Monster Ark

Despite the presence of several veteran actors, Monster Ark amounts to little more than below-average horror shlock. The premise is mildly interesting - the recovery of an ancient manuscript suggesting that the Biblical Noah performed a prior task for God; constructing a previous Ark to serve as a prison for a monster unleashed by the Darkness (they don't go much into what exactly the Darkness was, because this is not a "thinking" movie). Needless to say, the monster is freed by the notably self-absorbed archaeologists to wreak havoc. All of this amounts to little more than a vehicle for a bad CGI-generated monster (who apparently has steak knives for forearms) to leap around hacking at people. It is also impervious to any man-made weapon, but often flees, anyway. Luckily, there is an ancient brotherhood created to protect us from this thing... though they seem pretty useless as far as the plot goes. The script deals with the numerous religious concepts raised by the usual half-hearted science-vs-religion lines, but nobody seems overly sorry about the fact that their mindless ambition has unloosed a killing machine - and possibly even the apocalypse- on an unsuspecting world. But this is supposed to be a horror film (not at all scary) with some action (not very exciting). But what do you expect from a film that supposedly takes place in Iraq but is shot in Bulgaria? Sure, there's a war on, but... A few brights spots - "Tiny" Lister stomping around snarling and shooting guns in an unintentionally funny role as a U.S. Army major, and the only two characters I didn't find annoying, Professor Nick's two students: lovely Amanda Crew and amusing Bill Parks (filling the token roles of young hottie and sarcastic nerd, respectively). It would have been more entertaining (and, oddly, more believable) as one of those teen-slasher films. Instead we get a ridiculous CGI creature leaping around the "desert" while a pack of idiots figures out what to do about it. It's nice to know Xena's side-kick can still get work, but do yourself a favor and pass on this one.

One thing that really peeves me, and it's prevalent with these made for SciFy channel movies, is the complete lack of knowledge of the subjects that they're doing. In particular, the military, but in the case of "Monster Ark", they managed to humiliate themselves with their lack of archaeological knowledge, as well. I know that these people can't be expected to be actual scientists, but it would be nice if they could be portrayed as a little more professional than a carnival barker.

As far as the military goes, this is great insight into the minds of the writers / director. If these people write characters that are so completely incompetent, what does that say about how they would confront a similar problem? Poorly written, bad acting, zero technical or military advisers, and a monster that makes Godzilla look real, and you have a big time flop. I hope those guys filled their backpacks at the craft services table, because this is a dog, plain and simple.

Hell, I'm getting addicted to these Sci-fi original productions showing on cable, but boy there are some stinkers amongst the charmers and sadly 'Monster Ark' is a dud. The premise actually sounded tolerant, but what came of it was not. After a somewhat imaginative opening, it becomes your stock-like monster on the rampage yarn leaving a small group of people to stop the problem. Its biblical horror set in a war-torn Iraq. When I mean biblical, it's the context of the film, and the sub-plot between the two main leads and that of religious faith. One who questions it and the other who does not. Where love and redemption wins out… lovely. And to set in Iraq… what an inspired choice… meh.

Archaeologist Nicholas Zavaterro along with his grad students discover a vase with an ancient manuscript informing them of the whereabouts of Noah's first ark that imprisoned a monster known as the darkness. Zavaterro, his grad students and his ex-wife/archaeologist head to Iraq to where it is. Along with some babysitting American Soldiers they discover the ark and find a crate which they obviously open and unleash the darkness.

Actually outlining the premise is really starting to bore, and when the darkness is released it's an unconvincing monster (an awful looking design… leftovers from a video game?) in clunky CGI breaking out total chaos. Rather unexciting chaos though. Jittery editing and shaky camera-work is plain tiring, as it sloppily moves. But the damaging aspect is the very dodgy script with its preachy/forceful messages… it was like a bad tooth ache. A towering Tommy 'Tiny' Lister's Sergeant character gave me a good laugh though, as he truly chew up his lines (enthusiastically) and then spits them out. Renée O'Connor was an itch that wouldn't go away and Tim DeKay is typically modest. Amanda Crew is wasted in a low-key role as one of the students. One thing, why does everybody have to yell out their lines? Declan O'Brien's direction is slick, but feels empty and goes for clichéd devices. Claude Foisy's eerily rippling score on the other hand was perfectly balanced and infused in to the film.

Lame, tacky and a drag. Simple as that.

When you're mentally editing a film nine minutes in, you know you're in trouble. Redundant scenes, pointless arguing instead of good dialogue...these things can be forgiven if they are rare occurrences and the story is good enough to carry it through. Unfortunately that isn't the case here, and the directionless scenes and dreadful writing continues to the end.

It's a pity, because the story is a good and interesting one, and O'Connor and DeKay have more than proved their talent over the years. They are let down by a bad script (so bad that at times their frustration is almost palpable), and direction which makes no attempt to compensate for or deal with the poor quality script. Surely opportunities for rewrites, even the odd scene, presented themselves?

If I didn't know any better, I would assume that the script is either a) a first draft, or b) a rush job. Maybe both. Or maybe the whole thing was written and directed by people with little experience who desperately needed a mentor throughout the process, and didn't have one.

The result is quite awful. The only people who might get anything positive out of this film are hardcore fans of the two leads who are prepared to forgive *anything* to see their faves on screen, or film students who would like to see a very good example of bad writing, especially bad dialogue.

That said, I gave it 3/10: one for the story (despite its poor execution), one for making the effort, and one for O'Connor and DeKay.

The only reason why I tuned in to see this movie is that the monster looked really cool in the previews. As it turns out that is the only good thing about this movie.

The story is that college professor Nicholas and two of his students discovers a urn. They take the urn back to America and have Nicholas's ex-wife Ava open it. Inside they find the original book of Genesis. Ava decodes it and discover that Noah had made a second ark to banish demonic monster, but the ark crashed and sinked in Iraq. So just like that the team heads over to Iraq with no problem from the government. There they meet hard ass Iraqui Captian Backhar. Together they find this "Monster Ark" and open the cage holding the monster. The monster escapes and goes on a rampage. Captian Backhar fail to stop the monster with raw fire power. Team then figures out that they must get Noah's staff to stop the monster, but the offspring of Noah are protecting it and won't hand it over so easily. Nicholas now must learn to have faith in order to stop the monster.

The Monster was the only thing that kept me watching. The acting was below average. The director inserted a sub-plot between Nicholas and Ava about them not trusting each other. He also add moments to create chemistry between characters, but these fail. The chemistry seemed fake and the sub-plot wasn't though out well enough.

The special effects on the monster where good enough but still looked fake. The Monster design was awesome but the movement needed work. The flash back scenes of the ark where completely CGI and look like something out of a 90's video game.

If you are looking to see a good monster movie watch this but fast forward though all the talking and just watch the scenes with the monster.