Review of Ravenous (1999) by Jesse O — 05 May 2014

This is a film of two halves. One half, where the mystery of what exactly happened in the cave is still unknown, is easily the better of the two halves. Perhaps it's not better, but the film score certainly helped make it seem better.

And then there's the second half, where you know who Colonel Ives really is and how Boyd attempts to expose him and his actions to others, who don't believe him and assume he had something to do with the others' disappearance and/or death.

I wasn't as into the film in the second half as I was into the first one, the fun and the mystery is all but gone once you find out the truth. Robert Carlyle is great as always, but the film becomes more and more conventional as it went along rather than it being the other way around.

The story is darkly comedic and there's plenty of laughs to be had but, again, it's something that tapers off as the film progresses. But at least the film has a dark, but ironic, tone. Too many horror films forget their inherent silliness as they try to make everything so serious.

It's good to see that not every horror filmmaker feels that way and injects a little comedy into a horrofic story of cannibalism. Still, even if there's problems with the pacing and the amount of interesting content to fill 95 minutes worth of film, and this is a problem with the horror genre in general and not with this film in particular, I found this to be a pretty good movie all things considered.

The combination of a great first half, with an excellent score, and a killer performance from Robert Carlyle certainly helps make-up for the film's problems in the second half. Not great, but a solid horror film nonetheless.