O Ataque das Formigas

This is a ridiculous albeit somewhat compelling low-budget effort at an "eco-disaster" movie. From the title you might imagine that it revolves around bees, but it is in fact about ant colonies which have developed advanced intelligence and super-powers as a result of alien intervention. The plot is mostly predictable although it does include some bizarre twists, the acting is mediocre and the special effects are not so special. That said, the premise is quite interesting - we know that ants communicate in some way and work together, but what if they got really clever? It is a mixture of "The Naked Jungle" (an oldie but goodie with Charlton Heston having to deal with "the marabunta") and "Phase IV", both of which are far better films.

After watching a movie, I always like to take a moment to contemplate about what I've learned from my viewing. "The Hive" taught me that if ants would ever grow self-aware of their capacities and become more organized, the human race wouldn't stand a chance for survival. That is of course the case for every insect species on this planet, if you think about it. Well, except maybe for ladybugs, because what are they going to do? Cute us to death? "The Hive" is an almost entirely computer engineered and made-for-TV creature feature about killer ants, so you know to keep your expectations rather low. On a slightly more positive note, the plot here is most similar to the underrated 70's Sci-Fi/horror gem "Phase IV", and that just happens to be the best killer ant movie ever accomplished. That particular gem also presented the hypothesis that ants, suddenly and without apparent reason, began to control and develop their intelligence with disastrous consequences for mankind. In sheer contrast to "Phase IV", however, "The Hive" lacks any sense of subtlety and plausibility. There were the 70's movie was thought-provoking and genuinely disturbing, the development of the ants in this movie is just ludicrous and exaggeratedly blown out of proportions. Set in rural Thailand, an entire region is suddenly overrun by an enormous and aggressive colony of millions and millions of ants – even different subspecies are combining their forces – that in a very short time span devour harvests, cattle and even poor villagers. The ants structure their mobility, plan their attacks, learn to set death traps and even send a spy into the brain of a hired exterminator. Later on, they even build some sort of central computer entirely out of ants and generate their own electricity. How brilliant is that? The government hires the world famous Thorax extermination team. They wear cool outfits, drive in macho hummers and use highly advanced bazookas that disintegrate a couple of hundred ants at once. This still isn't efficient enough, though, so the team leader has to go to the ants' headquarters in an island cave and "negotiate" with them. Yes, that's exactly how retarded this movie is. But hey, no further complaints from my side regarding the film's entertainment factor. Any dumb horror movie that opens with a sequence in which a mother and her three-month old infant are savagely eaten by insects is guaranteed to enjoy my full attention. "The Hive" suffers from too many boring sequences and an overload of wannabe intellectual dialogs, but the ants attacks are campy good fun. Additional warning: don't sit around and wait to see the seemingly cute girl with the impressive rack that is illustrated on the DVD cover. She doesn't appear and the film and, in fact, it doesn't contain any sleaze or nudity whatsoever. Bummer!

I'm giving this a 5 coz it did make me laugh out loud on a number of occasions.

The basic plot, killer ants. It sounded like the kind of cheap sci-fi B-movie I like, so I though I would watch it. And I was entertained for all the wrong reasons.

The acting was OK, not the worst I've seen, but I've seen a LOT better. The story was ridiculous! I mean, even to the point where; you know in Bond movies, how the bad guys does a plot exposition to Bond? Well, the 'ants' do this to the good guys of the movie...yes, the 'ants' actually tell the humans what they want! I'll not tell you how, but it is ridiculous! It made me laugh out loud.

The direction was taken from the 'how to film every camera cliché in the book' school of filming.

The end was really disappointing. They try to have a 'twist' ending, but it's more of a 'we couldn't be bothered to think of anything, so we'll resort to an obvious answer' ending.

After I saw this, I read a review that said this film has 'credibility', lol, really, it's only credible if you've never seen the 'moving image' before. If you like B-movies, that make you laugh, then you will enjoy this. If you're looking for a sci-fi/horror/action film, then this isn't for you.

I don't know why I keep attempting to watch a film made by the Sci-Fi network. Somehow, I think that just maybe this one will be decent. But, as usual, it sucks! When will I learn? You can bet that when you hear the announcement, "An original Sci-Fi film" it will be the usual lame story line. Some painfully bad CGI creation of a killer creature (super sized snakes and reptiles seem to be the favorites) attacking a group isolated, stranded idiots. And when I say "painfully bad CGI", it truly is painful to watch. ("I confess, just turn the channel!") I've seen better effects from the original Nintendo games! What I find even sadder is that some of the stars who sign up for these catastrophes are ones that "I thought" were on the fast track to great careers. Actors like, Stephen Baldwin, Michael Pare, Casper Van Dien & Dean Cane to name a few seem to keep reappearing in these features. I like to think that maybe they new managers or that there is just no quality work going on.

But, you can always count on the Sci-Fi channel to be in production of another low budget cookie cutter flick. I guess you gotta take what work you can get. Unfortunately, I believe that starring in these films is just going to keep you starring in these films. So you can kiss the Oscar goodbye!!!! "The Night of the Lepus", now there's a good cheesy I could enjoy over and over again. And that starred Janet Leigh, Deforest Kelly and Stuart Whitman.....what bet did they lose?

I do not dare to call myself a film critic but I think I do know how to appreciate a good film and differentiate between a good movie and a bad one. And in my opinion, this is a rather bad one, given the technology in film-making of 2008.

Honestly, when I play the movie, I thought it was made in the 1980s. The whole texture of the film just looks cheap and unpolished. Even if it's done on a low-budget, I assumed given the abundance of hi-tech equipment and all today, there should be at least some quality to making this film (apparently I was wrong). None of the characters look good(except for the lead actor who look like Keanu Reeves at times)and frankly, I would not turn my head to have another look at them if they passed me by on the streets.

The plot is ridiculous and the twist at the end of the movie just made me deemed this film as stupid rather than pleasantly surprising. The CGI is really really bad and childish. And to be called a sci-fi movie, the special effects should be the most basic component that the film-makers should invest money in. I would probably had felt better if it was seriously just a plain good horror movie about man-eating ants destroying things and end up being destroyed by humans. This, to me is more convincing than telling me that the ants are controlled by aliens. I am utterly disappointed in this movie and though I do not deny the fact this movie has the potential to be good, it failed badly this time as I do not see the effort in the film-making process.