(BBB, C, VV, M):

Dominant Worldview and Other Worldview Content/Elements:

Very strong moral worldview, with some redemptive qualities, teaches that protecting the weak elevates and ennobles the soul, and aids in one’s survival and defeat of evil, and the movie also promotes compassion, empathy, helping others, and equipping the weak to survive, but two parental figures in the movie are evil and heartless, but the hero tries to appease his evil father and gain his approval, despite his father’s rejection;

Foul Language:

No foul language;

Violence:

Strong and light, sometimes scary, violence such as predator alien murders his older son because he refuses to kill his younger and weaker brother (the Predator society is based on Spartan-type values regarding hunting and war), evil father tries to kill the other son but the older brother pre-prepared his spaceship to take the younger brother to another planet to earn their clan’s hunting initiation status, younger brother crash lands and fights off vicious vines, younger brother finds human female android who helps him survive the planet’s dangers, she helps him survive plant seeds that explode and put other creatures to sleep before eating them, she helps him kill a large alien animal for food, they have to survive grass that’s sharp as knives, they discover and eventually befriend a small creature who helps them in the hunt, younger brother fights large alien creature with rows of vicious-looking teeth and an ability to regenerate in hopes of capturing said creature and earning him the right to become a respected member of his clan, younger brother and female android battle evil heartless androids of large corporation that wants to use the younger brother to develop weapons and other useful items for people and wants to do the same thing with the large alien creature and its regeneration abilities he’s hunting, a big fighting sequence occurs near the movie’s end, followed by another life and death fight, and android robot bodies are smashed or torn apart or beheaded, characters are impaled or partially exploded using small fiery worm creatures;

Sex:

No sex;

Nudity:

No nudity;

Alcohol Use:

No alcohol use;

Smoking and/or Drug Use and Abuse:

No smoking or drugs (evil android puts good android to sleep by turning her off); and,

Miscellaneous Immorality:

A humanoid alien creature, the Predator in the movie title, has a disagreement with his evil father but he hopes to earn his father’s respect by hunting and capturing a large, awesome alien creature, but the evil father has decided that both his younger and elder son are too weak to survive, so can his mind be changed?

PREDATOR: BADLANDS is a rousing science fiction thriller about a humanoid alien who tries to appease his evil father and gain his approval by hunting a large apex predator on an extremely dangerous planet but needs the help of a female android and a small monkey-like creature when they encounter a group of heartless evil androids. PREDATOR: BADLANDS is a terrific, exciting movie that teaches protecting and equipping the weak and that promote compassion, empathy and helping others to overcome evil, but the movie has lots of strong, intense action violence, scary moments and some scary characters and creatures.

The movie opens with a brief written preface about the Predator race of aliens called the Yautja. The primary goal of these aliens is to hunt, and they hunt alone.

Cut to their home planet. Kwei is the larger older brother of Dek. Dek, the movie’s central character, is the runt of the litter in a clan that removes any sign of weakness. The Yautja think one weak link breaks the chain. Sadly, for Dek, that means he’s subjected to not just being ousted from the clan but being killed.

Kwei and Dek are arguing about Dek’s situation in Kwei’s spaceship. Unexpectedly, Kwei sympathizes with Dek, but warns him that his chances don’t look good, especially since their father already has rejected Dek. Dek chooses a lethal planet called Genna as his hunting ground. He also decides that, to gain their father’s approval and elevate his status, he will hunt a large and allegedly unkillable apex predator called the Kalisk. Kwei is not happy about that. He thinks the Kalisk will kill Dek because Dek is too weak. Dek replies, that, if he dies, which probably is likely, at least he will die with honor.

At that point, their gray-haired father appears. He’s angry and asks why Kwei didn’t kill Dek as he ordered to do. Kwei defies his heartless father. So, their father decides Kwei too must die because to forgive weakness is itself a sign of weakness. So, he tries to kill Kwei, but Kwei defends himself.

Meanwhile, Dek tries to help his brother, but Kwei shoves Dek back into his spaceship and closes the door on him. So, Dek watches helplessly from the ship while Kwei fights his father. Eventually, the father fatally wounds Kwei by thrusting his flaming sword through Kwei’s chest from behind. With his dying breath, Kwei activates his ship to send Dek to Genna.

Dek is knocked out by the spaceship’s sudden movement, and he wakes up on Genna. Immediately on exiting the ship, Dek encounters deadly brown vines that swing form the trees and try to kill and eat him. He fends them off with his blade and guns. A strange monkey-looking creature watches the fight and bonds with Dek. The creature is able to escape the vines by swinging through the trees, but he seems to help Dek fight them.

After fighting off the vines, Dek and the creature come to a clearing. They face new dangers, but get help from a damaged human-looking android, a female named Thia. Thia activates her translator and is able to understand Dek while he can understand her English. Her torso was severed from her robotic legs when she and her android companion, Tessa, encountered a Kalisk. She offers to take Dek to the creature’s lair if Dek will help her get back to Tessa, who disappeared during their fight with the creature. When Dek says he only hunts alone, Thia proposes that he think of her as a tool.

Dek agrees. So, with that, Dek and Thia establish a partnership, and the monkey creature, whom Thia names Bud, accompanies them.

Of course, getting to the Kalisk’s lair and capturing, or even killing the Kalisk is a very difficult proposition. Complications ensue when they come upon Thia’s twin android, Tessa. Thia’s twin decides that she and the androids under her leadership should serve the evil corporation that brought her and Thia to Genna. That means capturing the Kalisk and imprisoning Dek to take both of them to Earth for the company’s experiments and technology creation, including weapons creation.*

The odds are stacked against Dek, Thia and Bud. Will they survive and remain free?

