The Carrier

Was drawn into seeing 'The Carrier', with a cool poster/cover, a promising trailer, an intriguing premise and as someone with a general appreciation for the genre it fits under. That it was low-budget, which from frequent personal experience is rarely a good sign due to that there are so many poor ones out there, made me though apprehensive.

It is sadly however yet another film seen recently, hence some reiteration because the exact same strengths and flaws present in those films are here, that to me was incredibly disappointing considering its potential which it doesn't do anywhere near enough with. 'The Carrier' is weak with not much point to it, with so many huge flaws and doesn't do enough with its potential, which was hardly small. There is very little to recommend in 'The Carrier'.

Lets start with the positives. Some of the acting is okay considering what was given to them. The production values had atmosphere and didn't look too cheap.

'The Carrier' also starts off reasonably promisingly, it does intrigue and it does have creepiness.

Going on to the negatives, the story does feel over-stretched and some of it comes over as vague and under-explained in the last third where the film especially became duller, more predictable, more senseless and less unsettled and never gaining momentum. All the characters are too sketchy and with nowhere near enough to make one want to endear to them. Their annoying and illogical decision making and behaviours frustrates. The chemistry lacks character or punch.

Making the film feel bland and forgettable with not enough heart put into it. The sound quality is obvious and utilised cheaply (being too loud in the build ups and people's reactions) and some of the acting seemed unsure. The effects can be ropy.

Dialogue can be stilted and rambling while the pace and film lacks tightness after such an intriguing start and doesn't recover. Found too many of the supposedly shocking moments not surprising and very bland and the atmosphere dreary, due to the excessive obviousness, a lot of idiotic and vague moments and explanations and the lack of tension and suspense. Thrills are none, thanks to stodginess and excessive over-familiarity, and found myself never invested in the drama, which tended to be overacted and statically directed.

A lot of 'The Carrier' has underdeveloped plot elements and often nonsensical and confusing character motivations, while too many of the things to make you shocked are far from creative or unsettling.

Everything is unimaginative and are more odd than scary, completely failing to show any sense of dread. The thriller elements fail to thrill and are very predictable and the drama is overwrought. Some badly sagging momentum too and a lot of weirdness. The direction is leaden, got the sense their heart was not in it.

Overall, weak but not without redeeming merits. 3/10 Bethany Cox

The idea had potential, but I think it just missed for me. The pandemic has taught us that people WOULD in fact be idiots, and try and jump on a plane despite the risk to others. So the very idea of this film is a solid one.

The problem is the characters were bland and one dimensional, and I don't feel the film had any real focus, or real ending. Like there were some very good ideas going on, but they needed developing more, and the film needed more focus on deciding what it wanted to be. It started off very reasonable, but then just went flat.

The other issue I had is the acting was a little all over the place. Some points seemed overacted, where as other actors felt flat/stiff. I wish the film had more going for it, because the concept is a good one.

Not a great movie by any stretch, but merely a somewhat good movie. My wife got this having no idea of the ratings, and I had read about it, expecting some utter crap movie. Honestly is is quite watchable, a bit low budget, but not nearly a bad movie. It is somewhat suspenseful and was a really good rainy weekend movie!

I think some of the really bad reviews are not real. A solid 5.5-6 movie. Acting is okay, effects a bit mediocre, but the music, filming and story are all fairly decent. The movie really got interesting after they got out of the sky and onto the ground! I wanted to lend a real view of this movie. So to sum up,a DECENT rental, you would do far worse. It is English made, and features and English cast, so those that are unable to watch anything that is not USA made or Big budget, just pass it by. For the rest, that want a good movie, give it a try!

Aside from the first couple of minutes (which were actually fairly promising, as a mother and her son try to escape London and the soldiers who were shooting anyone trying to get out of the city after the outbreak of a deadly disease) I was confused from the very beginning of this movie. Made in 2015, it depicts a global pandemic that makes the Covid-19 pandemic look minor league. This disease is caused by resistance to over-prescribed antibiotics, has no cure or treatment, begins by disfiguring those who get infected and then eventually kills everyone it touches. That much was clear - but what confused me was the plane. Not because all travel in and out of the UK and all flights were prohibited. I get that there are still planes and some people will be able to access them no matter what. But why this particular group. The captain, Tobias (Edmund Kingsley) said that he had a "select" group of passengers. But why? In what way? They really didn't seem all that "select" to me. So I was confused by - why these people, in this plane and at this time? And that was never really clarified.

But beyond that, it just wasn't an especially interesting or original movie. The description makes you think that there's going to be some sort of outbreak on the plane that makes the flight horrific, but really most of the action takes place once the plane lands to refuel and gets attacked by the infected - and even the attacks are dealt with fairly easily. I will say that I was intrigued by the character of Eric (Joe Dixon.) He was clearly being portrayed as the "bad guy" but there were other times when he was quite relatable, and even his motives at times seemed quite noble - basically - "you can't go anywhere because you'll infect anyone.) Aside from him, though, none of the characters were especially interesting. As far as the story goes, I didn't understand the need for the second plane and the flirtatious exchanges between Tobias and the other (female) pilot. The story didn't need that. And, sure, a few people die - you expect that - but while it portrayed (mostly through the dialogue of the characters) a world gone completely to hell, frankly, with bodies being burned in the open and a desperate and frightened population, it just seemed to be lacking much in the way of real intensity, and it ended up being a movie I could watch (thankfully it's fairly short) but not really get engrossed in. (4/10)

There are some interesting little set pieces here that, at the very least, keep the watcher interested. However the big problem is that the writers have a basic concept of 'plague on a plane' and no idea of how to flesh out the story, the characters or how to end the film.

The action is wooden, the character motivations are strange, to say the least, random things happen like people turn up to shoot at people and then just disappear.

However the scene with 'the arm' is quite harrowing, the opening scene is full of suspense and the counter play with the other pilot is well done. Shame they couldn't knit it all together.