Gallow Walkers

I rarely rate a movie as low as I am doing Gallowwalkers. Any worse and it would have been funny bad. Unfortunately it manages to stop right before it gets there, but goes far enough for almost all movies to be better. I am not kidding. The story is a confused mess, the actors play bad, the action scenes make no sense.

You know when you have dreams when it is really hot and everything seems to move in slow motion and doesn't respect any narrative and it is all a blur that you fight to make sense of and can't? That's how bad this movie is.

And you might dismiss my comment and think that I have something against Snipes. No, I do not. I know he is not a good actor, but I've watched a lot of his movies. I respect him as an action star. He is like a black VanDamme. But this film... I am really astounded that it could have turned this bad. Speechless, almost.

I watched this movie without reading any reviews for it, thankfully, as most are really harsh, most rating it as a 1. The images and camera shots are amazing and definitely made the movie more enjoyable than the plot, as well as the end credit images were superb. The plot is interesting, though not properly explained at points, as well as not addressing some key issues throughout the movie. Without Wesley Snipes, this movie would have been worse, and that's saying something. The camera kept focusing on him when he makes one word/sentence responses for way too long. The supporting cast were not written in well, and at times seemed out of place, appearing at random moments without any cause.

The action scenes are good, though the close ups can be disjointing for the viewer during fast paced scenes. The flashback scenes helped to reveal the plot throughout the movie, but, the randomness of scenes and the transitional points were just irritating.

The budget was about 17 million, so they might make it back, but this movie is only for those who can sit through 90 minutes of confusing scenes with little actual thought. I would rate it a 5 because I did enjoy it. The racial and gender presentations were a bit questionable and does try to identify their key audience pretty well (however narrow it will be). To anyone planning on watching it, skip it, unless you're looking for basic action and a basic storyline.

It seemed like they weren't really sure what it was.

Some things that may make you LOL in this dire bore-fest:

I laughed so hard when that well bucket was just sat on ground level, and when he dropped it back in the well, it sounded like it fell on to some metal on the ground! Really, really atrocious filming in that scene. Were they all high or something when making this?

The 'bad' guy doing a 'muhahahahaaa' on the gallows scene was just hilarious.

And what was with that cave thing about, holy crap! Was the entire scene just removed?

The actors delivered the tired script straight and awkwardly like some kind of cheap SciFi channel TV movie. They all appeared somewhat self aware and miserable. Cringe making at times, Snipes does his best not to laugh in places it feels, although he's good at the Blade poses as usual.

And don't me started on the music, trying to be all Spaghetti Western from the 1960's, but cheesing it up really badly in places. But to be honest the music was the best thing about the film! Which says a lot.

It has decent gore effects, surprisingly, and I guess it was memorable for some reason, perhaps all the bad wigs and head pieces made it memorable. Not in a good way though.

I honestly felt sorry for the editor of this, but it got into such a mess anyway. I suspect too many hands (guys in suits) got involved in the final cut.

Sorry it's not a proper review like review, but it really wasn't worth caring for. Avoid. Unless, no, just avoid.

So many extremely harsh reviews.... I'm tempted to rate it a 10 just to try and offset some of the bad but I won't. I will go ahead and rate it as I feel it deserves. It is a simple plot when stripped to the core, however the angle they take and the creative way they give it a supernatural twist made it interesting enough to watch.

So many reviewers pick it to the bone critically for not being mind blowing detail/story wise. I think that's harsh. It was a fun little movie that is plenty enjoyable if one doesn't think to hard on it... Just taken as it is I actually liked it more than I thought I would. I have seen it around but never bothered to watch it due to all the negative reviews.

It was a friend of mine that told me I should give it a chance as he thought it was a good little watch and he is rather particularl on what he likes. He and I have very different acceptable base criteria for movies and he will not watch half the things I think are decent movies. To put it short, he only likes things with lots of action and/or really good CGI. but even he said I should give this one a shot so I did. Is it unforgettable? No.... However it was entertaining enough and better than I thought it would be.

Interesting Weird West film (i.e. western horror mash-up) had potential, but instead becomes laughably bad. Wesley Snipes plays a cursed gunman who's victims come back as the undead. Snipes is solid as the strong silent gunslinger (basically Blade in a duster), and at times the film has strong visuals, with bright incongruous colors that echo Jodorowsky's "El Topo," so I'll give the filmmakers credit for trying to do something original, but overall this attempt at a genre mash-up comes off as unintentionally laughable. While this film wanted to be "Into the Badlands" it ended up being closer to the "Wild Wild West" movie remake. Overall, this film is only for hardcore Snipes fans. Patrick Bergin and professional wrestler Diamond Dallas Page also appear in this disappointment. FUN FACT! "Gallowswalkers" was originally set to be filmed back in 2005 as "The Wretched" with Chow Yun-Fat in the lead!