The Rig

Alright, well first of all, just based from the movie cover, you already know this is going to be something like a standard horror movie from the late 80's / early 90's, and sure enough - it is! This movie is just screaming late 80's/early 90's horror flick. From the way it is shot, the storyline and the setting. Let's take an isolated rig out in the middle of the ocean, miles from land. Throw in a storm, of course, for good measure. Then cut off communications with mainland and then have some strange creature come aboard the rig. A creature no one ever heard or seen before. Yeah, late 80's/early 90's cocktail right there.

Oh, and while we are at it, lets put William Forsythe's name up on the poster, then we have a semi-famous name to draw people in. Now, this puzzles me indeed, especially because his role in the movie is no more than a supporting role, if that much even.

Anyway, "The Rig" is actually filmed in an adequate manner, especially if you are into horror movies from back in the day. The setting of the movie, well it has been used a bit too much in the past.

The people in the movie also did a good enough job with their roles. But you never really got to feel for any of the characters, as they were all just portrayed superficially. There were very little character development and building in this movie. Basically just your standard isolation-horror-with-slim-survival-chance-movie here.

And what was up with the storm? At one point it was furious and pounding the rig with no mercy. But when they had to go out to walk on the cranes (or whatever it was) the storm had dissipated? Even though they had said it wouldn't break up before the next day? And once off the crane, it started to thunder and get sort of stormy again? Tch, tch...

I must admit that I blackout and snoozed maybe 10 or 15 minutes away of the movie, but when I woke up, I could immediately get back into the movie and the story, because nothing major happened, nothing that couldn't afforded to be missed anyway.

What ticks me off in these types of movies, is the fact that you rarely get to see the creatures in full detail. It is always blurred motion, small and fast glimpses, silhouettes, or whatever they come up with to make it more thrilling and creeping. No, no, no! It doesn't' work to that end, it doesn't become thrilling, it doesn't become scary. I will tell you what it becomes; it becomes annoying and frustrating. As a movie lover, I want to see such monsters, I want to see the horror that stalks the people. I am not content with glimpses here and there. It makes the whole project reek of low-budget and cheesy effects.

If you are in for an evening of horror in the predictable genre, then this might be something right up your alley. But if you, like me, prefer more than just cheap thrills and bad plots, don't bet your money on "The Rig". The movie is bearable to sit through if you have nothing else at hand, but there are far better horror movies available. And don't get fooled by an otherwise rather interesting-looking movie cover!

If you're wondering why, with a summary like that, I can only give it 1 out of 10, let me explain.

If someone can take a script this bad and a cast so poor and still persuade people to hand their money over to it, then, if you're an aspiring movie maker, you should be ecstatic.

It has absolutely everything bad you can think of in a movie: Horrendously poor editing; a completely pointless flashback to a few minutes earlier, in black and white to remind you (if you're a complete idiot) what just happened; dreadful, tinny low budget music to match the low budget set; and a man in a plastic monkey suit grabbing people in a quick blur of camera motion while someone throws fake blood around.

And dialogue that's so poor that if they had managed to hire a cast of decent actors they would have ended up shaking their heads at the inanity of it all.

There are some tits in it. That ought to double the viewing audience.

Give this one a wide berth unless you have the choice of watching this or sticking map pins into your eyeballs.

THE RIG is another nondescript monster-on-the-loose story, made foul by an almost non-existent budget and a distinct lack of imagination. Indeed, the paucity of creative energy is evident in this film's paint-by-numbers script, which tells exactly the same kind of story as has already been done dozens of times before by better directors with bigger budgets.

In this one, the crew of an oil rig find themselves menaced by a monster from the ocean floor, although there aren't many explanations on offer. It all boils down to a man in a rubber suit – or what looks like a child in this case – running around and killing overacting cast members in slapdash ways. Attempts at poverty-row gore effects are pitiful and the acting from the no name cast is even worse, not that it mattered when the characters are so clichéd to begin with. The only actors I recognised were THE BRING remake's Art LaFleur and OUT FOR JUSTICE's William Forsythe, neither or whom can readily be described as stars.

In the end, the things that really bring THE RIG down are the lack of money and the lack of experience on the part of the director. It just looks cheap and cheesy throughout, and not in a good way. There are no surprises, no well-directed scenes of suspense or action, just a mindless mess of watered-down and hackneyed scenarios done before and better.

I'm usually a huge fan of cheap low budget movies. And just as a previous reviewer said, I also thought the monster was a gigantic sea creature... but it turned out to be some tiny monster that looked not much larger than a little kid.

You can almost always tell the cheaper-made movies apart from how they show the monster. It's always... show an arm here... a leg there... a scene with some teeth and claws, etc. However, what makes this movie stand apart from all of that is this... You NEVER actually really clearly the monster(s) at all. I figured that maybe at the end you will be able to clearly see it... but no... it was inside a dark tunnel so you can't even really see it clearly.. unless of course you pause the movie... then you can sort of see it... kind of... hahahah Aside from being kind of predictable and the characters doing illogical things... it wasn't all that bad, I guess. I did manage to watch all of it.

This movie makes absolutely no sense and was written by people who have absolutely no idea of work safety regulations... people die all the time on that drilling platform and the staff acts like if they simply deserted - there is no emotion, no stress, no documenting what happened, just sex scenes and stupid dialogue.

I understand they had no budget, but that no excuse for lazy writing and pathetic acting. Roger Corman made movies on shoestring budgets but never sank that low.

I'm surprised the director ever found another job.