Hostile

Up late and found this movie. No need nitpicking this movie, just enjoy it. It's pretty damn good.

I love a good post apocalyptic thriller so I was looking forward to this one. It starts really well, and then quickly becomes odd, then frustrating, then just plain eye-roll worthy.

The entire movie jumps back and forward between timelines but does so in a way that feels very jarring. The entire relationship between the two leads felt unrealistic... so many plot points and character decisions just became too much of a stretch for me. I can suspend my disbelief to a certain point but c'mon guys...

I really wanted to like it, it was shot beautifully, the creatures were genuinely creepy, and it had potential.

Points for originality, I definitely wasn't expecting what I saw (though I did call the 'twist' about 20 minutes before it happened). The message that the writer tries to leave us with is a nice one but feels out of place in this genre and left me with too many questions.

Most movies if you don't get me within the first 10 minutes, I'm out. First of all I'm a fan of dystopian and post apocalypse movies, so it got my attention for over 10 minutes, there were deep sigh moments (the can we get the story moving sighs), but it kept me watching, and after a certain point I felt committed to see it through to the end. While I was watching I'm thinking to myself, is it so bad that I'm watching or is it just good enough to keep me watching, whether it's the former or the latter, I didn't regret the watch, but I wish I would've watched a better movie with that time, talk about opportunity costs!!! If you're watched out on the latest or streaming and you want to watch something for the sake of watching, this isn't a bad fare, keep in mind it's a low budget movie with decent writing and decent acting and the story keeps going just enough for you to not bail out.

This was definitely not what I was expecting, it was actually much better, and deeper. I'm sure this movie, like most with flashbacks, will get panned by some reviewers because of it. However, after watching it through, the movie is actually more in the flashbacks than the "present" storyline. It has a really cool and moving symmetry at the beginning and end, using the gunshot. I actually let the movie begin to play over again at the end, which is where I really noticed it, and by rerunning is where you catch all the foreshadowing that you may not have caught. One of the first scenes, in the art gallery, with the "look past the ugliness" explanation of the Bacon artwork, is the basis of the story. I think you'll enjoy the movie as long as you're not looking for it to be the typical, gory, zombie-like post apocalyptic movie. Also understand that one flashback doesn't pick up exactly where the other left off (this threw me off at first and is why I enjoyed watching it a second time after understanding). The flashbacks are linear, but time passes (weeks to months) between them. This was a pleasant surprise, since I sit through quite a few bad movies when I look for free movies to stream.

It stands out in the overused zombie genre with its combination of horror (a bit?) and drama. Pace is slow with the amount of flashbacks but it pays off in the end. Don't expect to get a lot of explanation behind the apocalypse though.