Review of After... (2006) by Anthony M — 17 Apr 2010

This low-budget horror by director David L. Cunningham is somewhat of a mind fuck, with a story that could of been pretty good it was wrongly executed and let down on a number of levels.

After... tells the story of 3 people, Jay, Nate and Addy. Nate and Addy are married and have recently lost their child. They are also a bunch of 'urban explorers' who go to places sealed off to the public as a sort of sport. They decide to go to Russian underground metro in search of Stalins 'METRO2' and Ivan the Terribles torture chambers. But everything doesn't go exactly to plan...

I thought the basis for this film was pretty good and while I have a lot of faults to pick with the rest of the film, this was probably the best idea. Through-out the film, they are mainly searching the areas until a number of things happen. Nate starts to hallucinate brought on by the guilt of the death of his child, I wasn't sure if this had any connection with the radiation poisoning which was never actually explained which 'caused the death of both Addy and Nate.

The acting was mediocre at best and while sometimes belivable, ultimately it was dissapointing. This fused with the confusing camerawork which couldn't decide if it wanted to take a third person prospective or found footage style of filming and the fast paced, annoying editing really frustrated me through-out the whole film. The soundtrack was completely wrong, taking an elecontric and in some places dancey sound which didn't fit at all with the theme of the film. The special effects were dire and while this film had its creepy moments, it was pretty much a failure.

After... would of worked well as a college student project but not as a consumer product. I wouldn't complain if it was given free through the internet but I know I wouldn't pay for this. While to give the film some credit, the story for the first 20 minutes was reasonably strong but in the end, it all went to shit.