PREDATOR: BADLANDS is a terrific science fiction thriller. It has excitement, thrills, heroic deeds, and lots of heart. Thia teaches Dek to be compassionate and empathetic. Meanwhile, the evil androids, including Tessa, are heartless automatons with not an ounce of sympathy. This conflict provides a marvelous, exhilarating contrast of good versus evil. Also, PREDATOR: BADLANDS has no foul or crude language and no explicit lewd or obscene content.

However, the movie does have lots of strong, action violence, scary moments, and scary creatures. The camera often cuts away from the more gruesome acts of violence, but it does show things like the father’s fiery blade exiting the older brother’s chest. Also, the good guys smash, crush, impale, and behead some of the heartless evil androids. Moreover, the predatory Yautja aliens are scary looking, as are the killer vines and the giant Kalisk monster. For instance, the Yautja have four large menacing teeth on the outside of their mouths, and the Kalisk has rows of scary teeth in its mouth plus a large scary dinosaur-like tail.

In addition, PREDATOR: BADLANDS shows that Dek and Kwei’s father is an evil alien who wants to kill his sons because they’ve disappointed him. Also, the computer program that the evil androids use is named MUTHR, like in the original ALIEN movie.* Thus, the movie’s two parental figures are evil and negative. So much for “honor thy father and mother.”

That said, PREDATOR: BADLANDS has a very strong moral worldview with some redemptive qualities. The movie teaches that protecting and equipping the weak ennobles and elevates the soul. It also aids in one’s survival and one’s triumph over evil.

MOVIEGUIDE® advises strong caution for the intense action violence and scary parts, characters and creatures in PREDATOR: BADLANDS.

* The evil corporation in PREDATOR: BADLANDS is the same as the one in the ALIEN movies, which originally ordered a heartless android to retrieve a dangerous alien specimen at the expense of the human crew of a spaceship called The Nostromo. 20th Century Fox, which is now owned by Disney, decided back in the 1990s to merge the ALIEN and PREDATOR franchises. In the ALIEN MOVIES, the company wanted to use the alien species to develop and sell new weapons, including bio-weapons. In PREDATOR: BADLANDS, the corporation also wants to use the large apex predator, the Kalisk’s, regeneration abilities to regenerate human body parts, including human and android soldiers, as part of the company’s medical and pharmaceutical division.

Psychological thrillers have to be my least favorite genre of all time. Rarely does a movie get by on just dialogue before I give up. The Cellar started out as such, and I was getting ready to lose interest. As I got further, I learned to appreciate the film. It’s a tough call, but I was fully entertained by the story. I really should learn a lesson and sit through these types of films more often.

Let’s get into the review to find out my real feelings.

Synopsis

A young girl wakes up in a dim underground cell, with no memory of how she got there. As she fights to escape, sinister secrets resurface, blurring the line between reality and her own buried traumas.

The Rundown

This is what turns me off to psychological thrillers. The lines between reality and horror don’t quite fit in my humble opinion. Whether it hides behind a horror facade or just outright rushes a story to fit into a 90-minute film. The stories require a lot more time to explain without confusion. Everything becomes complex and a think piece instead of just plain enjoyment.

The Cellar is the film that made me second-guess all the movies I have ever written about, where I say there’s no love in reality, so horror movies are an escape for me. I like to be entertained, not just a lack of understanding. The film does move slowly, and sometimes it confuses you, but in the end, you can piece together the story. It becomes simplified as the movie progresses. It brings a sense of clarity.

Hello Darkness

The dark setting also gave the movie more “pop”. You would think a dark cellar is redundant; however, the film definitely becomes more interesting and eerie as we look past the characters and experience flashbacks. The film has almost a Silent Hill vibe when it comes to explanation. That isn’t a bad thing at all, seeing as I have a Silent Hill tattoo and a small obsession with the games.

This is honestly what I picked up on after about 20 minutes of the movie. It is almost as if the film is hard to piece together on purpose. The film is like a tapeworm slowly creeping into your brain. It stays there and takes over your mindfulness. The film makes you feel a certain level of paranoia because, of course, this story could easily be reality. We have always had a way of looking at extreme religious intent and walking away quietly due to their stature in the community.

In The End

I didn’t find too many problems with The Cellar. The director passed the test on the film. Though I was about to give up hope as usual, I am extremely glad I gave it a longer shot than most.  I would have missed out on a great film if I had told myself it wasn’t my interest, and being ready to talk down the entire film.  I can’t argue about the significance, and Jamie David Langland’s directorial debut is outstanding. I look forward to seeing more films under their name as time progresses.

 

 

A story that focuses on the feelings for long enough to forget the facts. Tu Maza Kinara lacks a B-plot, leading to a disproportionate time spent on the minutia, while ignoring directional story progression.Suraj (Bhushan Pradhan), a perfectionist, is shattered when an accident results in the death of his wife (Ketaki Narayan) and the psychological mutism of his daughter (Keya Ingale). His perfect life now has to make space for his daughter’s special needs. The film poses next to no challenges for the main character, removing, as a result, any scope of development. Rife with inconsistencies, the film shows ‘psychological deafness’ being cured by a hearing aid and Suraj teaching his previously speech-abled daughter to pronounce Aai and Baba. The cinematography for the songs is quite possibly the only saving grace for Tu Maza Kinara. A film that has exemplary colour grade and a capable cast suffers at the hands of poor direction and a story that goes nowhere.