The Beast of Bray Road

Okay, I just watched Beast of Bray Road. It was the new werewolf flick from Asylum.

The film didn't really cover any new ground, it was a pretty much by the numbers werewolf flick. The story was similar to the Jaws story line. The acting for the most part was pretty decent. The beast looked like a cross between a werewolf and bigfoot. No cgi, which I liked, this was a good old school guy in a costume. We don't get any full transformation scenes, but considering the budget I would say that was for the best.

Nothing new here, but it didn't bore me either, moving along at a decent pace. We had a good amount of gore and a little bit of boobs. Don't go out of your way looking for this unless you need to see every werewolf movie, but there are worse ways to spend 90 minutes.

You can see a very good direction that this team is heading in. With this movie especially. A great flick all the way through. A monster film to keep your pants on. A fantastic time waster, and I mean that in a good way.

A new Sheriff is in town, not familiar with the back woods. The locals per say. Then strange things begin to happen, people are missing and there are no clues. Nothing but blood and parts. A Cryptozoologist comes to town after a string of rumors pops up on the internet. Rumors of a Werewolf devouring savage. Here to seek and destroy. People keep turning up dead, in grizzly fashion. The deputies band together to fight this deadly menace. They'll do whatever it takes to finish this nuance once and for all. The finale ends ??????????? I never give the ending away, what would be the point of you even renting it then when you know what is going to happen. Well, it doesn't really matter. Just know that it's kind of weak and not as surprising as you might think. Or not.

This movie followed the supposed accounts of an actual Beast on Bray road, Wisconsin style. Like the 13th Child based on flick also, the Jersey Devil type deal. There is a lot of bloodshed in this here film. Bodies are ripped apart, heads split open, arms, legs, you name it. No CGI effects here either. Good old fashion make up. I always buy that for a dollar. The usual actors and actresses are beginning to make appearances in each film as they go. A common bond, Hammer style baby. You need the brotherhood to maintain a tight production and team overall. Just like a band, you can only get better, well you'd hope so.

A behind the scenes featurette, commentary, Bloopers, Trailers and so on. They can only get better, and this is prime example.

So what happens when The Asylum veers away from their Hollywood cheap send-ups and puts their heart into something original ? Well, a damn good b-movie, that's what ! "The Beast of Bray Road" is apparently based on local Wisconsin lore, but do not think this "based on true events" tag line means your next Lindsay Wagner & Robert Urich TV movie of the week. It's probably based on a true story told around a campfire. What this is is a fun, fast werewolf movie like you haven't seen in a while, better than recent submissions like "War Wolves" or "Never Cry Werewolf", shot efficiently on a tight budget. It has blood, beasts and boobs (well, just one quick pair) and makes for the perfect midnight movie.

The frequent and very clear views of the beast is a nice surprise for monster fans, and for the budget, I'll say it looks really good. The deaths are gruesome and plenty, sticking to a slasher template. All the actors make a good job and actually are given some basic development and dialogue to play with. I was completely taken aback when I burst out laughing at a one-liner delivered by a drunk bimbo just before her demise in a car. This is definitely not a comedy, but the joke was good and unexpected.

All in all, very recommended for B-movie fans.

Review: The Beast of Bray Road(2005) So here's another one of those straight to DVD horror films that can either be really fun or really bad. So besides vampires, the second most played out genre is werewolves. Besides Neal Marshell's Dog Soldiers and Underworld, there has yet to be a were wolf film that has yet to broken new ground. Beat of Bray Road is somewhat based on a true legend in the Midwest about sightings of a real life were wolf on this road. This film comes from the same people who delivered the kick ass and fun "Jolly Roger" so I was pretty much expecting the same kind of film and hoped it would be just as good. Well the good news is the it is pretty good but the bad news is that it's as fun as Jolly Roger. While Jolly Roger was horror fun, Beast of Bray Road is more serious and straight forward horror film. Is that a good thing or bad thing...well truth is it's not a bad thing but it's not but it does hurt the film a little.

The Beast of Bray Road is more about telling a story then having killing and nudity every 10 minutes. The film feels like a real real story as it unfolds through out the film. I really liked the fact that the film was more about the characters of the small town and how the strange creature effects the town. So I liked the characters interacted with each other and slowly unfolded. But the bad thing is that the film makes the same mistake as other low budget films that want to be like real films...it tries to tell a story that sometimes feels dragged on in certain places. I liked the story of the film a lot but there were some moments that seemed too long or uninteresting(plus some of the bland acting by some of the actors really doesn't help either). I really loved where writer/director Leigh Scott took the story and I knew just want he was trying to do. He really wanted to make a different kind of low budget horror film by taking it back to more of a classic story telling point of view ala Stephen King based classic like Pet Cementary and Graveyeard Shift. So I knew just were he was coming from and I really respected him for trying to do a different kind of film. He really does deliver a pretty good film here and a great story. I really liked that he made it flow so smoothly and had the set up of other bigger films. On the downside, I saw a lot of things coming but I really didn't care. I was really digging this film to bother with that. But the film's twist ending did have me bummed. I could tell from the way the character was written that they were going to be the werewolf because it was a classic set up of making the character so likable that I knew they were setting it up for them to be the were wolf. I knew they were going to do it for twist's sake, I didn't want them to do it but they did it and I hated it. But besides that...Scott writes a great film considering the budget he had to work with so much love for him for that.

