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A Truly Horrifying Experience! CREATURE (2011) Review

Take everything you know and love about horror from the slasher glory days of the 80's and leave it at the door. Expecting very little from CREATURE, I was served even less. While going in seemingly blind to this theatrical wide release, I was somewhat puzzled by the lack of attention this film was receiving. I mean come on? This is a rare independent horror film with practical effects (no CGI here kids) involving a "CREATURE" slasher style character and it made it nationally into theaters. Someone out their surely was happy about this. Why were webtes, such as ours, and many others not jumping with joy and sticking it to BIG Hollywood about getting a horror gem into theaters? About 20 minutes into the film I quickly realized why, it mply is not a good film.



CREATURE starts out proming enough, a beautiful, fully nude woman out for a dip in the murky swamp. Ok, so it's not something my wife would probably do but hey, I am a male, I enjoy a nice female figure in all its glory. Director Fred Andrews (who helped pin the script with pal Tracy Morse) made sure not to cut away as the young lady dipped into the waters expong herself as much as posble before the first of many deaths took place. Out of nowhere a giant croc leaps out of the water and disposes of the said beauty with ease. At least I think it did. The biggest problem with this film is we NEVER get to see the kills. We get some camera movement, some sound and some bloody aftermath but that is literally it. It's as if you are watching stock footage from ANIMAL PLANET. Would it get better? I mustered on for the good of the community.

Struggling to figure out exactly what kind of film I was dealing with here was the biggest problem throughout CREATURE. This film throws everything it can at you; nudity, gore, backwood rednecks, a wild legendary tale and incest. Wait, what? Incest Yes fellow horror fans, this film is at its very core is all about incest and we even get a little brother and ster action. Why go down the street when you can go downstairs? That seems to be the motto here.

Plot holes abound, the script goes from x kids on their way to vacation in New Orleans all the way to crazy religious acts and bizarre sacrifices. I am really struggling to conjure up the words to describe what this movie entails. It is literally all over the map and takes you on a ride that frankly you do not want to go on. You won't hear me compare it to Adam Green's HATCHET because it would be doing an injustice to the legacy those films left, like them or not.

I will not be going into heavy detail here because the plot jumps from one point to the next without warning, making little to no sense. I will tell you this, the CREATURE looks great. Nice refreshing practical effects are displayed here however there is one small problem. . .WE DON'T SEE IT UNTIL 40 MINUTES INTO THE FILM After a few more bare breasts and one helleva angry "handy J" from ster to brother we finally get to see the CREATURE in action. Amazingly this monster would rather get into a wrestling match by pounding repeatedly on his foe. You have a giant gator mouth my friend, filled to the brim with teeth, why not use it?

The ending is a must see to believe type of ending. I won't be

spoiling anything for you, no you must witness this yourself. Let's just say after tting through what seemed like a decade watching this nonsense we get what could be the most unbelievable ending in horror movie history.

I have not been this pissed nce they unveiled Roy at the end of FRIDAY THE 13TH: PART 5. Not even TUCKER & DALE could save the film at this point.



All in all, CREATURE tries so hard to be so many different things that it cannot even get the mplest of things right. How this film got pushed through to the masses in a full theatrical release is unbeknownst to me. It doesn't help that the whole time I am watching the film in the back of my mind I am thinking about Michael Daughtery's fantastic 2007 film TRICK 'R TREAT that was shelved, only to be released later on DVD and Blu-ray. All the actors in this film try hard to keep you focused but at the end of the day you can only rise to the level of the source material you are given and it just isn't here. My hopes were swallowed by you CREATURE. Let's hope that the word sequel doesn't get brought up anytime soon.

RATING: F

http://youtu.be/0wFLRbkzWxo
Horror Domain - Cursed Evil Overlord Monday 9/12/2011 at 06:40 AM | 82491
Even though it wasn't as good as I was hoping I thought it was alright.
mich13 Monday 9/12/2011 at 10:52 AM | 82499
I was stoked by the old school goodness of a rubber suit monster and all the things that COULD have been.....but somehow I knew that this would suck. I will see it just to see it, but the general consensus all around is that this flick is a total dud. One or two problems? we could deal with it...but this film sounds like its got all kinds of issues.

