Intermedio

I have to admit, I cribbed that line straight from the movie. I'm not sure if the actor was trying to put his personal spin on "what the heck" or if the writer is just plain retarded, but that is the caliber of dialogue you are likely to find in Intermedio. I know, I know, it's a horror movie, who gives about the dialogue? Is there gore or nudity in this? Yes on gore, no on nudity - which is a shame, given their leading lady. The gore was cool and I have to admit the intermedio was kind of creepy. But really, some of the situations in this movie are so ridiculous it will make you yell out, "Oh, come on!" in a movie whose premise involves white drug dealers, haunted caves, and men who can endure massive mutilations without immediately going into shock. But other than that, there isn't much to recommend this movie since it isn't even funny enough accidentally to make it worthwhile. There are bright spots, however. The intermedios, as I've said before, are kind of creepy. There are some nice computer effects in there and the sets are actually far and above what one would expect from a low budget movie. In short, hats off to the makeup/effects people, the location scout, and the wardrobe folks for putting the ladies in tight T-shirts. The writer and director, on the other hand, should be fed to the lions.

A group of four teenage friends become trapped in a Mexican border tunnel where they fall prey, one-by one, to tortured ghosts who haunt it.

This movie deserves recognition as having possibly the best actors to appear in such a terrible film -- Edward Furlong, Cerina Vincent, Amber Benson... not that these are A-listers, but how did such a terrible film attract people who have had such notable careers? This could have been played by amateurs.

I am not blaming the actors, of course. There is no way this could have been good. Maybe a new director, new script, a few other changes... of course, then it would have been another film entirely. Which is what it would take to make this one good.

This is a standard teens-against-monsters horror quickie, and you know what that means. There is not one iota of originality in this movie; you've seen every one of these recycled plot devices a hundred times before.

Stock teen character personality types: check. Stupidly going somewhere they shouldn't be: check. In the middle of nowhere: check. Grotesque, vicious ghosts/creatures of some kind that get a kick out of killing teens: check. Teens turning into monsters too, and trying to croak the remaining survivors: check. Weird old man who has a history with the evil: check. Incessant screaming, futile banging on doors to escape, arguing about how to kill the creatures, running around in caves, characters "calming down" each other, lots of red paint on stomachs and necks, surprise attacks from supposed allies on each other, cars that don't run, monsters that just keep on chasing you etc etc etc. Check.

The acting and scripting are even below the established low level for this kind of movie. This one is only good for background noise while you're doing chores; or to laugh at it MST3K style. As for a story? Nope.

I thought the presence of a known actor like Eddie Furlong might mean that this movie has a certain level of budget, if not quality. Neither is the case. This is a cheap movie with cheap "effects" that are eye-rolling at best, laughable at worst -- the "ghosts" are guys dressed in skeleton costumes, a la Karate Kid (Plus, I'm getting sick of digital blood in horror movies.). The dialog is a ridiculous heaping of clichéd yelling ("We're not gonna get anywhere yelling at each other like this!" and that sort of crap). The actors are no better -- just a bunch of overacting, and Furlong is not immune. He's seen better days. His hunched over, paunchy stoner body, and baggy eyes make him look increasingly like Peter Lorre. The only entertaining part of this film is watching Cernia Vincent running around in a cut-off t-shirt sans bra and with thong-cut jeans. Too bad the director is so incompetent; the cuts are jerky and disjointed, and he even has Vincent do some sort of Matrix-like fall-back maneuver to dodge a projectile, all with a straight face. The director tries to throw in some cheap "boo!" scares, but nothing -- nothing -- in this movie is remotely frightening, except for the fact that it was even made.

This movie is showcase of director's errors and poor acting. Gen's red shirt (Cerina Vincent) starts full length (completly covers her) and as the movie progresses it gets shorter and shorter. There is no explanation for why that happens in the movie. I guess the director decided at some point that the movie was too boring, and they needed to add some "skin" to it. There is one scene toward the beginning where the image is mirrored (left is right, and right is left) for no apparent reason. Very annoying given that the actors have shirts with stuff written on it... which reads inverted in that scene. The coloring of the picture changes from scene to scene, switching from dark to light. It seems like they used two cameras of extremely different quality, and kept switching between the two. The audio quality seems to switch too from time to time. Very annoying. The whole movie is mostly running around tunnels, heavy breathing and panicking. It is also poorly dubbed from English to English. I guess the acting got so bad at times that they had to change it later. The "special effects" are as good as cheap Halloween decorations and the storyline is defective in so many ways!