Man-Thing (2005)

Where to even start? Unless you are a total comic nerd, you have no idea who or what Man- Thing is. Either way it doesn't matter. From the get go you know what you are in for. No big budget, no big stars, no medium stars, little word of mouth. Side note, when pressed most detractors will admit never actually seeing it. The look of the film is really well done. They did do the best with what they had. The acting was adequate. But like I said, you know what you are in for. Plot wise its straight forward, A monster seeks revenge on its creators because they deserve it. I like that Man-Thing is not from his/its point of view. No delving into back story, "Oh the pain of tragic lost love!". No, none of that. Just Man-Thing dishing out stern, unapologetic justice on humanity. You know, because they deserve it. Not a bad little movie if taken as such. I have also tried watching with volume on mute and playing music over it. The result is pretty good. Obviously, metal works the best but give it a shot with your personnel favorite.

A new horror about a lake monster, done with no less than a monster movie-making ! The lead, (Matthew Le Nevez), is bad. "Acting" is something he has never heard of. "Character" is something the scriptwriter has never heard of either ! You'll never know : was the lead having problems? Was he smart? Was he angry? What I know now for sure is that the scriptwriter has problems, one of them is that he's stupid, and that made me angry !The girl ? Grrrrrr ! I bet they wanted to insert any girl anyway into the movie's events, while forgetting giving her a character too. Her being here is absurd comedy. She falls in love with the lead, kissing him now and then, then and now, for no obvious reason but providing the movie with kissing. She's with him at the last scene, so the poster may have her with him…wet !The rest of the movie is at rest as creative or even workable. In the start there is a scene that copies the first scene of (Jaws). After that there is a "monster in the lake", how many movies had that before? Then, a slasher movie where everybody is killed, misshapen and torn apart, a man who wanted to have the land for himself, a Red Indian voodoo, and snore, snore, snorrrrr.. sorry, that was me in front of this ! In brief : What's new ? And in terms of making that old movie, or movies, what's not bad?The editing is primarily good, trying to make a surprising dark character for the movie, however loses every power it has during the lost and incredibly boring second act, in which nothing happens but some guys go into the lake, talk to each others, then get murdered brutally (At one moment I hoped that the creature may eat the lead, that should have made me happy, and changed the mood a bit !). The cinematography doesn't get out a chronic case of green for the lake scenes and yellow for the rest, so with the movie's unoriginality and emptiness I felt discontent; maybe that's a point for the sake of the movie's atmosphere ! And the direction has its moments, but what a scary vacuum it plays in for all the time, and it's shameful enough working with a script like that ! It pulls off one matter though, which is hiding the creature's features for almost all the time. It's a smart trick yes, based on the good horror works to inflame the expectation and generate some fear, but the thing is when we got to see it at the end, it looked so primitive and poor to feel frustration and regret. Here's a movie that doesn't want to complete anything good at all !"Let him dig, dig, and dig.. his grave" is a line I liked. Though, between you and me, was anything in this movie better than it ? Well, this movie digs its grave by its own hands ! (Man Thing) is a movie thing. It's supposed to be a B pastime product, however ended up as the movie shown on video in (The Ring); just series of hardly related dark images that do nothing but curse you. Heck, I should have been warned when the movie's title, at the movie's start, looked like a green vomit !P.S : How come that (Stan Lee)'s name is on this ? The man is a master of beautiful crap. Why he went on to produce pure crap this round ?!

Well, no, it is definitely better than a B-movie. Viewing the movie, one can tell that there is enough money invested into it. This is not a cheap video or like the cheaper made-for-television variety -- at least by North American standards. If it happens to be so in Australia then I envy them.Terrible actors? Not at all! Watch these names -- they are all up-and-comers! I watched this movie because I noticed that Jack Thompson was in it. Jack has been around for a long, long time. Thompson is a super-star in Australia and has been in pretty much everything decent that has come out of that country -- usually one of the high-lights. And, in Man-thing, the Marvel Comic adaptation that never saw the light of the movie theatres, Jack is definitely the heavy-weight here. I liked his performance. I liked his Southern US accent, his greed, his gravitas.Interesting little international cast here, too. One from Split ENZ land, one from Taz, one from Italy. Lots from Oz. And, until I studied the credits, I believed these were Americans. And, let me tell you, I tend to be picky about poor accents and acting. You want poor accents? Watch Sean Connery in The Wind and the Lion, or Richard Gere in First Knight. Poor acting? Watch most of the James Bond movies. This one felt like what it was supposing to represent and that impressed me.Some complained that the Man-thing was only in the end of the picture or that it was compromised by deeper characterizations of the Sheriff, the medicine-man, the teacher,etc. I enjoyed all of the characterizations and felt that this added to the movie. [ I agree that the soundtrack was well done and fitting and that the swamp scenes (which dominate this picture) were nicely shot. ] I suspect, however, that the critics were fan-boys of the comic and thus disturbed by the "monster's" smaller role in the larger storyline.Sadly, this movie lacks the completeness of a beginning. We don't get a genesis here and are fed only the smallest of hints of where the Man-thing came from and that is sad.Sequel? Well, I doubt that will happen with a direct-to-DVD, but to be honest, a re-make would probably lose some of the wonder captured in this pic. I recommend that you watch it -- if you are into Marvel lore and haven't read the comics. I am still stunned by Imogen Bailey's sexy introduction.Another issue I have is with the storyline fed to us by IMDb if not the movie-makers. Man-thing isn't seen burning anyone (unless it is the fast-motion shaking). It does have bizarre eyes but if there is terror transferred in its stare we don't see that.What the movie version does is impale its victims seemingly without reason and without intelligence. It is like a natural disaster. That is to say that, if it were real, it would just be better not to be there. It wouldn't matter how innocent you are.I have re-rated this. And, I have to say it is truly an under-rated movie. People take exception to the somewhat wooden acting of the new, young sheriff. Looking back at it. New guy, trying to get a feel of the town. He did a great job.

An Oil Company whose owner is an ambitious villain(Jack Thompson)is polluting the Bywater lands and the villagers are up in arms and a swamp thing is committing horrible murders. A new sheriff named Kyle(Matthew Le Nevez) arrives the little town. He is sent to the Bayou to investigate , helped by a deputy (Alex O'Loughlin) . There finds a beast, a plant with an animal's aggression power for survival and fury. Meanwhile the sheriff falls in love with a gorgeous elementary school teacher named Teri ( Rachael Taylor).This exciting picture is packed by thrills, chills, gory killings and brief nudism in charge of Imogen Bailey. It's an unusual mix of monster movie and intrigue but definitely an enjoyable movie. From the producers- Avi Arad and Stan Lee- of Spiderman, Daredevil, X men, Blade and several others. Director Brett Leonard made this campy swamp romp adapted from the Marvel comic books of the same name. Director deliberately use comic-book style to keep us from taking anything too seriously. It's a co-production USA-Australia filmed in Sydney , New South Wales with good cinematography by Steve Arnold. Fans horror will love this movie about a monster part vegetable, part man . In similar style adapted from D.C. Comics were made in 1982 ¨The Swamp Thing¨ by Wes Craven with Louis Jourdan, Adrienne Barbeau and Ray Wise in which a chemical installation turns into walking vegetation monster. And its following : ¨Return of Swamp Thing¨(1989) by Jim Wynorski with Heather Lockleaar, Lous Jourdan and Sarah Douglas.