This is also VERY bad for mainstream horror. The adverting money behind this film was immense. Fango cover; tables at every convention with tons of free goodies. A nation wide theatrical release.....all for nought. Studios take note of this. They will continue investing their money in other avenues or in safer remakes and reboots.
ny ghoul Monday 9/12/2011 at 05:57 PM | 82514
I was stoked by the old school goodness of a rubber suit monster and all the things that COULD have been.....but somehow I knew that this would suck. I will see it just to see it, but the general consensus all around is that this flick is a total dud. One or two problems? we could deal with it...but this film sounds like its got all kinds of issues.

This is also VERY bad for mainstream horror. The adverting money behind this film was immense. Fango cover; tables at every convention with tons of free goodies. A nation wide theatrical release.....all for nought. Studios take note of this. They will continue investing their money in other avenues or in safer remakes and reboots.

Exactly Evan, I wanted to love this film so badly. It just is all over the map, I couldn't find one redeeming quality and I really tried. I have never given a film an F on this te before. It is not something I enjoy doing especially when I know someone put their heart and soul into a film. But at the end of the day I just can't give this film a pass. It wouldn't be fair to everyone that pays to see it....
Horror Domain - Cursed Evil Overlord Monday 9/12/2011 at 07:16 PM | 82519
I just read an article which mentions that Creature broke records.....the negative records however.

Concerning Box Office take.

It played on 1500 screens and made only $331,000.

NO offense to the film makers or its crew in any way but if the movie doesn't have the star power or the marketing to reach millions of people, its not going to do well in such a wide release like that.

I'm not sure who pushed this one through but I think their job is on the line.

I haven't seen it yet but I'll wait for a $3 download.

Commiserations to Creature!!!
cash Tuesday 9/13/2011 at 01:37 PM | 82570
what needs to be realized in terms of reception is that it DIDN'T have the world heaped upon it.

A Fango cover doesn't mean much: nce the company fell apart a year ago, legions of followers have all but buried the greatness that once was Fango.

The TV spots were terrible, and didn't run until 6 days prior to release. Think about that for a minute, and then think of how many times you've been to a theater in mid 2011, only to see a promo for a flick that wont even be released until summer of 2012 - a FULL YEAR OUT (Spidey, Avengers etc). x days is a nail in the coffin before birth for a film.

The adverting money was minimal, to put it kindly. You've got to keep in mind that 90% of people who conder themselves fans of horror, have never even been to a convention. I've been around the con scene for awhile, heavy promo at a con really isn't indicative of anything other than someone doing their job; it's not always insanely expenve (I know more than one author who have had their books featured at cons, on a zable level, for next to nothing, I can say the same

for some indie filmmakers.) Keep in mind a - there's a financial team behind these projects and b - they're traditionally pretty fucking hooked up. If I had an indie film, book, comic, mag etc, I can get it pushed at major cons for a few grand: it's not uncommon to pay more for your booth than the product that ts there.

This film flopping was in no way a big hit to mainstream horror: you have to know about a movie to care what affect it's success or failure produced. The only people who even know this movie exists is horror nerds like us who happen to work/frequent the niche market. Ask your general 9-5 consumer who doesn't vit Fango what "Creature" is and they're going to give you a bac dictionary description, not an outline of this film.

Sucks it seems to have blown balls, but it does nothing to pronounce some form of commercial negativity in regards to horror.

Say Paranormal Activity 3 came out and did numbers this low, now THAT would gnal a negative perception of commercial horror.
Matt_Molgaard Wednesday 9/14/2011 at 01:44 AM | 82656
I think maybe you're over thinking this one a little bit. It's not an Oscar winner, but it manages to entertain on several levels. It's a guy in a rubber suit, incest, and loads of titties... All on the big screen. It's a film that knows what it is, and works within the confines of that.
Shawn.Savage Wednesday 9/14/2011 at 02:00 AM | 82659
Matt, sorry man but you are WAY off on this whole thing.

