Hyenas

Following a series of grisly murders, a hunter and his protégée team up together to find the culprit terrorizing their small town and set out to stop the vicious shape-shifting creatures responsible from continuing their rampage.

This turned out to be quite an enjoyable effort. One of the better elements is the new and somewhat original take on werewolves provided here where they're not portrayed as typical humans but more like rabid animals with the unique ability to shape-shift rather than be afflicted with a curse or other such condition. That, combined with their obvious pack-like attitude, creative back-story and absolutely cruel viciousness makes for an absolutely appealing creature that gets a lot right here, including times where it really drives up the tension as they stalk their prey or simply engage in stealth tactics to force their victims into a deadly situation. As well, there's a lot of rather fun confrontations here with the creatures including the opening encounter at the highway trap, the forest shoot-out that initially encourages belief in their existence for the skeptical aide and the garage encounter that really serves as the film's biggest and most chilling sequence as the trapped victim slowly realizes his doom in the darkened garage and slowly goes insane with their tormenting before springing the final trap. It's repeated to nice success during the woodland encounter but just doesn't have the same impact as earlier, and thankfully the final encounter at the house is where it gets to the highest mark with a spectacular assault on both sides from the creatures and the hunters' defenses coming into solid showings. There's still a few flaws here, including the absolutely inane CGI for the creatures in their animal form which looks inherently fake and quite laughable due to the rather distracting nature it implies throughout the scene. As well, the fact that it tends to employ a few extra plot lines that aren't needed is a little confusing which spreads the film out a little longer than it really should be, but overall there's a lot to like here if the flaws aren't too damaging.

Rated R: Graphic Language, Graphic Violence, Full Nudity and minor drug use.

For creating a movie so Godawful that it truly defies description! I first discovered this movie's title when I was browsing through John Carl Beuchler's list of credits here on IMDb, naturally seeing such a title listed captured my imagination and why wouldn't it.

Now I did harbour ideas of purchasing the movie, based upon Buechler's participation and of course that of Eric Weston as director, although it had been many a year since I had last sat down to watch Evilspeak, favourable memories of that movie still lingered in my mind! Trying to find a release date or even a website that was selling the movie proved impossible, but luckily for me(however dread was to follow) here in the U.K. we have the horror channel, who from time to time do show the odd decent little horror movie, so without hesitation I sat down to watch it.

From the opening beats of the movie, my initial thoughts of yeah turned quickly to Holy crap! You would think that the presence of headline star Costas Mandylor would at least elevate the movie, but having witnessed Mandylor sacrifice his dignity in the movie Dr Chopper I should have known better, if it wasn't for the Saw franchise the man wouldn't have a career! As for Eric Weston, what happened in the intervening years between Evilspeak and Hyenas? did he forget how to be creative? In this instance the artwork for the movie offers more than the actual movie delivers! 1/10

How do you say something good about a film that has been universally panned?

Well, Christa Campbell (The Wicker Man, Day of the Dead) is in it. That is always a positive comment. There was definitely more than one skintastic moment before she changed into a hyena.

For the ladies, there is Costas Mandylor (SAW IV, V, VI).

Remember Meshach Taylor from Designing Women? He does a good crazy person who knows all about the creatures.

If nothing else, Amanda Aardsma will make you want to find out about Frisians. Her brother David is a Yankee pitcher, by the way.

A few surprises at the end as Crazy Briggs replaces his recruits.

All in all, it kept my interest and is worth another watch.

It looks good on paper. Eric Weston directed it, well, in 1981 he made the cult flick and video nasty "Evilspeak" so I thought, this is going to be good. Sadly, only one minute into the movie and I knew it, this is going to be bad. But I gave it a chance. Costas Mandylor from the Saw franchise was in it but just face it, from a blockbuster to a no-buster. The idea was okay, changing the theme from werewolves into hyenas. But a lot of things broke this flick down. The killings are all of screen. I admit, you do see some victims but it's never that frightening or gory. Secondly, they used CGI for the hyenas, no prob wasn't it for the fact that it was badly used. And the gang of hyenas were based on Lost Boys. Even the acting for almost everybody was wooden. It's sad, I really am sure that it could be done much better. Of course a horror wouldn't be anything without nudity (?)so they gave us Christa fully naked but if you take a close you can see that she hasn't got any nipples. I have said it before, if you agree to do nudity than show it and don't hide your breasts after CGI. Really, what I thought would be a well done came out as a dreg. Now I understand the laughing of the hyenas...

This was another tough one to get through. I mean, when it comes to horror or movies in general, i'm pretty chill. This however...this is another kind of bad.

Directed by Eric Weston, this film follows a group of "WereHyenas" as they embark on a feeding frenzy in town. When a woman and child are murdered on the side of the road, the husband(played by Costas Mandylor) and cops don't know what to think. When a crazy local by the name of Crazy Briggs claims to know what's going on, Costas aka Gannon agrees to join him in the hunt of these creatures. Without knowing it the film jumps a few years. thanks for the heads up.

I could go on about how bad this movie is but i don't have the patience. So i'll make this brief. The acting is horrible. Like i'm talking barely a step above acting. which is funny because I've seen some of these actors before and they are not bad actors. everything was just wooden and uninteresting. felt like i was watching machines act.

It had almost no natural flow at all. The editing was the same. most of the time making cuts so jarring i had to do a double take to make sure i was watching the same scene. The CGI. Oh my god how terrible it is. Just look at the up top pictures for a example. Trust me, it gets worse.

From everything i saw, it looks like the direction is what was weakest here. Never heard of this Eric Weston before but damn dude, i've known some beginning student directors who could have gotten a better performance out of these actors.

Final note: It seems to me they wanted to pack this film with hot actors and actresses and did this in a hurry. They put in alot of nudity but even that was lazy. most of the time covering something half way up with CGI or framing it to where you had to ask, are they trying to tease the audience or just keep it at a certain rating?

Fun fact. I actually met the lead hot hyena girl in this film. Christa Campbell. Met her years ago on the set of, "The Taking of Deborah Logan". she was a producer i believe. She has acted before but was much better then this. Don't know what happened. (Again i blame the director) think his direction for her was, just look serious and strip. thats almost all she does in this film.

ok i'm done.

I give HYENAS, a 1/10