Acting wise, this film suffers again...like most low budget horror does from bad supporting cast. The leads were pretty great a believable. Jeff Denton as our lead Phil was great and I really liked the guy. Sarah Lieving was great as Kelly. Not only did she look good but the girl could actually act and was just fun to see on the screen. At least Jeff and Sarah had noticeable chemistry unlike the bigger budgeted The Fog remake where the awful Tom Welling and Maggie Grace had ZERO chemistry on screen and couldn't even act.Tom Downey from Jolly Roger is in this film and is great again. I really like him...he plays it straight but realistic. Now comes the only really draw back to the whole film...the acting of some of the supporting cast. Afew are pretty good at doing what they have to do but others here are just plain bland. They have zero personality on screen and it really comes across and hurts the film a lot. With the kind of script that Scott wrote, it would have really needed good actors to make the story interesting and alive but instead they drag the interesting script to kind of a bore. Then there's Tom Nagel, once again...he blows another role. I don't get this guy, he acting is just that...acting. He doesn't seem natural at all and is straight out acting and it gets annoying fast. I'm not a fan of his at all.

Direcing wise Scott does a really bang up job. I really liked all the different stuff he brought to this film. First he shot it pretty straight forward, there's nothing wrong with that because it gives the film a real classic feel to it. It seemed more like I was watching a real film than some low budget horror. Scott has a real feel for capturing that old school feeling and I really dug him a lot. All in all The Beast of Bray Road was as fun as I hoped it would have been but it was pretty interesting to watch. I really liked how the story unfolded and I liked the cool bloody kills. The film was hurt by some bland acting by actors here and there but I dug the whole film a lot. It's a smart, good little film that gave me what I wanted but still has it's problems. But it's all good. Great show.

A nice little and a little too easy going indie' B-movie, The Beast of Bray Road, is, allegedly, based on factual reports of sightings, circa 1989, of the legendary sasquatch and werewolf myth, or cryptozoology as the scholars would pronounce, and wild as the beast itself, the over active imaginations of the peoples' of Wisconsin, U.S.A.

Directed and written by Leigh Scott (b.1972), aka Scott Slawner, brings his extended family together for another outing, this time to do battle with modern folklore and superstition. Released by Asylum Home Entertainment, whose category embarks on the wonderful B-movie drive-in genre as Snakes on a Train (2006), Vampires vs. Zombies (2004) and The Fanglys (2004), all straight to video, and all for sale at the bargain basement bin at your local video rental shop. Most here, at least, have worked together in other projects, Jeff Denton (as Sheriff Phil Jenkins), working in Leigh Scott's Art House (1998), Sarah Lieving (here as Kelly), and Andrew Lauer had played against said director in the T.V. movie H.G. Wells' War of the Worlds (2005). Ms. Noel Thurman (playing Sheriff Pamela Fitske) in Mr. Scott's The 9/11 Commission Report (2006).

Mr. Scott's movie is very light comedy; too many weak points to be taken seriously, The Beast of Bray Road could be taken for a Saturday morning T.V. matinée parody at best. If it were not for the gross out flesh eating scenes and, once, light nudity and some coarse language, but not often. We can forgive Mr. Scott for trying too hard, but try he has and he has, forgivingly, done reasonably well. The attention to detail can be somewhat lacking, sadly, and it is this that has The Beast… looking a little too unprofessional and unfortunately this gives it its comical look, the desired effect perhaps or a bad dose of laziness and complacency.

The beasts makeup, on the other hand, is impressive, and done by Eva Lohse, regrettably, the only highlight of the movie, and not really seen enough, and Dizzworks Design too played their part. Ms. Lohse is credited as key makeup artist and having worked on Rent Control (2002), Employee of the Month (2004), plus many others as Dead Men Walking (2005) and Dracula's Curse (2006), which coincidently has five members of The Beast…co-starring.

The poor attention to the editing, again by Leigh Scott, has given The Beast…more plot holes than Emmental cheese, we are left scratching our heads and left feeling the efforts are rather curdled in the process and that this could, if at best, have been a half decent movie. This could, and to be fair, be down to a lack of proper funding, if so then the parodying of the major American beer companies and their logos that are seen in "KELLY'S Roadhouse" might be understandable.

The clichéd character development, too, is feeble and the lack of originality only separates its need to be taken seriously. All in all The Beast of Bray Road is a group of new family and old friends making movies, if it doesn't workout, then fine, lets make another. If one should hit the jackpot and stir up peoples imaginations then all the better for them, but in the meantime The Beast…will remain an okay movie, but it will never walk down the road of being a good movie.