Soultaker: O Ladrão de Almas

Okay, to be fair this movie did have an interesting concept. Given a few script rewrites, some decent actors and a budget, this might have been a fairly decent cult flick instead of the MST3K fodder it turned out to be.

Still, it was better than "Armageddon."

Now I did watch this when it first came out on VHS, and all my friends and I thought it was a pretty good movie, but then again, we were teenagers. But honestly, not that good of a movie in retrospect. Sort of a hair metal, Dokken version of Carnival of Souls. But a bad movie does not exactly mean it is unwatchable; however, this one seems to lack the charm a lot of the regular Mst3k fodder usually contains. But if it was on cable, and I was bored and drinking beer--sure, I'd watch it again. But then again, I've watched Howling VII about five times now, so maybe you really shouldn't be listening to me.

Anyone else think it kind of sad that the director supposedly commented on his own movie? And why did he feel the urge to use caps lock so much?

Poor Joe, while the rest of his family is out doing respectable movies, he's doing this kind of crap. I've seen two of his movies, thanks to the wonderful people at MSTK and I couldn't think of any other place that they should be viewed.

This really isn't such a bad little movie. The basic story is quite interesting: five teenagers on their way home from a summer festival crash their car and awaken to find themselves unharmed. However, one of them is missing, and a mysterious man in black is stalking the rest of them down one by one and seemingly killing them. What the kids don't know, but soon come to realize, is that they are lost souls, thrown from their bodies at the moment of the accident. Their physical comatose selves are in the hospital, and the two remaining survivors have only a short time left to get back into their bodies before the Angel of Death comes to claim them.

A low budget, bad 80s music and an overly drawn out ending are the films only major flaws, but the acting is quite good and the story (written by star Vivian Schilling) is well thought out. Schilling went on to write a book entitled "Quietus" which is a sort-of sequel to this film.

Worth checking out at least once, with or without the MST3K commentary.

Soultaker is not as bad a film as some would make it out to be, but it is still not good. The directing is well-done, and I think one of the better areas of the film. Joe gives a good performance; all the other actors are decent, save for David Shark, who is sub-par.

The technical aspects of the film aren't bad. The dialogue is hackneyed at spots, but I think the biggest weakness of the film is its pacing. It starts out well; introducing the characters and setting up the premise, but hits its biggest snag halfway through. The film suddenly stagnates as the characters sit around a house. It appears to be trying to build tension, but instead it's boring and drawn-out. It then picks up the pace again but quickly loses it during the incredibly long hospital sequence at the end. By that time the audience has already figured out where the plot is going and it's all just stretched out to be exhaustingly long.

All in all, despite its clearly small budget, it's the underlying screenplay, not the technical aspects, that hurt this movie the most.