Site 13

Trying to uncover a strange mystery, a woman is tasked with looking into a scientist that's recently awakened from a decades-long coma after he led a group of students into the woods for an experiment, but the more she looks into it the more she realizes a cosmic entity has been drawn into our world.

Overall, this was a rather decent enough effort. Among the better features is the rather strong setup that provides a fantastic starting point for what's to come. The initial starting point of the recovering coma patient hoping to piece together the remnants of his past indiscretions that put him into that state which sets the rest of the film off in the right direction. From the bizarre interactions with the rest of the inmates at the insane asylum where he recovers to the need for uncovering what's on the fabled video tapes he recorded the strange experiment with, this initially comes together quite nicely at providing the kind of intriguing setup that gives this a lot to like. As well, there's also the fun to be had with the burgeoning sense of dread and overwhelming cosmic-styled evil that's employed here. This comes about through the use of the recovered footage taken from the original experiment that sent him into the catatonic state played out for the majority of the film that shows him and the rest of the team encountering a series of truly odd and bizarre scenarios once they begin working in the woods. Featuring no shortage of weird camera edits, unnatural behavior that should show more urgency than what's going on here, and a rash of gruesome encounters featuring possession, occult activity, and much more at play here. These are all enough to make for a generally fun time although there are some issues holding this one back. The main issue with the film is the sense of chaos and confusion that erupts from not knowing the general purpose of everything happening. The beginning attempts to explain the original concept of the experiments but that doesn't tell anything about what's going on with the demonic figures appearing, the seeming possession of individuals one minute before being normal the next, or what the overall goal of the creatures' influence on Earth came about. There are glimmers of a concept here with the tortured inmates running after them throughout the asylum but very little of what's going on has any context at all rendering much of this quite confusing and somewhat bland. On top of its budgetary issues, these are the main drawbacks to this one.

Rated Unrated/R: Graphic Language and Violence.

I have no understanding AT ALL of how this movie is currently rated at 5.2/10 -- as awesome as it would be to have a well to drink from that would never go dry and only only has 7/10+ movies to offer, we all know that is just unrealistic. Those movies are kind of rare. So I would assume most movie fans are like me and have learned to just find the best movies we are able to find that are 4.5-5.0-ish or higher. Pretty low expectations I would say. So how this is rated at 5.2 is absolutely just beyond my understanding. I only even rated this a 3 out of the kindness of my heart because for me it was really more like a 2.5, so I just rounded it up, but honestly a 3 is way more than this deserves.

Despite my first impressions looking at the title name, synopsis, and photos was that I was already pretty sure this was not going to be a good movie, despite having a 5.2 rating at the time I watched it.

The synopsis I read before watching sounded interesting and within the realm of the kind of movies I tend to enjoy, but the movie itself feels like there is no direction and no main plot at all. The movie has nothing at all to offer to justify it even being created.

Lots of people hate, or are just over the whole found footage thing, but I still love them but the camera work is just absolutely horrendous. I would even see this is probably some of the worst camera work I have ever seen. And what makes it even worse is knowing that this camera work was actually 100% intentional because it is quite clear that the violent trembling and lightspeed turning in the cameras direction is simply an attempt to fill in the complete absence of any type of effects and the absence of the entire movie having very little, if any at all, scenes that are meaningful in anyway, let alone meaningful to the plot.

So the professor mentions that he works at Miskatonic University, which indicates that the movie is actually set to take place within the universe created by H. P. Lovecraft and the Cthulhu Mythos. Though the name K'Luta is not one of the Elder Gods in the actual Mythos. Which makes me wonder whether the Nathan Marsh character is related to the Marsh family from Innsmouth.

The storyline in the movie never really caught on with me, because it was a pretty weak serving of a narrative. Writers Nathan Faudree and Tony Urban didn't really feel like they were agreeing upon in what direction to take the movie, and it felt rather disjointed and disharmonious.

I was not familiar with the cast ensemble in the movie, but I will say that the acting performances were actually fair. I've always never been keen on movies which happens to have the writer and director also starring in the movie, which was the case with Nathan Faudree in "Site 13".

The movie constantly changes between properly filmed scenes and home-made handheld footage, which was quite a nuisance. I absolutely loathe the found footage genre, and I don't sit down to watch a movie that I could very well have filmed better myself with my own digital video camera.

The entity, K'luta, was sort of a watered down rendering of Azathoth from the Cthulhu Mythos. The rendering of the entity was actually fair enough, but I just never got the sensation that we were dealing with an entity powerful enough to devastate the world, as it just lazily hovered in the air, merely moving its one eye about. But points for trying though.

I honestly wanted to like "Site 13", but it was just too much of a chaotic and irregular movie. The narrative was not particularly well-constructed, and the camera that was in constant motion just didn't play out that well for me, nor did the home-made footage.

Ultimately, then "Site 13" is just another stale and forgettable foray into the cosmic horror of the H. P. Lovecraft-created Cthulhu Mythos, and not with much of any particular success here.

My rating of "Site 13" lands on a three out of ten stars.