Intermedio

I had read the script when it was workshopped on zoetrope.com or triggerstreet maybe, so i was looking forward to the film. I was saddened to see that the script which I had read was not the one that had been filmed. I'm not sure what happened between the translation from script to screen but this movie wasn't the original campy horror it once was. Sure there were moments (Railsback monologue was cool), but the production just fell short. Seems to many corners were cut. It was really "The Inbetween." At times the editing worked, others it didn't. Same with the acting. It could have been better and it could have been worse.

"Intermedio" is a film with 2.5 IMDb User Rating. Unfortunately this site is no longer reliable with many fake and one line reviews. Therefore I do not look anymore the IMDb rating to select the movies I will see. However "Intermedio" is indeed awful, with laughable dialogs, characters and special effects and senseless storyline. Watching this flick is a complete waste of time. My vote is two.

Title (Brazil): "Caverna Maldita II" ("The Damned Cave II")

This movie is showcase of director's errors and poor acting. Gen's red shirt (Cerina Vincent) starts full length (completly covers her) and as the movie progresses it gets shorter and shorter. There is no explanation for why that happens in the movie. I guess the director decided at some point that the movie was too boring, and they needed to add some "skin" to it. There is one scene toward the beginning where the image is mirrored (left is right, and right is left) for no apparent reason. Very annoying given that the actors have shirts with stuff written on it... which reads inverted in that scene. The coloring of the picture changes from scene to scene, switching from dark to light. It seems like they used two cameras of extremely different quality, and kept switching between the two. The audio quality seems to switch too from time to time. Very annoying. The whole movie is mostly running around tunnels, heavy breathing and panicking. It is also poorly dubbed from English to English. I guess the acting got so bad at times that they had to change it later. The "special effects" are as good as cheap Halloween decorations and the storyline is defective in so many ways!

A group of four teenage friends become trapped in a Mexican border tunnel where they fall prey, one-by one, to tortured ghosts who haunt it.

This movie deserves recognition as having possibly the best actors to appear in such a terrible film -- Edward Furlong, Cerina Vincent, Amber Benson... not that these are A-listers, but how did such a terrible film attract people who have had such notable careers? This could have been played by amateurs.

I am not blaming the actors, of course. There is no way this could have been good. Maybe a new director, new script, a few other changes... of course, then it would have been another film entirely. Which is what it would take to make this one good.

I have to admit, I cribbed that line straight from the movie. I'm not sure if the actor was trying to put his personal spin on "what the heck" or if the writer is just plain retarded, but that is the caliber of dialogue you are likely to find in Intermedio. I know, I know, it's a horror movie, who gives about the dialogue? Is there gore or nudity in this? Yes on gore, no on nudity - which is a shame, given their leading lady. The gore was cool and I have to admit the intermedio was kind of creepy. But really, some of the situations in this movie are so ridiculous it will make you yell out, "Oh, come on!" in a movie whose premise involves white drug dealers, haunted caves, and men who can endure massive mutilations without immediately going into shock. But other than that, there isn't much to recommend this movie since it isn't even funny enough accidentally to make it worthwhile. There are bright spots, however. The intermedios, as I've said before, are kind of creepy. There are some nice computer effects in there and the sets are actually far and above what one would expect from a low budget movie. In short, hats off to the makeup/effects people, the location scout, and the wardrobe folks for putting the ladies in tight T-shirts. The writer and director, on the other hand, should be fed to the lions.