You can put down Fango all you want, the fact is that its exposure. It was on the cover of a magazine that can pretty much be found anywhere and while it may not be enjoying the glory of it's past, Fangoria is far from dead and has plenty of subscribers. I'll gladly gn my movie up for a cover any day.

TV spots......they ran only 6 days prior? It seemed like every time I turned the TV on there was a fucking commercial for this movie. I would swear that the teaser was out way before 6 days as well. Plus, pray tell what low budget horror enjoys tv spots these days????? Again, you cannot put down any tv spots in this day and age. Conventions...again, you can downplay them but thousands pass through. CREATURE certainly left an impreson at the Monster mania I was at. So lets do the math....if a FANGO cover, TV trailers during prime time, and tons of convention exposure dont benefit a film, then what does???

oh, right. Steve Spielberg giving his blesng. "Mainstream" horror is in trouble for the mple fact that all the "horror legions" out there do not go out and support indies and the small guy. So we will see more and more bad reboots, remakes and the occaonal good film.

Shawn, you make a very good point as well. Sometimes people can over analyze films that were meant to be just an hour and a half of blood, tits and popcorn. Shit, so many of our 80's clascs were filled with technical gaffes, bad acting and so on. I still intend to see it, and I wish I would have caught it at the theatre. Whether CREATURE sucks or not, I DO applaud any return to the throwback style of monster movie mayhem! I respect Justin's review as well because he's on the mark very often.
ny ghoul Wednesday 9/14/2011 at 02:20 PM | 82689
Matt, sorry man but you are WAY off on this whole thing.

You can put down Fango all you want, the fact is that its exposure. It was on the cover of a magazine that can pretty much be found anywhere and while it may not be enjoying the glory of it's past, Fangoria is far from dead and has plenty of subscribers. I'll gladly gn my movie up for a cover any day.

TV spots......they ran only 6 days prior? It seemed like every time I turned the TV on there was a fucking commercial for this movie. I would swear that the teaser was out way before 6 days as well. Plus, pray tell what low budget horror enjoys tv spots these days????? Again, you cannot put down any tv spots in this day and age. Conventions...again, you can downplay them but thousands pass through. CREATURE certainly left an impreson at the Monster mania I was at. So lets do the math....if a FANGO cover, TV trailers during prime time, and tons of convention exposure dont benefit a film, then what does???

oh, right. Steve Spielberg giving his blesng. "Mainstream" horror is in trouble for the mple fact that all the "horror legions" out there do not go out and support indies and the small guy. So we will see more and more bad reboots, remakes and the occaonal good film.

Shawn, you make a very good point as well. Sometimes people can over analyze films that were meant to be just an hour and a half of blood, tits and popcorn. Shit, so many of our 80's clascs were filled with technical gaffes, bad acting and so on. I still intend to see it, and I wish I would have caught it at the theatre. Whether CREATURE sucks or not, I DO applaud any return to the throwback style of monster movie mayhem! I respect Justin's review as well because he's on the mark very often.

All I can tell you is that I speak from some experience. I was a contributing writer for Fango for over a year - you should know that I know what their high end circulation numbers are (I would never reveal those as that's extremely unprofesonal, and I'm nto full on blasting Fango by any means). Trust me, you're blowing that out of proportion. Is a fango cover good publicity? Absolutely. Does it guarantee success? Not by a long shot. And i can absolutely guarantee you, Fango CANNOT be found "anywhere". Hell, I live in a region with 150k-175k surrounding population, and I can tell you for a fact, you cannot enter a store and buy it here locally anymore. Knowing their numbers (I don't know what the numbers have looked like for the last few years) fairly well, and condering that an area the ze of that in which i live in doesn't sport a ngle outlet to stock the magazine (barring special orders) says a lot. You may conder me to be spewing off at the mouth, but I've been in this buness a long time, I've got a lot of experience "in the scene", I know a lot of financial figures that go into conventions and costs of those who participate, and I still keep in contact with plenty of industry heads. (it seems you and Justin know each other, and I can tell you now he'll vouch for what I just said: I'm not speaking fabrication)

