DVD Moonlight Sonata

This film grew on me as I watched it. But monster films have a large hurdle to jump to make it past 6 on my scale. There's a lot of competition in this genre.

This is a story of a sort of "flu" outbreak in a college dorm setting. It follows a fairly standard zombie-film trajectory, where otherwise ordinary lives are interrupted by a rapid-spreading contagion which turns people into monsters.

In this case, the monsters are werewolves rather than zombies. Even with a low budget, I'm going to say that it kicks New Moon's ass. Sure, Lautner's hot, but werewolves don't stand around looking hot with puppy dog eyes — they chase and maim and kill and eat, like they do in this film. Also, this cast is easy on the eyes in a more realistic way, so there.

The film this reminded me most of was [ Rec ] (don't waste your time with the pointless US remake Quarantine) because in both films there is an attempt by authorities to prevent our characters from leaving the danger, which is happening right in the building they call home.

I like that the dried/drying blood is dark, almost brown. So many filmmakers miss that. Other technical aspects of the film were also good. I like that I can't tell exactly which effects were digital (maybe a dent in a door, maybe some flying blood, but nothing jumps out as digital).

I'm not sure what to say about the werewolves. On the one hand I'm tempted to say each is just a guy in a furry suit and wolf mask. But on the other hand, isn't that actually closer to what a werewolf should look like than what we've seen recently? These are supposed to be human wolves, not big versions of wolves, and not wookies. No film in the history of cinema has ever gotten this right, and it could be that it's just not possible. But I think the most useful change here would have been animatronic wolf heads, and I suspect the filmmakers would have loved that, if there was budget for it.

This film has some genuine jump-out-of-your-seat thrills. And the camera is used wisely to keep the monsters mostly hidden, or in a flurry of activity, because things are scarier when you don't exactly know what is chasing you.

For me, the weak area was character. We spend some time with the characters before the carnage begins, so I should be able to name most of them and tell you a bit about them, and why I want them alive, or dead in a shower of blood. But I'm not really able to do that. I also wasn't really sure how the medical team got there so quickly, or what their story was, and whether the doctor's indifference to an arm injury was related to that.

The credits tell me that (aside from the cast) this is mostly a two-person effort, which is cool. But I hope they'll delegate some of the duties for their next film, so they can focus on adding depth to the characters, or bring out more of the comedy they hinted at.

Did I recognize the masked man, not currently listed in the IMDb credits? I think so.