Cub (2015)

I'm surprised at how low the score is, this film deserves to be in the six's. We are at a point where horror movies are just a waste of time. No real scares or thrills. The only pleasure I get from contemporary horror is making fun how bad they are. Needless to say, Modern American Horror is in a huge rut right now. Which is why I found this film refreshing, and think that American cinema needs to take some notes. This film is by no means perfect, but it is at least entertaining. I found it to have some good acting, decent writing, and it builds tension and suspense very well. In most horror films today, I find myself not caring about any of the characters. They are so wooden and bland that when they die I'm neither cheering or grieving for them. This film actually gives me characters that I both hate and care for. You got characters that make you angry, and characters that you can relate to. As far as filmmakers making horror movies like Paranormal Activity and Ouija...where the hell is that in your films. But I won't bash those films anymore in this review. I liked this film. I didn't love it, but I respect it. It caught my interest, made me invested, gave me moments that had me on the edge of the seat. Overall, it's pretty good. Not a film you must see, but a film that will do its job and entertain you for an hour and a half.

Nice to see, another nice good Belgium movie after ''BLACK'' and "Sl8n8" and "LOFT 2008 original''. A few years ago, I mentioned that Belgium and the Netherlands should work together for better movies. Nice to see, that my country Belgium, have founded another way. Always, was the problem: money. Glad to see, we have now again a good Belgium horror. In the past, we even had a few gory splatter-movies. This horror movie focus mostly on character's building-up. Instead of only GORE and blood. Nevertheless, a little more blood and gore was welcome, to increase more the scary parts. It has indeed it's scary moments. There where 2 great action moments, where the music did kick-in. I've loved these moments + good music. Reminded me on those ''Halloween'' movies. Specially with that young girl of Michael Myers. Also here, 2 dead where original. So nice bonus. It's still not perfect, but for a more reasonable budget, Belgium did it's best AGAIN. Maybe it needs only more sponsors ??? Our latest movies are WAY better, than those from the Netherlands itself. Our next star movie: "BLACK 2015". Happens in Brussels.

To begin this review , I must say that taking into consideration that this was the director's feature film debut , he did extremely well. The direction was the best thing about this film. Now , the issue of this film comes from it's script.It lacked focus. The story is simple enough : 12 year Sam goes camping , he his bullied by the other scouts and even by one of the scoutmaster (And his evil dog!) . When Sam tries to warn everybody that he saw a character from an Urban legend , Kai (an animal/boy who eats people) he his laughed at so Sam ends up developing a rather strange and disturbing relationship with Kai that would turn this Camping trip into a living nightmare! So the story is fairly straightforward as you can see but the issue is the writers felt necessary to add small layers/subplot to it that makes it more complex then it should. I can go on to much details or I will spoil the films.Let just say that the director gave Sam a mysterious background that raises a lot of questions but none of them are answered by the end of the film. For me ,personally, Cub is very good up to it's last 10 minutes.Great atmosphere, great direction,great acting by it's lead actor but the above issue I have with the film gives us an ending that leaves things to the viewers imagination. Your personal enjoyment of that film will come to this at the end : If you like to have a clear ending to your film , I am afraid you will be disappointed by Cub but if you are the type of person that loves a film to end in an ambiguous sort of way I believe you would find much to like in that film. Outside of this , Cub do a lot of things right. So if you are up for a very dark little film that has a very strong and shocking yet confusing ending you could do much worse then this trip to the wood. I give Cub a 6 out of 10

Legends are created to inspire, scare, obey and for entertainment. Sometimes for some people, it's a great opportunity to utilise the concept to do illegal things. Whatever this movie is about you must observe carefully and try to apply these theories. You will get the story, but enjoying watching it is up to what you were expecting and what it delivered. If you had seen numerous similar horror-thriller, then you feel awful.Belgian horror-thriller, well, that's what they say, but I doubt it. It sets in the summer scout camp, which is directed by a newcomer. A thirteen member of the scout team heads to the woods to set a camp. But it was about a 12 year old Sam, who is a cub scout. He's a first choice of pick to bully by his fellow scouts, especially by the den leader as well by one particular pack leader. He's always late, weak and his over imagination makes him a weirdo in the herd. During in the camp, he discovers what was said to be a legend is real. Not bothers to convince others since they never going to believe him. His adventure is to go deep and discover the secrets, but all the above finds the right place for his essence."Kai does exist. He lives in a tree house in the woods."The 'Marina' girl was in a prominent role. In this 80 minute movie every role was a prominent one. There was no time to develop character, but simply a straight forward presentation. Began with the spilling werewolf concept and it did not hold longer the suspense. Once you know it's not a horror, but a thriller you would lose the interest. Follows the cliché, the same old killings without the reasons or proper explanation. Well, at that time of the story that how it looked, but sooner or later you will know the truth. It's not only the camp versus the whoever hunting/haunting them. It's about the basic instinct, the first reaction to the situations. There is no surprise on the pack leaders, their's behavior is not just based on the fiction, merely true in reality.Traps were the best parts compared to the killings, but too short to have pleasure. Initially I expected it to be a children's horror movie since they are involved, but there are some contents that do restrict them from watching it. Commercial recognise is very important for filmmakers, so they didn't fear to bring the cliché on. I still feel the end should have been a little creative and a fresh idea could have served it well. Not only the end you are going to predict, well, almost everything before from happening.Keeping mystery is the key factor for a movie if the director and writer want to surprise the viewers. Does that 'hold-back' is good enough to satisfy the audience during the twist is the question. First half of the movie nicely keeps the suspense, all about the next half where smartness lacks. Actually, there is no twist at all, the story itself reveals from beginning till the end. All we have to do is figure it out ourselves what this battle is about, other than good versus bad. I'm itching to say it, but it'll spoil if you have not seen the movie yet, so I let you find yourself.As the Belgians perspective the film is okay kind, but not to the rest of the world. Overall an average movie compared to the international standards, but the production quality is impressive. A nice concept, set off very well, but the blow is maybe the influence of Hollywood in today's world cinemas, especially in this genre that did not help to finish it off ably. The days gone by this movie will be forgotten, but I believe in this filmmaker who has a good knack for this type of films will definitely come up with another brilliant product in a near future.6/10