Creature's failure will do nothing to reflect negatively on commercial horror, the fact is, it's been a terrible summer for the genre, with or without Creature's existence.
Matt_Molgaard Wednesday 9/14/2011 at 07:48 PM | 82714
Matt,

Im glad that you can at least agree that a FANGO cover is great publicity. As for being a contributing writer, does that qualify you to be privy to sales and subscriber info? Maybe you were an exception. Anyway, Im good friends with Mike Gingold and Tom Weaver for many years, so I have a good sense of Fangoria's influence on horror fans. Also, Im in NYC....you can find Fangoria at comic shops, best buys, blockbusters, and candy shops. I know the same holds true for other big cities. Towns with 150K population? I doubt they even get espn magazine.

I speak from experience as well, and I can assure you that CREATURE enjoyed a great amount of publicity for its level of film. Televion trailers during prime time viewing???? what more could you ask for. And if you know the cost of what goes into publicity as conventions then you'd know that multiple tables with tons of free merchandise adds up to a good amount of money for a low budget B horror movie.

I dont know how you can say that this movie wasn't advertised enough.
ny ghoul Thursday 9/15/2011 at 06:02 AM | 82757
A great debate thrives on!

I know both of you guys well (both behind the scene guys and industry profesonals) and yes you both make valid points however at the end of the day, good or bad, this movie will be forgotten because it's mply a bad film. No matter what went into it, what could have happened promotional wise, being in Fango, etc., it just doesn't matter. The film in my opinion wasn't comprable to even some of the worst low budget films I have seen. Again take nothing away from everyone that was involved, it went to theaters, that deserves some kind of merit. It's just a shame that it brought nothing to the genre that we all love so much, again my opinion.

Both great arguments and a healthy debate should always rage on but for "gawd" sakes don't let CREATURE lurch in between two terrific horror movie guys! :)
Horror Domain - Cursed Evil Overlord Thursday 9/15/2011 at 06:47 AM | 82761
A great debate thrives on!

I know both of you guys well (both behind the scene guys and industry profesonals) and yes you both make valid points however at the end of the day, good or bad, this movie will be forgotten because it's mply a bad film. No matter what went into it, what could have happened promotional wise, being in Fango, etc., it just doesn't matter. The film in my opinion wasn't comprable to even some of the worst low budget films I have seen. Again take nothing away from everyone that was involved, it went to theaters, that deserves some kind of merit. It's just a shame that it brought nothing to the genre that we all love so much, again my opinion.

Both great arguments and a healthy debate should always rage on but for "gawd" sakes don't let CREATURE lurch in between two terrific horror movie guys! :)

Its all good brother and cheers to healthy debates! I guess what really struck me and ultimately disappointed me was that even with the tv trailers, magazine covers and articles, etc etc etc......the sad fact is that noone went to see the film and it wasn't in the theaters long enough to be killed by word of mouth.

This brings me to a point Ive been making for a while. Ok, theres a "movie date night" demographic that will go see FD films, SAW films, etc on a friday evening. Im throwing them out, and just focung on the horror "scene". Horror fans seem to complain, bitch and moan and say all kinds of crazy things on forums about how mainstream horror sucks, how they are ck of remakes, etc. YET, when an indie film does break through a bit, such as CREATURE did, there seems to be virtually zero support. Until indie horror films show a return at the box office, we're going to be steadily fed a diet of mostly shit mainstream studio efforts. Franchise horrors done on the cheap that capitalize on a long dedicated fan base.

