Animal (2014) – Movie Review

<p>Ok&comma; I have to admit&comma; the only reason I watched <em>Animal<&sol;em> &lpar;2014&rpar; was because of the movie poster&period; It caught my attention and made me curious&comma; so thumbs up to the art and marketing department&period; Then I after I started watching the movie I realized it was a Chiller&&num;8217&semi;s film&comma; which was a bonus to me because I&&num;8217&semi;ve liked a few of the movies they&&num;8217&semi;ve put out&period; Chiller Films is an American distribution company that specializes in releasing indie horror and thriller films&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Animal is a horror&sol;thriller that has an eighty-six-minute runtime&period; It was directed by Brett Simmons and it was written by Tommy Hutson and Catherine Trillo&period; It&&num;8217&semi;s rated NR &lpar;not rated&rpar; but has language and violence&period; Something else that caught my eye was that the movie was produced by Drew Barrymore&period; I was curious to see what about this movie caught Barrymore&&num;8217&semi;s attention to want to produce it&period; Her past producer work has usually been on fun light movies like <em>Never Been Kissed<&sol;em> &lpar;1999&rpar; or even the action&lpar;&quest;&rpar; flick <em>Charlie&&num;8217&semi;s Angels<&sol;em> &lpar;2011&rpar;&period; The last time she produced something dark was the movie <em>Donnie Darko<&sol;em> &lpar;2001&rpar;&period; So&comma; I figured something about <em>Animal<&sol;em> had to be good to get her in on a horror film&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<figure id&equals;"attachment&lowbar;132790" aria-describedby&equals;"caption-attachment-132790" style&equals;"width&colon; 1000px" class&equals;"wp-caption aligncenter"><img class&equals;"wp-image-132790 size-large" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2017&sol;12&sol;30124531&sol;Animal-2014-still-1-1024x638&period;jpg" alt&equals;"" width&equals;"1000" height&equals;"623" &sol;><figcaption id&equals;"caption-attachment-132790" class&equals;"wp-caption-text">Chiller Films&comma; Animal<&sol;figcaption><&sol;figure>&NewLine;<p>The story is about five college friends that are out for a hike in the woods when they find a dead body of a woman and the animal that killed her&period; As everyone is running for their lives&comma; they come across a cabin and decide to use it as a safe place to hide&period; Once they get inside the cabin&comma; they realize there are other people already inside&&num;8230&semi; for the same reason&period; Trapped inside the cabin by the creature&comma; the small group of survivors must figure out a way to get out of the woods&comma; before the creature catches them&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>As far as the story goes it&&num;8217&semi;s nothing new and super simple&comma; which makes it&&num;8217&semi;s just another creature hack n&&num;8217&semi; slash flick about tearing up poor individuals that look tasty&period; The upside about the story was it&&num;8217&semi;s been a few since I&&num;8217&semi;ve seen a creature flick&period; So the change up from the killer not being another zombie or serial killer flick was nice&comma; but as a creature flick&comma; I wasn&&num;8217&semi;t impressed&period; It&&num;8217&semi;s one of the movies that end up raising more questions than it answers before it&&num;8217&semi;s over&period; Now&comma; I&&num;8217&semi;m not a big fan of movies where a creature pops up somewhere in the world&comma; starts killing and we never find out where it came from&period; At first&comma; I thought those kinds of movies where being all cool and mysterious&comma; but later I realized it&&num;8217&semi;s more like they didn&&num;8217&semi;t want to bother putting a lot of work into the story&period; It was easier to leave everything as a mystery than it was to build a solid backstory for the creature&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<figure id&equals;"attachment&lowbar;132791" aria-describedby&equals;"caption-attachment-132791" style&equals;"width&colon; 1000px" class&equals;"wp-caption aligncenter"><img class&equals;"wp-image-132791 size-large" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2017&sol;12&sol;30124608&sol;Animal-2014-still-2-1024x638&period;jpg" alt&equals;"" width&equals;"1000" height&equals;"623" &sol;><figcaption id&equals;"caption-attachment-132791" class&equals;"wp-caption-text">Chiller Films&comma; Animal<&sol;figcaption><&sol;figure>&NewLine;<p>The playthrough was good&comma; but pretty quick once everything kicks off&comma; which was kind of a downside in this case&period; Because right as everything gets going&&num;8230&semi; it&&num;8217&semi;s over&period; As far as a hack n slash goes&comma; it&&num;8217&semi;s a good movie&period; You get just enough story to get the characters in place to fight or die and that&&num;8217&semi;s about it&period; For a decent horror flick&comma; I was disappointed due to the lack of story and I got bored with the typical arguments you see when a group of people are put in a life or death situation&period; There are a lot of things that <em>Animal<&sol;em> had going for it that could have made it a really good movie&comma; but they didn&&num;8217&semi;t utilize that potential and it comes up short in the end&period; So&comma; <em>Animal<&sol;em> ends up being a flick with some good death scenes and great effects&comma; but that&&num;8217&semi;s it&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Some of the cast is Jeremy Sumpter &lpar;<em>Soul Surfer<&sol;em>&rpar;&comma; Keke Palmer &lpar;<em>Scream Queens<&sol;em>&rpar;&comma; Elizabeth Gillies &lpar;<em>Vacation<&sol;em>&rpar;&comma; Parker Young &lpar;<em>4th Man Out<&sol;em>&rpar;&comma; Paul Iacono &lpar;<em>Fame<&sol;em>&rpar;&comma; Amaury Nolasco &lpar;<em>Max Payne<&sol;em>&rpar;&comma; Thorsten Kaye &lpar;<em>All My Children<&sol;em>&rpar;&comma; Joey Lauren Adams &lpar;<em>Chasing Amy<&sol;em>&rpar; and Eve &lpar;<em>Barbershop<&sol;em>&rpar;&period; Overall I think the cast did a good job&comma; but no one stood out as a great actor&sol;actress&period; It was cool seeing Adams in the movie and even though I think she&&num;8217&semi;s a good actress&comma; you can only do so much with what you&&num;8217&semi;re given&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<figure id&equals;"attachment&lowbar;132806" aria-describedby&equals;"caption-attachment-132806" style&equals;"width&colon; 1000px" class&equals;"wp-caption aligncenter"><img class&equals;"wp-image-132806 size-large" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2017&sol;12&sol;31194259&sol;Animal-2014-still-3-1024x638&period;jpg" alt&equals;"" width&equals;"1000" height&equals;"623" &sol;><figcaption id&equals;"caption-attachment-132806" class&equals;"wp-caption-text">Chiller Films&comma; Animal<&sol;figcaption><&sol;figure>&NewLine;<p>The special effects looked great and the monster that Gary J&period; Tunnicliffe came up with was the best part of the movie&period; When I think about it&comma; it&&num;8217&semi;s kind of sad that they wasted such a killer looking monster on this movie&period; Just a heads up&comma; the movie is super gory&comma; like watching people being opened up and eaten gory&period; So&comma; bring a strong stomach if you&&num;8217&semi;re wanting to give this one a watch&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Overall&comma; <em>Animal<&sol;em> makes for a perfect late night horror flick when you&&num;8217&semi;re needing a fix of random bloody deaths and very little storyline&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;