Let's Be Evil

IMDb must find a way to quell these deliberately manipulated movie ratings. Find out how the rating system is being exploited and put an end to it before users lose all confidence in it. Those who cheat the system should know there's backlash, for every false 10...their film will receive numerous 1's, and neither fairly assesses the movie being reviewed.

Is this an 8 star or higher film? In my eyes, no. A few may believe so, but I believe the vast majority of honest opinions would place it between 4-6. The premise is intriguing and executed moderately. The acting is mediocre. Mostly though, we aren't observing performances, but observing scenes and listening to the accompanying dialogue instead. Thus the editing, CGI and set are of primary importance and I believe the filmmakers did a decent job of it, earning a solid B-.

It's primarily seen through the eyes of our protagonist. She's one of three young adults (in financial straights) who accepts a mysterious assignment to supervise a group of highly gifted children in a top secret advanced learning program. She enters an underground facility which is completely pitch and is given a set of glasses which operates much like Google Glass, only then is she able to see her surroundings and receive any information. This alone kept me questioning what was truly real throughout the film since technology of this nature can control ones perception of reality. It can be programmed and designed to manipulate a person so I was never certain who or what was really happening. The feeling was much like watching films like Black Swan, Vanilla Sky or Inception in that it is somewhat disorientating and one cannot be certain about what's experienced. To be clear, this film is absolutely nothing like the 3 films I've mentioned and it cannot compare; the air of disorientation and uncertainty is all that is in common. At its' core, this is the best thing about the film.

Our protagonist soon realizes that the children are far from average. They are mentally and intellectually far more advanced than most adults who may be considered genius and these prodigy's only pause from their studies to eat a highly regulated diet and sleep a precise amount of time. She alone feels pity for them, voicing it by saying that children should be allowed time to be children, to have recess and play. Her opinion proves to be a critical point to the plot.

I think that more tantalizing visuals and dialogue would have done absolute wonders for the production value of this film. The set was too claustrophobic and lacked ambiance. It reminded me a bit of the lower levels seen on the set of Ex Machina, except a bit more like (as one reviewer stated) "a concrete submarine" meets inner city raver nightclub. Some imagination, space, and attention to detail would have gone a long way since the set was such a critical part of the production. There's no background on the female protagonist nor her co-protagonists which leaves the audience with no concern about their plight. They are nondescript and we learn nothing about them, it didn't even benefit the story to have the co's present. A backstory and some amount of character development was critically missing.

There were some tense moments, more of them would have made the film somewhat thrilling but the run time is fairly short and there's not much in the way of building suspense. One freak-out occurrence and our protagonist is already exiting the facility. She's compelled to stay however, then there's only the second occurrence which is our climax. Throughout the climax you are on a POV trip through darkness and confusion. Terror is intended, but it's mild since it's not conveyed as well as it could have been. I loved the ending. It was a bit confusing but if you're paying close enough attention and processing it then I think you'll appreciate it to. Is it brilliant? No, but it's satisfactory.

Decent watch, if forgettable, at best, won't watch again, and can't recommend.

(Please keep in mind that the mobile app erased my original review, so I'm a little peeved.)

My biggest concern with this movie is that it concentrates on fear mongering against technology more than creating a good movie. I understand that it's supposed to be a psychological thriller, but that should be what you're concentrating on and not teaching the audience to fear technology: just tell the story.

In fairness, it did do a lot with a clearly low budget: low level actors you won't recognize and (mostly) kids for background characters, Google Glass (or similar) tech, an underground bunker setting, and not particularly great cg effects, but they managed to get by.

The real crux of the story is that isolated in a bunker, they kind of think they're going mad, so "what's real" comes into play, and then it becomes the inevitable question of "is it me or is the technology out to get me", and when that tech is a virtual OS (think Cortana), then there is no telling what is going to happen so there is no expectation, thus nothing to subvert. Its a rule in both Horror and Comedy to play with the audience's tension / expectation (Rules of 3) to establish a pattern, and then break/deliver on it in a surprising manner.

The camera work also messed with me quite a bit. Not only do you have a switch between natural 3rd person camera work and 1st person perspective, the camera work alternatives between almost imperceptively still and wildly jerk about as the audience was intended to experience an earthquake. It feels like the movie was trying to be "Hardcore Henry" esque, but didn't actually do anything special with the camera angles and distracted with the Head's Up Display (HUD).

There's a movie here, you might even like it, but I'm willing to bet that the movie is too unique without much spectacular happening for most people to enjoy it.

It bills its self as something of a augmented reality horror movie, getting to to mess with peoples minds.

I'm not sure if the makers of the movie know what augmented reality really is, as its "use" in the movie is more of VR.

The acting is decent but the story line is stretched thin to hit 1:22 running time, at least the version I saw. There's really not much there, only 4 actors on screen have lines, 3 of which you learn no back story and there for have little emotional connection to.

It attempts to be a psychosis horror but anyone who has a few minutes of film training can easily see its a low budget set, in an abandoned building hidden by low light and lots of subtle color.

This film has the best trailer I've seen in years, a good combination of lights, colors and funky music. Then as a British Horror enthusiast I was thrilled to see it was a British movie.

The praise stops there.

Three actors a mixture of talent, two good females one awful male actor, a warren of tunnels that are probably the same and the worst American accents ever. Everything was American, it was like it was pretending not to be a British movie, but it was.

The story is very "damned" similar, but that's also where that ends.

Unfortunately the story was just too awful, 45 minutes in I just couldn't go on, it was truly unbearable, boring and utterly tiresome. You could have slept through portions and not missed a thing.

So sad it was so bad, it could have been so good.

I am fairly easily pleased when it comes to movies, but this one became frustrating to watch with in the first 10 minutes.

What is wrong with it? The story. Everything else about the film was OK like the acting etc. but the story was just plain stupid.

When it started it was OK and logical, but it soon descended into a very poor storyline that seemed was financed because it could be made cheaply, regardless of content.

Really you would be better off watching the commercials.