Review of Alone In The Dark

Introduction

I guess the best way to introduce this film is the opening narration:

In 1967, mine workers discovered the first remnants of a long lost Native American civilization - The Abkani. The Abkani believed that there are two worlds on this planet, a world of light and a world of darkness. 10,000 years ago the Abkani opened a gate between these worlds. Before they could close it, something evil slipped through. The Abkani mysteriously vanished from the Earth. Only a few artifacts remained, hidden in the world`s most remote places. These artifacts speak of terrifying creatures that thrive in the darkness, waiting for the day when the gate can be opened again. Bureau 713, the government`s paranormal research agency, was established to uncover the dark secrets of this lost civilization. Under the direction of archaeologist Lionel Hudgens, Bureau 713 began collecting Abkani artifacts. When the government shut down his controversial research, Hudgens built a laboratory hidden within an abandonded gold mine. There, he conducted savage experiments on orphaned children in an attempt to merge man with creature. Hudgens victims survived as "sleepers" - lost souls awaiting the moment of their calling.

OK. That`s the intro to the intro done. Edward Carnby (Christian Slater) is a freelance paranormal investigator who has unanswered questions from his past related to the Akbani, and is flying in with a recently discovered Akbani artefact. Professor Hudgens details someone to follow him from the airport, kill him and recover the artefact. Meanwhile Hudgens has also recovered a gold chest that contains something evil. The Captain of the vessel Hudgens has hired suddenly gets greedy, locks Hudgens in a cabin and opens the chest. Hudgens emerges some time later to find everyone dead and the ship covered in blood.

When Carnby meets up with girlfriend Aline Cedrac (Tara Reid), who just happens to be an archaeology assistant to Hudgens and working on an Akbani exhibition, a creature with the ability to appear invisible causes havoc in the museum they meet in. Just as things are looking a little hopeless in storms a unit from Bureau 713 under the command of Carnby`s rival Commander Richard Burke (Stephen Dorff). All these things are related and all hell is about to break loose…

Oh, and before I forget, can whoever compiles these DVDs please quit with those bleeding anti-piracy adverts. Stop already. I used to be able to at least fast forward through them, but I couldn`t do anything with this one and considering I had to restart the disc a couple of times to force myself to view everything other than the film, it just got really repetitive and bloody annoying. Everyone has got the message that the big film studios want to give the impression that DVD piracy is controlled by organised crime and terrorists. They just don`t think it`s true. They all know that while some dodgy seller on the local high street or in a local pub may just stretch to having links of that sort, the person that they generally get their pirated DVDs from is more likely to be a bloke they know in work who spends hours upon hours downloading stuff via the P2P networks, puts together a cover and sell the thing for a fiver. I don`t believe in that sort of thing myself as it goes against the quality of the DVD format for picture and sound quality, but an annoying three minute warming at the start of every disc may well be enough to drive people to pick up a pirated disc just to get away from that really bad music and grainy wobbly picture.

Can I stop now?

Video

Good transfer, though what did you expect? Dark throughout most of the action, but again what did you expect given the title? The one annoyance is that Uwe Boll has clearly been watching The Matrix recently, given the propensity of slow motion shots and the incorporation of a pointless bullet time sequence, which sadly doesn`t even look as realistic as anything from the 1999 film.

Audio

Choice of DTS or 5.1 soundtracks, although neither is that impressive with the gunfire during the couple of big battle sequences being amongst the weediest I`ve ever heard.

Features

Commentary - quite a dry commentary from the director, didn`t really get much from this.

Into The Dark - 7 minute behind the scenes featurette that spends a lot of time talking about the film being based on a video game.
Shedding A Light - 9 ½ minute look at the visual effects

Storyboard to Screen - straight forward comparison of storyboard against actual sequences for the Pinkerton Chase and Sand Worms.

Bullet time animatic - rather simplistic and dull animation that covers the same ground as the Storyboard to Screen sequence for the Pinkerton Chase.

Music Videos - 5 headbanging music videos by various thrash metal, or whatever they call themselves at the minute, bands who appear on the soundtrack in thankfully shorter forms. Every band only seems to know how to play extremely repetitive power chords and haven`t got in any lozenges for their singer with the inevitable sore throat.

Conclusion

What can I say? There have been a number of films based on video games and I can`t remember any that have been that good. Resident Evil was OK-ish in my book, but was slated by most people. To say that this film makes Resident Evil look like an Oscar winner kind of gives you an idea of how great this film is…

The story is a mess. It`s supposedly about paranormal investigators but turns out to be about creatures from another dimension against lots of bad actors with weedy sounding guns and a never-ending supply of ammunition. On top of that, we have a supposed evil genius who hides from a creature at the start of the film but incredibly by the latter third of the film seems to be commanding them all (and then inexplicably disappears). Lots of extraneous actors who do little but act wooden or attempt to look startled in front of largely unconvincing sets. As to the ending, well how on earth can creatures that are harmed by light appear off-camera and attack our gallant heroes in the middle of a deserted city street in broad daylight? Hmmm, forget one of your major plot exposition points, guys? Not that this particular plot point was ever used, so maybe they figured everyone would forget about it.

Christian Slater and Stephen Dorff are the only plus points in this, even though it looks as if both are strolling through this. The script clearly doesn`t help, but they look as if they`re doing their best amongst the dross. Tara Reid, on the other hand, just seems to demonstrate the declining quality of standard for those who currently acquire the job title of actress. Reid is so bad that she is completely unconvincing and I had to stifle a grimace whenever she opened her mouth. In one of those curious but seemingly standard Hollywood clichés, Reid plays an archaeology assistant who is quite happy to catalogue artefacts by day and then slide into expert firearms mode in the blink of an eye without a word of explanation. And the less said about the gratuitous sex scene the better…

Massive plot holes, so-so CGI and lots of bad acting make this film one major waste of time. Not even the extras save this film as they are by and large pretty rubbish too.

I had to watch this, you don`t. Make sure you don`t or you`ll regret it.

You have been warned.