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[Mothman]
Plot:An evil entity stalks unsuspecting victims.
Cast:Jewel Staite,
Kennon Kepper,
Susie Abromeit,
Douglas M. Griffin,
T.W. Leshner,
Connor Fox,
Matty Ferraro,
Lawrence Turner,
Jessica Erin Sylvia,
Jerry Leggio,
Monica Acosta.
My Thoughts:It is what the premise says it is.
Review:"Mothman" is another SyFy original film where some really not-too-bright people, living in a small town, are stalked by some evil, creepy, cgi thingy. But I liked this movie, which is something I cannot say about many SyFy original films. Why? Well, they avoided over-cgi'ing the film. And the CGI that was used, made the title creature look menacing enough. Instead of the laughable giant snake deal we've seen in films like "Anaconda"s 3 and 4. "Mothman" starts when a group of teens are out in the woods, hanging out, and once they go for a swim, one of their friends ends up severely injured and dies on the spot.
The situation then degenerates into an "I Know What You Did Last Summer"/"Sorority Row" scenario, where no one wants to take responsibility for his death, and so they decide to just dump him into the lake, and say "fuck it, we'll take this secret to our grave". Now fast forward to 2010, in the small West Virginia town of Point Pleasant, a festival to celebrate the local legend of the Mothman is gearing up. And it should be no surprise that this spurs the title monster to re-emerge and start killing people in brutal fashion.
But his appearance is also spawned by Katharine (Staite)'s, return to the town which she left many years ago. She is there to do a story on the Mothman legend in order to keep her job at a local gossip rag. Will she too fall victim to the demonic creature known as "The Mothman"? Oddly enough, this movie is based on a real life West Virginia legend. The title monster was reportedly spotted in Charleston and Point Pleasant West Virginia within the time span of 1966 and 1967.
And much like the real-to-life legend, which describes the creature a winged monster, with large, red reflective red eyes, and large wings...that's exactly how the filmmakers patterned their creature for this film after. Problem is, the darn thing hasn't been documented as seen since way back in the 60's, and the movie here just gives us some "Pumpkinhead" backstory, possibly that like in "Pumpkinhead", where the demon was created from the soul of a dead, bullied, mentally-retarded teenager, this movie flirts with the possibility that "lake boy", who I mentioned above, might be The Mothman, back for vengeance.
Either way, the thing is ripping people apart, and someone's gotta stop it. Of course no one expected Jewel Staite to have to be the one to do it, but like typical creature features, her news story, and the local hot guy, are keeping her in town. So she might as well lend a hand to shut this mofo down. Question is, how do they do it? This film is anything but unpredictable. But on some pedestrian, and even silly level, it's still fun to watch sort of. The film though, runs through every cliche in the book. We have a resident asshole who is married to the obligatory "bitch" character.
And as expected, one of them manages to scrap together some human deceny in order to join the fight against The Mothman. Staite and the films leading male, play the two goody-goodies who you know will have a lot of close calls, but won't ever die for real. And then we have the resident creepy old guy, who this film makes into a blind, creepy, old guy. But when it's revealed just how he became blind in the first place, and how it ties into The Mothman, it's a pretty chilling scene to watch. Score a point for this film. The kills aren't too shabby either.
The Mothman is an evil spectral, entity, who moves through mirrors and anything reflective like a toaster, or a trailer. Rather than killing his prey up front, he can simply reflect himself off of something, and grab them from within the object. With all of these powers attributed to the title monster, it's too bad no one did a feature film "Mothman" movie before the low-budget, SyFy version. That is unless you count "The Mothman Prophecies", but everyone I know hated that movie so, lets move on.
The kills, as I said, are quite good, weird, odd, creepy, and bloody. Granted, with a made-for-tv horror film, they only have so much to work with as far as gore is concerned, but I liked what they were able to do with the character demises. As far as cameos in the movie are concerned, you might recognize the guy who played the crooked sheriff in "Children Of The Corn 2:The Final Sacrifice", as the Point Pleasant Mayor.
And the film does throw in a few intriguing twists at the end, pertaining to just what or who is The Mothman, and why it's appearing at this point in time. But these averagely-clever twists, are murdered by a terrible ending, which takes place in a hospital room, and is about as predictable as a game of Russian Roulette with a fully loaded gun. Despite that though, "Mothman" is worth seeing once for fans of cheesy monster movies, or obsessors of the "Mothman" legend, and anything pertaining to it.
Positives:Decent story, Jewel Staite is likeable in the female lead role, just like she's likeable in most stuff. The monster was pretty cool, and the twists near the end were decent for a SyFy movie. Kills were decent also.
Negatives:The final scene is terrible, absolutely pathetic.
Overall:Three stars out of four.
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