The Devil's Rock (2011)

I was looking for a bad movie to put on while I was playing a computer game. Well pretty much ruined my game playing, I had to play at a much lower level so I wouldn't get killed and I would pause the game to follow the conversation all the time, I eventually gave up playing the game to pay attention to the movie. The low ratings are coming from people that think the more buckets of blood sprayed about the better the movie, they don't care about plot or the characters and the conversations between them. I maybe rated it a little high to counter the low ratings but if you like good movies that are well made you will like this movie however if you are just looking for a mindless bloodfest you probably won't like this one.

If I had to pick the best of all the New Zealand movies set in the Channel Islands featuring Nazi plans to win WWII by supernatural means, The Devil's Rock would be at the top of the list. To give it due credit, as a low-budget claustrophobic three-hander, it manages its resources very well. There is loads of blood and gore, a demon with decent makeup, a cute lady, a dastardly (but perhaps misunderstood) villain, a doughty hero faced with the sort of problems no-one should have to face, boobies, and a script which tries hard to keep you interested and very nearly succeeds.It needed a bit more to happen in order to be completely successful, but I suspect that was difficult to achieve within budget.

Nothing – not even crap movie logic – annoys me as much as an actor who thinks that mumbling is the hallmark of great thespianism. For most of the movie I struggled hard to understand what that moron was saying. Sunderland pretty much talks like a ventriloquist for the duration. It's as if his mouth had been sewn shut by a Clive Barker cenobite; you can barely see it move. Pity this wasn't a Hellraiser movie, because I would have enjoyed seeing him torn to pieces, even if it'd just be make-believe. Worse yet, this cretin talks in a very low volume. Heavy-duty mumbling + low-volume slurring = a very unhappy viewerTo make matters worse, Sunderland is part of nearly every scene after the first 15 or so minutes, and ALL of the movie's exposition comes through his barely-moving lips, so if you can't understand what he is saying you're basically screwed. If the time has come for English-speaking viewers to have to hunt down English subtitles for English-speaking movies, then it's time to EJECT A FEW ACTORS AND DIRECTORS PERMANENTLY from show-biz. I hope this guy never works again, at least until he learns the BASICS of performing in a movie, i.e. BEING FRIGGIN' UNDERSTOOD. Until then, flipping burgers is the best application I can envision for him. Perhaps rolling hot potatoes in his mouth could prove as useful practice; might teach him to separate the upper and lower jaws on occasion.As for the plot, it's pretty straight-forward. Two Ally soldiers find a German post dripping in blood, with nearly all the Nazis hacked and butchered. The rest of the movie is one big pull-and-push between the Nazi and the New Zealander, in what is supposed to be a great battle of wits. In the end, the Nazi snuffs it and the Ally soldier opts not to send the succubus back to Hell. He thinks it wise to use it as a weapon against the Nazis, not realizing that such a creature can do more harm than good in the long run. That's what you get when you let Kiwi peasants make crucial decision, I guess.So what's the point here? That a New Zealand farmer won D-Day for the Allies because he didn't send a succubus back to Hell? While it does evoke memories of "Outpost", it is fairly original with its single setting, just two men, and a female demon whose sole tactic is sex. TDR manages to remain interesting in spite of its limited setting, just three characters, and a deranged mumbler. The fact that both soldiers were wounded and badly beat up on several occasions, yet STILL managed to talk, walk and function was a quite on the absurd side. Plus, I didn't understand the entire plot – but I have that to thank Sunderland for. Nice job, moron!

Not a bad film, obviously knows who its audience is, which is sci-fi and horror nerds who watch movies like this. There's even a nod to the Indiana Jones films and Lovecraft myths.So the plot is that on the eve of D-Day, a couple of New Zealand Commandos are sent to take out a gun position on one the channel Islands, to distract the Nazis from where they were really going to land. The two commandos find most of the Nazis are already dead, mauled by something in the fortress that is screaming horribly.After one of them is killed by the last Nazi, who is also a specialist in the occult, the other finds the Nazis have summoned a demon who can shape shift into the image of the viewers loved one.Now, I give this movie its due. It was probably made on a budget of bottle deposits, but the acting isn't that bad and the plot moves along at a good pace. Better than the typical, "Let's make a Zombie Movie" garbage we see from low budget film makers.