Wilderness (2006)

It looked a bit inconsistent. Some killings were shot pretty badly. The landscapes looked amazing and some of the movement was divine. Mostly quite subtle sound design and lovely with some great music and surround/bass well used. I would watch this again but it was not what I was expecting. It did not have suspense or supernatural. It was like Eden Lake (2008) but nowhere near as harrowing. The girl from Sugar Rush was not right for this at all. Otherwise the acting was good. Overall too inconsistent to recommend.

Hot on the heels of the horror comedy SEVERANCE comes WILDERNESS, a similarly-themed low-budget British movie about a bunch of people on a remote Scottish island who are being picked off one by one by a camouflaged maniac. Bearing many similarities to DOG SOLDIERS in terms of dialogue, gore effects, and the always-welcome presence of Sean Pertwee, despite its predictability and lack of originality, WILDERNESS rocks! An engaging script, plenty of action, and some creepy isolated locales make this flick a winner, and it's also a genuinely exciting film with people fighting for their lives against an unknown oppressor.The movie benefits from the usual clichés that arise when people are stranded somewhere remote; it's all about group dynamics, and watching the characters fall apart or become leaders is always engaging. The acting from the young cast is surprisingly decent, with lots of stand out performances with Toby Kebbell's mad hero taking the honours. And, of course, with this being a modern horror film, it's very gory stuff despite a 15 certificate. Legs and heads are severed, there's a pack of vicious dogs that tear people to shreds (Sean Pertwee never has much luck, does he?) and things culminate with a nasty knife vs. axe fight which makes for really vicious viewing. Lean, pared down, and offering all the splattering you could ever want from an intense horror outing, WILDERNESS does just what it says on the tin – and for that it deserves top marks.

I remember viewing this movie along with "Severance" which is both alike in many ways and as I started watching this I was purely hooked all the way through. At the start we get a group of young offenders in a prison and one of them commits suicide, after he is continuously bullied by his cellmates, the remaining inmates are then sent to an Island where they have to learn team building which was a little far-fetched and out there and then they come across a small group of girls who are also there for the same reason and both become targets of a psychopathic army man whose hell bent on killing them all and armed with vicious attack dogs.This movie was pure fun all the way through, okay the who dun nit angle wasn't hard to figure out but that didn't matter as this movie sustained suspense all the way through and it's unpredictable which is rare in horror movies these days and the death scenes are well thought out and very elaborate and those attack dogs were nasty and vicious and were well used, and this movie really makes the most of out of its eerie island setting and cleverly staged scenes in the woods and the cliffs and oceans. This movie has a definite height of realism to it despite the ridiculous reason that they were sent to the island, and this movie does build drama and suspense, the killer was spot on and a welcome change from the usual teen slice and dice, here we get an army guy decked out in camflourage and decked out with attack dogs which makes the chase scenes more nerve racking and exciting which does add a hint of intelligence to the proceedings, but my only complaint was that when the killer was finally revealed he was quite easily dispatched which was a bit of a downer.The acting was very good despite the fact that they were mostly underdeveloped but that didn't stop them from becoming interesting as we get a range of variety in the cast Sean Pertwee as the Prison guard gets a nasty death and gives a credible performance, as does Alex Reid she displays true strength and courage to her role and should've been in it more. Toby Kebbell as Callum was also rather interesting and added a sense of mystery to his role. Stephen Wight also did well at making his character unlikeable and believable as the movie carries on he becomes more and more unhinged which was exciting and Lenora Crichlow brought true charm to her role as Mandy and made decent for final girl material.All in all "Wilderness" is a decent survival flick slasher movie, that brings something a little different to the table and gladly it works as a whole.

A group of bang-up young lads, whose hobbies are drug-dealing, rape, murder, psychological torture, Nazism and juvenile delinquency, go on a backpacking trip to a remote ex-army island together with their happy-go-lucky special-cases caretaker, Jed (naturally played by Sean Pertwee, the Brits sole horror star). Supposedly alone on the island they fortunately stumble upon a couple of equally nice girls, who are all too open to share the island (and their very doubtful virginity). Even more luckily it turns out that apart from them the island has it's own drunk, who loves getting beat up, as well as a murderous special ops with four blood-crazed dogs. This means the boys are in for the funnest game of their lifetime: kill or be killed.A bit of "Lord of the Flies" with a survival thriller twist to it "Wilderness" is a surprisingly gripping experience. Much owed to the absolutely excellent cast with special kudos given out to Luke Neal and Toby Kebbell, as well as the director Michael J. Bassett, who has proved to be a remarkably capable actor's director. Both "Wilderness" and his debut "Deathwatch" (both survival horror movies) show immense talent to exerting the best out of his cast. Without a single note wrong throughout the movie you can forgive it's script inadequacies as well as some occasional sub-par cinematography.The bones and flesh popping out here and there throughout the movie are found lacking and seem to plastic, but nonetheless the gore should satisfy the most disgusting needs. The biggest fault does however seem to lie with the ending itself - the overwhelming feeling I had was that the scriptwriter had no idea how to roll the credits and went for the obvious, if lame and abrupt outro.Also what is it with black guys and horrors? I've had an intense horror-filled week behind me and in every single movie they are always the first to die! Really people - stop it already!