Proliférations

I, too, am a sucker for a wonderfully terrible Sci Fi movie. This movie has been somewhat entertaining. There are a bushel of bad actors,terrible special effects, and awful story line. But, my greatest disappointment has not been in the aforementioned attributes. But, in the fact that this movie was not filmed in Mongolia. More like Podunk,Montana or Lampshade, North Dakota. When first choosing to watch this movie, I thought of "Centipede," a wonderfully awful film actually filmed in India...which made it that much better (worse). I jest, but the landscape of the film is in contrast to it's title....a definite disappointment for me.

Really bad acting, bad plot and .. too much to critique.

My FAVORITE is that in the Gobi desert, we have grass, trees and it a significant resemblance to middle America.

Maybe that is why the Mongolians drive GMCs and the police vehicle says "Police".

Didn't anybody involved in making this movie give a darn? It appears not.

Cheesy movies can be good - Tremors for example, didn't take itself too seriously, but managed to engage us.

This one is just bad.

Where as "Tremors" was entertaining and brought something new to the world of movies, then "Mongolian Death Worm" hardly manages to step up to even half of what "Tremors" managed to do - even with its questionable sequels.

The story told in "Mongolian Death Worm" is about huge, subterranean worms that have been brought out from their slumber from far beneath the surface of the Mongolian steppes, brought about by a commercial oil drilling company, of course. As the worms ravage the countryside, it is up to a treasure-hunter, a police officer and two volunteer health workers to put an end to the subterranean terror.

Right, well the storyline is just about as cliché as they come in this particular genre. But as every bit cliché this movie is, then it is equally predictable. But yet there is something about the semi-bad monster movies that is alluring. The storyline is lacking anything challenging to the audience, it is just simply put your mind on autopilot and sit back.

The dialogue is forced and not really delivered with enough conviction to fully buy into it. And you never really for a second thought that anyone was in any real danger from neither worms nor earthquakes.

And it was really, really hard to buy into the attempt of making it seem like this was actually taking place in Mongolia. Especially when everyone was speaking English, and even the local police vehicle had 'police' brandished on its side.

One of the carrying factors of the "Mongolian Death Worm" was the worms, as they were actually nicely made. Sure, this wasn't top of the line CGI animation, but it worked out well enough to suit its purpose.

"Mongolian Death Worm" is the type of monster movie that is hard to take seriously, but still it is fun to watch because it is just that cheesy and campy.

Was I imagining it or was this movie somewhat devoid of the usual pacing?

Okay, there's a guy searching for treasure while two doctors are trying to reach civilisation and these people are kidnapped by the local crime lord and meanwhile some manner of drill-using company is having difficulty because all their workers keep slacking or getting eaten.

I'm confused. Very confused. I just wanted a monster movie. Was I that exhausted it all seemed complicated or was it really moving at speed comparable to erosion?

Stephen Monroe, director of the best Syfy-commissioned movie, Wyvern, meanwhile provides a film with characters more charismatic than your average Syfy-commissioned movie. Unfortunately the monsters are lame. Their victims are usually distracted by something else and those aware can easily defeat them with firearms.

OK, lets be up-front about this. There is a legend involving gigantic earth worms in the remotest parts of the Gobi desert. The West has sort of been interested in them since the early 1920s. There has been no confirmation of their actual existence, well not until this movie came along any way.

And then there is this movie. It is poorly scripted, crippled with an utterly predictable plot. The hands down winners for stilted and shabby acting go to George Kee Kee Cheung as the sheriff and Nate Rubin as the terminally irritating Dr Phillip. Nate is still cutting his teeth as an actor. George though should have known better. He is an accomplished character actor.

Sean Patrick Flanery as the lead and Victoria Pratt as the romantic interest make a better job of it, particularly Flanery. Even so they are cardboard cut outs of Michael Douglas and Kathleen Turner from Romancing the Stone.

Of all the movies about Genghis Kahn's lost tomb and treasure, giant earth worms, medical aid posts by far the best I've seen. It was fun, in a completely daggy way, then the 90 minutes was up.