Rage of the Yeti

An expedition team on an Arctic island are terrorised by some sort of legendary Yeti creatures, so a rescue team is sent to locate them while also completing the task of retrieving a valuable artifact. Talk about a snoozer! After watching a Syfy original ("Black Forest"), I decided to watch another; "Rage of the Yeti". Downright lacklustre and plodding. Not much to stare at and a lot repetitive action. Outside the silly combination between the leads David Chokachi and Matthew Kevin Anderson, not much fun occurs. Still I got to hand it credit because the acting (the likes of Yancy Butler) was acceptable and it never took itself seriously, but everything else less so. The underwhelming CGI quality was expected; lazy and terrible with hokey monster designs and poorly staged action. The clichéd plot was inconsistent and uninspired with many stupid and bland inclusions. It was very much a stop and go affair despite its tendency to rush through things with poor explanations. The structure just doesn't come alight and the script is beyond tawdry. Lame, dull Syfy original.

"Can you capture one for a million dollars?"

As this is being written it is just over twenty minutes into the movie (including commercials). So far there have been numerous technical errors, an utterly stupefying plot, poor CGI, and a complete lack of acting ability; and those are the high points.

The movie does have three notable things about it.

• First, it is a well advertised SyFy movie feature on Saturday evening, so you know before it starts that it can't be very good, and you can keep your expectations low.

• Second, it took well less than ten minutes to confirm that the previous point was correct.

• Third, David Hewlett did not exactly repeat his Dr. Rodney McKay character from the Stargate series. What he did provide were a few scenes shot in a day or two so that his name could be included in the movie.

The only reason to watch this movie - once - when you have absolutely nothing else to do, is so that you never have to watch it again in your life.

And, for those who think that twenty minutes is not sufficient time to form an opinion about this garbage; the rest of the movie was, if anything, worse.

I was frustrated by another critics review given only 20 minutes into this great flick. Perhaps we really are the victims of high budget films losing our ability to appreciate anything with a budget under $100M.

As a low budget movie made on a shoestring this movie is great, the acting is sufficiently tongue in cheek for you to see the "ham i ness" as really a spoof on the high budget/ entirely CGI films.

The storyline mimics the feel of the early generation of scifi and is a great reminder of the originals in this space, "lost in space", "doctor who" and even "the day the earth stood still".

If you a movie that is clearly trying to be a very real movie, made by very real people then this is a movie for you. Also take a look at another one of David Hewletts home grown greats. "A dogs breakfast" then you will truly get an insight into this movie makers great ability to deliver a great product while gently tweaking the nose hairs of the movie making establishment.

As far as SyFy original movies go, this one isn't too bad. Sure the acting is bad, but I have seen worse, sure the cgi is bad, but again, I have seen worse. I found the two main characters entertainingly ridiculous, and the whole movie had a very lighthearted feel to it that made it better than some others that try to be too serious for what they are. This movie knows it is a SyFy original and just has fun with it. The monster was interesting rather than just being another snake or crocodile, and the characters were entertaining rather than overly dramatic. Sure, it is a SyFy original, so it isn't some great blockbuster movie, but it is better than most of its kind. If you like SyFy originals, I recommend this one, if you don't, then yes, steer clear.

And to the other reviewer's comment on David Hewlett just doing a few scenes to add his name to the movie, maybe you should look at the director listed for the movie before you comment next time.

Another low-budget Syfy feature, better than most due to some humorous interplay between the leads; David Chakochi and Matthew Kevin Anderson. Face it, like most Syfy feature movies, it suffers from a lack of money, so the CGI is primitive, the cast is made up of lesser-known actors, and the story isn't the strongest.

I'm a big fan of low-budget productions, they test and hone the skills of the entire crew. When they manage to overcome the limitations and produce something that is entertaining enough to sit through an hour and half, I consider that a credit to their abilities. This movie passed that test, maybe not with flying colors, but good enough so that nobody associated with this movie should be ashamed to have it on their resume.

Along the way, they managed to pay homage to other, bigger successes in the genre, notably references to the Stargate franchise and Farscape. Good enough!