Older Gods

I was surprised how much I liked this but I did!

I doubt that friday the 13th / freddy / scream slasher horror fans will like it that much as its thoughtful and slower paced. It replaces gore with mystery and emotion. Its basically a drama with horror elements as its very creepy in a couple of scenes.

I think it was pretty ambitious for a low budget and I was always intrigued.

I thought Rory Wilson did a great job as the lead, its difficult to essentially be the only person who talks through an entire film but I thought he carried the film well.

I think if you go into this understanding knowing what it it (slower, thoughtful, creepy) rather than expecting a monster movie or something, you'll like it.

This is an indie film, with a low budget, but the talent behind the project is evident. As you can guess from the title, it was heavily inspired by H. P. Lovecraft's stories and mythos. The film has a great start, building tension slowly but steadily, with a fantastic photography, especially in the dream sequences (which reminded me a lot of another, superior, lovecraft-inspired movie, The Void). No unnecessary action sequences, like many other modern horrors. After the first half I was sure it was going straight to my list of favourite movies...finally, a Lovecraftian story done right! Alas, it began to lose momentum and in the last half hour crashed miserably, with a series of unfortunate choices that, besides being decidedly out of place in a Lovecraftian worldview, also completely ruined the atmosphere cultivated up to that point.

I give it a six and not less for the first part only; give it a chance but do yourself a favor and skip the atrocious ending.

I think it has some nice points to this film, but in some ways it missed the mark to have the right tone for a Lovecraften horror. The set up was great, investigation of what happened to a friend when investigating some cult like activies works.

But it had to much drama, and not enough horror. Some moments had good tension, but overall it wasn't there as much as it could have been. Some of the dream stuff was pretty cool though, and the cinematography was nice. There were some beautiful locational shots too.

I also think with it being cult linked there could have been more cultists stalking the lead. But one guy messing with you isn't really as scary as it could be.

This had a couple of decent scenes but was overburdened with inane dialogue and far too much exposition that didn't actually expose anything. The dialogue from the friends narrative is long slow tedium. This did have potential but needed a few more rewrites to pare it down to just the useful and interesting an eliminate the pseudo pretentious drivel that only serves to lengthen the film. The ancillary characters who appear as voices don't come across as realistic at all but as amateurish. There is just too much chatter that seems like padding the run time. This may have been suited to be a 30 minute short.

Older Gods is a bit of a trippy experience, leaning much more towards a drama/psychological thriller with sci-fi and horror aspects to it.

It generally had quite the slow pace that consistently teetered between tension building and belabored, but edged out on the positive for the most part. It had a nice atmospheric sense of suspense, spook, and existential dread. Throughout, much of the dialogue became drawn out and monotonous on many occasions... seemingly pertinent, yet not overtly so. Despite maybe needing said conversations broken up a bit, I don't know if much of the script and acting helped with this issue.

The main guy, while not a bad actor, felt disconnected and one-note throughout the majority of the film and his performance in high intensity/emotional moments was also a bit underwhelming. There were also quite a few phone calls throughout the film, all of which had stilted and unconvincing voiceovers. Where the acting was quite enjoyable was from the character of the friend on the video. He had a natural and down to earth delivery that was enjoyable to watch.

This movie in many ways was also a visual treat. It looks great with a really nice quality of picture and truly stunning and unsettling visuals throughout. There were some impressive effects that really bumped up the overall quality of this movie as well.

Beautiful technical quality aside, I think the foundation for a really interesting story is here. It felt a little undercooked and lacking some layers, ending up having it more so land on the side of a solid proof of concept. However, I don't think that should take away from what this is as a whole.

Indie filmmaking is an art in and of itself and should be appreciated for exactly that. They made something cool and thought provoking here and while it's not going to be everyone's cup of tea, it still deserves its flowers. 4.5 rounding up to a 5, would recommend.