The general consensus seems to be that CREATURE was a shit film regardless, which is too bad. I only hope that studios give more and more indie films the kind of attention that CREATURE did get.
ny ghoul Thursday 9/15/2011 at 11:53 AM | 82767
A great debate thrives on!

I know both of you guys well (both behind the scene guys and industry profesonals) and yes you both make valid points however at the end of the day, good or bad, this movie will be forgotten because it's mply a bad film. No matter what went into it, what could have happened promotional wise, being in Fango, etc., it just doesn't matter. The film in my opinion wasn't comprable to even some of the worst low budget films I have seen. Again take nothing away from everyone that was involved, it went to theaters, that deserves some kind of merit. It's just a shame that it brought nothing to the genre that we all love so much, again my opinion.

Both great arguments and a healthy debate should always rage on but for "gawd" sakes don't let CREATURE lurch in between two terrific horror movie guys! :)

Its all good brother and cheers to healthy debates! I guess what really struck me and ultimately disappointed me was that even with the tv trailers, magazine covers and articles, etc etc etc......the sad fact is that noone went to see the film and it wasn't in the theaters long enough to be killed by word of mouth.

This brings me to a point Ive been making for a while. Ok, theres a "movie date night" demographic that will go see FD films, SAW films, etc on a friday evening. Im throwing them out, and just focung on the horror "scene". Horror fans seem to complain, bitch and moan and say all kinds of crazy things on forums about how mainstream horror sucks, how they are ck of remakes, etc. YET, when an indie film does break through a bit, such as CREATURE did, there seems to be virtually zero support. Until indie horror films show a return at the box office, we're going to be steadily fed a diet of mostly shit mainstream studio efforts. Franchise horrors done on the cheap that capitalize on a long dedicated fan base.

The general consensus seems to be that CREATURE was a shit film regardless, which is too bad. I only hope that studios give more and more indie films the kind of attention that CREATURE did get.

it's very true: genre fans are fickle. you either win or lose with the audience, and the quality of a film doesnt always act as a clear indicator of why flicks surge or sputter.

I would have liked to have seen more interviews, clips, still pics etc for Creature. I think that could have helped the film conderably. If you think about it, there just wasn't much of ANY talk about the film. I never caught any advance reviews, or advance interviews. I was never treated to any excluve imagery prior to release. There may have been a few tes covering the picture, but I never caught any articles on it, and I tend to frequent at least half a dozen different webtes everyday. In the end, maybe this one was mply destined to fail, and perhaps even those outlets who received a decent chunk of promotional change to plug the picture stood up and refused to sell the public some bogus info.

All I know is from my standpoint, the flick fell victim to a horrible marketing scheme. i can see where you (NYG) may have caught a lot more promo on the film being in NY. Same can be said for anyone in LA - when you're stationed directly "in the mix" your eyes and ears catch a lot more than say, someone tting in...Texas.

At the end of the day, I'll still check this flick out

at some point, and probably end up telling myself "I should have listened to Justin and saved my money."

Matt_Molgaard Thursday 9/15/2011 at 01:53 PM | 82774
LOL! You will Matt but its something that a genre diehard should see mply because it is just that bad. Evan totally agree that independent horror should be supported to the brim. I think it would help us all in the long run. Again my perfect example goes back to an October 2007 wide release of TRICK 'R TREAT, I think it would have did great. Even that film however wasn't really a low budget indie film like we are talking about here.

I want to get behind Indie horror but only when its worth it. When something like CREATURE comes along and stinks up the joint it only does more harm than good for our beloved genre. Much more deserving films should be given the chance. Once you witness this film you will understand that its not just a bad movie. It doesn't make sense. The script is a mess. Its just horrible.

I hate to be that strong against a film and I actually haven't ever been this focal about a film here on the te. I come from the cloth of if you don't have something to say nice then mply don't say it. Especially never trash a film but this was atrocious. And for it to get in theaters when there are sooooo many deserved films shelved I just had to speak my mind.
Horror Domain - Cursed Evil Overlord Friday 9/16/2011 at 03:33 AM | 82812