Mansquito

I am a horror fan. That means I like to be scared and I also enjoy horror flicks that bring me to laugh (like really bad ones) or that make a reasonable effort while failing. This one doesn't even try.

I stopped looking at it after the man transformed into a giant mosquito. In a minute or so, what was a man transformed into a fleshy insect, something that seems to haunt the nightmares of every person that dreamed of seeing a decent movie. Meanwhile there is a girl that begs the transforming man to stop transforming. After he obviously doesn't, she begins to beg the fleshy insect that used to be a man not to hurt her. It works just as well as the first attempt.

If I'd had more time I would have seen the whole movie and probably really be upset by it. I mean, they took every possible animal or plant and made a movie about it attacking humans, humans transforming into it, then attacking humans, etc. But mosquitoes?! They are really deadly, I agree, but not when people transform into them! No, this is a really bad movie. Stay away from it.

And I apologize for bringing The Fly into this. After all, at its time it was close to original in both idea and effects. Not the mention Jeff Goldblum that made the movie a good one.

You don't have to watch Mosquito Man to know that it takes heavy influence from David Cronenberg's classic film 'The Fly', but I liked said film a lot and so decided that I would be happy if this film merely offered a fun retelling of it. I'm pleased to say that while Mosquito Man is silly and redundant, it is at least lots of fun and therefore offers enough as far as I'm concerned. I have to admit that I find insects fascinating, and this is a good thing given how many insect related horror films there are to choose from. Mosquito's don't really interest me, and the film doesn't really delve into their life cycle much...but luckily, it doesn't really matter. The film bases its plot on the idea of a virus that is working its way through the human population. A couple of scientists have found some sort of cure involving mosquitoes, but this backfires when a convict set to be used as a guinea pig escapes and causes an accident in the facility. His DNA is then merged with the mosquito DNA and he becomes, you guessed it, a human-mosquito hybrid with a mission to mate with the female scientist who has suffered the same unfortunate fate.

Director Tibor Takács made a minor splash back in the eighties with cult hits The Gate and I, Madman. This film is unlikely to remembered with the same affection as the latter two films, but it features the same kind of nonsense, yet well worked plot line. The special effects are important in a film like this, and despite being a film that is unlikely to ever amount to anything - Mosquito Man does feature great special effects. The central monster looks cool enough, and this is matched by some great gory scenes that will please anyone with a mind to see it. As mentioned, the plot doesn't delve very deep but it does at least focus on the important elements and remains interesting for the duration. The acting is surprisingly decent also, with the hot Musetta Vander providing the eye candy (both for the audience and for the title monster), while Corin Nemec is good in the opposite role. It's not hard to guess where it's going at any point, but the film races towards the inevitable conclusion with style, and the director chucks in a nice gore sequence every time things start to dry up. Overall, I wouldn't hesitate to recommend this trash to anyone looking for a fun flick, and it's nowhere near as bad as it could have been.

Mansquito(or Mosquito Man) was a little better than I expected, but that's not saying much. It is surprisingly not bad on a visual front, with good photography and nice locations, and the music at times was spookily atmospheric. Plus the ending was the best part of the film, very effective. What let Mansquito down though was a fair number of things. I have seen worse special effects, but they are still rather cheap and not very well-utilised with the mosquitoes not menacing enough. The script is of the cheesy and stilted kind and the story apart from some spark at the end never really engaged me, coming across as dull, predictable and especially with the male mosquitoes ridiculous. I probably would have had a stronger impression of Mansquito if the beginning had been promising, but viewing so many obvious mistakes in one scene really hindered that. The characters didn't come across as very likable either, not as stereotypical as I have seen characters other movies of the genre before but annoying and underdeveloped, and the acting is really quite poor. Overall, could've been much worse, but Mansquito bugged me too much for me to properly enjoy it. 4/10 Bethany Cox

SciFi has been doing a little better with their films lately. I enjoyed Frankenfish, this, and Species III. THey are making some ones better than Raptor Island...Ugh, I shudder to think of that crap. Anyway, this is Mansquito. SciFi usually uses bad CGI effects, but in this they managed to have GOOD effects! GO figure! The effects really impressed me, some CGI, but not much at all. THe Mansquito looked real good, and there were some nice gore effects. Hopefully there will be more gore in the DVD release hehe. ANyway, this film is not too original, but it is entertaining. Very entertaining. Good way to waste 2 hours of your time. Def. one good monster/killer bug film. Recommended if you want to have some good fun. 7/10

A convict is scheduled to be used in tests involving the west Nile virus, but escapes and is bitten by a mutant mosquito, transforming him into a hideous insectile humanoid. It's up to cops to track him down as he makes his way through a city, sucking his victims dry. This is one of those "Made for Sci-fi channel" films, which, lets face it, more often than not turn out to be stinking cesspools (See Dinocroc, King Snake, Boa vs. Python, etc.) or, putting it more kindly, on the "lower end of the horror spectrum". However, "Mansquito" actually manages to transcend most of the other films sci-fi produces. It's got decent enough acting, plenty of nasty gore scenes, cool creature effects, but lots of problems too. To start, the plot is carp. I'll admit that. It's got lots of 1-D characters whose sole purpose is to be killed off in horrible gruesome ways by the monster. The science behind the creature is non-existent. It's also very, very predictable. Director Tibor Takács—who was responsible for 1987's effects-laden cult hit, "The Gate", and the really cool "I, Madman"—has since done some not-so-great low-budget horror films like Killer Rats (2003), but he redeems himself somewhat with "Mansquito". He gives the film a fun feel and never lets the pace drop. He also gives us just what we paid for—gore and a slimy, ugly monster. At first the gore is rather tame, but it really picks up towards the end, check out the "SWAT team dismemberment" for some real nasty stuff! As I said before, the creature effects are really cool. The effects are handled by Tony Garner, who also worked on "Seed of Chucky". Thankfully the monster isn't CG most of the time, just a good old man-in-a-suit (Except for shots of the creature running or flying, in which the makers implored so truly awful CG).

If you're looking for a fresh, original sci-fi film, look elsewhere, 'cause "Mansquito" is anything but that. However, it IS a fun, gory monster movie for a boring, rainy Saturday afternoon.

6/10.