Citadel

From the Irish and Scottish film boards a nice gritty horror that plays out like a great short story. Quite creepy with solid main performances from Cosmo (Braveheart and Game of Thrones) a world class actor and newcomer Barnard. This reminds me of another similarly gritty Celtic collaboration. A great Urban horror set in dangerous Scottish estates abandoned it seems by police and society where fear breeds. The agoraphobia of the main character is done well I thought and that different angle and its subsequent analogy of escaping from the hopeless forgotten edges of society added another dimension to the main character. Cosmo is great as always as the unorthodox priest and you'll not be seeing him waving about any bibles trying to dispossess anyone. The only complaint I will make is a scene which isn't really essential in which some dodgy CGI is employed. The main character might look a bit over made up in his attempt to look like a sleep deprived fear driven man, but otherwise I really enjoyed this film done on an extremely modest budget displaying just how to make a modern urban horror.

I do normally take a look at other reviews of the films I watch, just to see if other people got something that I missed. Here, I think I must have been watching a completely different film. If you check out a lot of the online reviews of 'Citadel' then you'll be told it's one of the best modern horror films ever.

It just bored me.

It's an Irish horror film about a young man who witnesses his wife being murdered by demon children, leaving him an agoraphobic. He later meets up with a - slightly bonkers - old priest and they team up to fight the aforementioned demon hoodies.

It's an okay enough idea (I've seen worse), but I didn't find any of the characters interesting or likable, plus the children weren't that scary (well, no more than their identical clones you see hanging around every off license up and down the country).

Yes, it was presented in a reasonably different way which made it clear they were trying to steer away from the Hollywood style of film-making. But, at the end of the day, it didn't take away from the fact that it bored me.

Others obviously disagreed. Fair enough.

First of all, the plot of the movie was very interesting and kinda innovative (I think so)... The storyline was well-written, it was simple and kinda easy to understand. The characters were very interesting, well-developed and really likeable. The filming location of the movie was just an abandoned creepy neighborhood. I have to admit, it was an unexpectedly scary movie and there were many jumpscares. The children's appearance was super creepy and kinda terrifying. The opening scene of the movie was definitely unexpected and it was kinda sad. The ending scene was kinda expected and it was super intense. Overall, it was just a nice psychological thriller movie that I would probably recommend it to my friends.

This movie obviously did not have the budget of the fancy multi-billion Hollywood production. Thus, in order to capture us, it focuses on one thing that Hollywood can not put a price on. Talent and acting. Aneurin Barnard is an excellent choice as the lead actor, and gives a wonderful and solid performance. He obviously is a very talented actor, and I am convinced that we will be seeing a lot more of him in the future. Hopefully not in crappy Hollywood high-budget flicks, but in films that focus on performance and talent. The entire cast was quite good in general, and combined with the direction, they created a "wonderful" claustrophobic atmosphere, that was exactly what this story needed. This movie will not impress due to its originality (as it is not very original really), but it is good due to the work put in it by talented individuals, and it is definitely worth seeing.

Honestly, I love the whole concept and the story. The thing I found so difficult to watch was the main character, Tommy Cowley. Granted he's agoraphobic, but I'm a bit irritated with such weak characters, especially when they're men. So you'd better have a lot of patience for Tommy's constant cringing if you want to finish the film.

In a nutshell, I thought the decisions the main character made were all short of idiotic, but then again, maybe it's attributed to his "condition". It didn't hamper the fact that the cinematography was quite good, the atmosphere--excellent, and the acting convincing. The spin of the story was also very interesting and I liked that they added an element of supernatural in it.

The pace of the movie is a bit slow, but I thought that worked quite well for the film. There's not much action involved, but I thought the ending was quite good. I still don't regret watching the film and would recommend it.