The movie has a nice look and great locations and moody opening title music. The set up of a photographer going on a shoot with a Bear attack getting in the way is obviously lifted from THE EDGE. A cast of familiar, if aging, faces and a supporting cast of capable performers also includes a "real" bear suit rather than computer created bear. So what's not to like about this movie?
Well everything else.
For one thing the movie is short on content, and full of padding, making it a dull affair for the most part. The bear is mostly off camera and so there are a lot of sitting around the cabin and talking scenes--most of them pretty routine. This still can't get the movie legitimately to feature length, even the end credit music runs out with about 2 minutes of special thanks and company logos filling the dead air at the end of the movie to make it a feature.
The movie proceeds like this. You get ten minutes of talk or more and then one very brief not convincing attack scene and or a very long "suspense" scene with no pay off--repeat this enough times until you run out of money to spend and the movie is finished.
Neither the photo shoots nor the Alaska wilderness "facts" are convincing either.
The "real" bear suit isn't that good, and doesn't look very large. So the resulting bear attack scenes are murky an not frightening or bloody. One attack with the bear attacking from underwater like some shark is silly. The rest are very darkly lit and the bear suit looks rather shaggy and inert. James Remar has a lead role as a good guy and does well at it. Ray Wise fans can stay home, he only appears in commercials for the genetic research company at the beginning and end of the film.
Several scenes awkwardly have characters put themselves in danger. A native bear expert rushing a the bear with a hand gun is especially stupid for anyone who really knows about guns or bears. A lot of time is spent with the unpleasant photographer character--played by the producer of the movie--imagine that?!? The fact that the movie tries to be about something with its pseudo-message ending doesn't help either.
Some nice Alaskan sunsets sadly don't a bear attack movie make. Credit and debit where it's due.
Well everything else.
For one thing the movie is short on content, and full of padding, making it a dull affair for the most part. The bear is mostly off camera and so there are a lot of sitting around the cabin and talking scenes--most of them pretty routine. This still can't get the movie legitimately to feature length, even the end credit music runs out with about 2 minutes of special thanks and company logos filling the dead air at the end of the movie to make it a feature.
The movie proceeds like this. You get ten minutes of talk or more and then one very brief not convincing attack scene and or a very long "suspense" scene with no pay off--repeat this enough times until you run out of money to spend and the movie is finished.
Neither the photo shoots nor the Alaska wilderness "facts" are convincing either.
The "real" bear suit isn't that good, and doesn't look very large. So the resulting bear attack scenes are murky an not frightening or bloody. One attack with the bear attacking from underwater like some shark is silly. The rest are very darkly lit and the bear suit looks rather shaggy and inert. James Remar has a lead role as a good guy and does well at it. Ray Wise fans can stay home, he only appears in commercials for the genetic research company at the beginning and end of the film.
Several scenes awkwardly have characters put themselves in danger. A native bear expert rushing a the bear with a hand gun is especially stupid for anyone who really knows about guns or bears. A lot of time is spent with the unpleasant photographer character--played by the producer of the movie--imagine that?!? The fact that the movie tries to be about something with its pseudo-message ending doesn't help either.
Some nice Alaskan sunsets sadly don't a bear attack movie make. Credit and debit where it's due.