Preservation

Mike Neary (Aaron Staton) and Sean Neary (Pablo Schreiber) are brothers excited to go on a hunting trip. Mike's wife Wit Neary (Wrenn Schmidt) is less excited. Mike and Wit are having marital problems. Sean is suffering from wartime PTSD. While camping overnight in the woods, their gear gets stolen including their guns and someone marked an X on all their foreheads.

I like the X idea. Mike has an idea about Sean, no matter how outlandish. The movie could have gone down that path. Instead, it goes down the less inventive path. I don't really care about the perps. Two characters make the same mistake. They don't finish the job which is a horror trope. This starts with some interesting ideas and then the movie becomes not so interesting.

I read from another reviewer that this was compared to "You're next" by a critic and was even rated better/higher than that. Let me back his opinion up: You're next is way superior than this, but it's also a different cup of tea and you shouldn't compare it. Since we can't see who's doing what for a very long time in this movie, this can be compared to the Spanish "King of the Hill" ... you can also mix a bit of Eden Lake into it (as there was a female lead character in that too).

Unfortunately the movie is letting one down after a rather strong beginning, which is a shame. A friend of mine felt that it was stronger (the survival instinct, the title is suggesting). Some things you have to figure out for yourself, but this movie has too many holes to be really great in my book. Still decent though

If you decide to see "Preservation", there is a strong likelihood that you'll find the plot familiar. That's because it dates all the way back to 1924, with Richard Connell's story "The Most Dangerous Game". A few years later, the story would be brought to the big screen in the classic story by the same name, starring Joel McCrea and Leslie Banks. Since then, the story has been re-written time and time again--appearing in television shows (such as "Get Smart", believe it or not) and various movies. So, you cannot exactly give this film many points when it comes to originality.

Like the old story, someone likes hunting. But instead of animals, their quarry is people. The only huge difference here is that you really don't know who the killer or killers are until the end of the film--whereas in the original story is was some twisted Russian aristocrat. Otherwise, the three victims spend more than half the film on the run--trying to avoid being someone's trophy. There really isn't a whole lot more to the story than this.

On the plus side, the film is very tense. Some of the acting is pretty good and despite a small budget, the movie looks good. I also liked the identity of the hunters--this was an interesting twist. On the negative, the film isn't exactly fun to watch. After all, folks are getting butchered and there isn't a whole lot of subtlety about it. I also was irked by a cliché that I often see in films---someone disables their attacker and instead of finishing off the killer, they almost immediately turn their back on them so that they can be murdered. I don't know about you, but if someone is trying to kill me, I don't beat them up and then turn my back unless I am 110% sure that they are truly dead. Overall, I don't consider it a bad nor a good film but there isn't enough about it that would have me recommend you go see it. If you hate violent films, there's also another reason to avoid this one.

I saw promise in this film. In the future, I'd like to see these actors and filmmakers do a more challenging project--something with more originality and which allow them to expand on their skills.

OK, teens as killers who communicate with one another only via text and violence. I can dig that. (One reviewer complains about how the heavy handed "messaging" of having them text when they're sitting right next to each other, but I've seen that happen, so I think that's a fair comment on our techno-generation.) But the character development of the three main protagonists is incredibly weak and the first two kills are ridiculous as protagonists, including a combat-hardened veteran who manages to best an armed and towered sniper with a stick lashed to his hand, decide to turn their backs on their antagonists without verifying that they are actually incapacitated or weaponless. WTF! Also, once we see the size of the teens in question (one of them a wheezing asthmatic), the idea that they could go mano a mano in physical combat as they do with two big strapping grown men (did I mention that one of them is a combat veteran?) is also absurd. If you're gonna make your killers beanpole teens, you'd better give them better strategies for killing grown men who see them coming than hand to hand combat and playing possum, if you want to keep any credibility as a thriller. Too bad, because the movie does have some good scenes--the lead killer almost drowning one of the other killers to make him not run home to mom, his face vibrating with sadistic delight behind his skull face mask, is effectively chilling. A little more thought given to the script and the choreography of the kills could have improved this flick a lot.

Preservation is meant to deliver a strong message for a thriller movie, it could have done so if only the narrative made a lick of sense. There is a good set-up for horror as the direction is bizarre yet it's occasionally eerie. The worst obstacle for this film is logic, characters would to the stupidest things only to be granted plot armor at later scenes. It has little to no consistency on how the sequences actually play out as though the movie presents obscurity for the sake of being edgy or meaningful and ends up accomplishing none of them.

Three people go into the woods for a weekend of hunting spree. Sean (Pablo Schreiber) is a war veteran with dark past, he goes to the hunting trip with his brother Mike (Aaron Staton) who brings his wife Wit (Wrenn Schmidt). After a night, it has become clear that they are being hunted by unknown individual or individuals. The first half is about life philosophy lecture of hunting or being hunted. It's presented with cliché remarks and not quite appealing.

The three main actors are mainstay for TV series and supporting roles, they are pretty good for setting up the tone. The movie picks up pace very quickly as the trip turns grisly. Sadly, the scenes don't have much clarity. At some points the protagonist would do highly questionable acts, ones with little chance of surviving, then it's the protagonist's turn to be dumb. They would have a hard time engaging the prey even though they are portrayed near unworldly just five minutes earlier, Jason Vorhees level of unworldly.

There are so many strange occurrences, such as its convenient traps, sudden manifestation of characters from thin air and steroid induced change for the protagonist. I understand it wants to display the incomprehensible nature of human and how a devastating event could change people, but the execution is all over the place. Whatever message it wants to convey would get lost if audiences struggle to digest the absurd plot devices.

It has a good concept to begin, but ultimately the poor execution baffles audience in the wrong way.