locations and scenery and photography that does look as though care went into it instead of the usual dull, slapdash kind. The score is decent, not too over-bearing or sluggish and the acting shows a sense of spirit and an effort to not be too bland or overdone. However, while I appreciated the moral and philosophical aspects, the script could have done with being more thoughtful and less cheesy and stilted, the story suffers from a lack of atmosphere and poorly choreographed and less-than-thrilling battles and while the characters are less stereotypical than characters in other SyFy movies(the creature and disaster movies of theirs are the worst when it comes to this) not much is done to make them interesting to let us relate to them.

Overall, not bad but not desperately good either, just average. 5/10 Bethany Cox

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")

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.