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[Paintball]
Plot:A group of paintballers are systematically picked off in the woods by unknown assailants.
Cast:Peter Vives Newey,
Neil Maskell,
Patrick Regis,
Brendan Mackey,
Claudia Bassols,
Jennifer Matter,
Anna Casas,
Iaione Perez,
Josep Seguí,
Felix Pring,
Neil Robert Maskell.
My Thoughts:Entertaining yet odd Spanish horror flick.
Review:"Paintball" is the latest genre pic to come out of Spain, under the Filmax label. The same people who brought us the "REC" series, bring us this tale involving a group of thrill-seekers who partake in a paintball challenge, deep in the woods. Unbeknownst to them however, the paintball game is really just a cover for something far more nefarious.
And as the game starts, the group soon finds themselves under assault from live ammo being fired by an unseen and mysterious assailant. "Paintball" is a very simplistic movie. Nothing fancy, nothing sparkly or really amazing. It simply rolls along on the element of surprise, a crisp package of sound effects, a dark, gritty woodsy setting, and a harsh sense of realism which the film implements very well to bring out it's characters and the overall situation they're involved in.
It's an indie film at heart, and utilizes every advantage that an indie film would have in it's arsenal to put on a good show for 85 minutes or so. The film isn't very graphic when it comes to blood and gore, this is not a splatter movie, which will be to the disappointment of some. But the levels of blood, gore, and overall violence are quite high, high enough to fit into the movies system, which doesn't start out very harshly. And instead, eases into the hardcore violence and suspense and intensity that the movie brings to the table.
The movie gets off to a high-octane start, but works in levels, ratcheting things up more and more as the movie goes along, and the group of paintballers gets smaller and smaller as their attacker picks them off little by little. The movie really thrusts the characters into a life or death scenario right out of the blue, and turns into a war movie really, where paintball skills and duck and dodge, escape and evade tactics become a necessity of survival for our heroes.
This film does have a weakness though, which revolves around the movies twist, it's one and only big plot twist. As I mentioned above, the invite to these paintballers was not just for a paintball obstacle course run, but had a very insidious ulterior motive. But when said motive is revealed by the overseers of the game, it doesn't come off as original or as anything really twisted, or shockingly ingenious.
Instead, it comes off as a nod or homage to "Hostel", blended with a little bit of "Saw", and the underlying theme of both movies which is people wanting to watch violence done to others, and people being put into traps to see how their survival instincts fair against a major, life-endangering threat. While that little caviat does hurt the films streak of keeping the story and events within it fresh and original, it doesn't completely damage an otherwise pretty entertaining and intense horror/thriller/action pic.
"Paintball" falls into the vein of films like "Severance", "Botched", etc. It's approach to horror blends a seemingly good-clean-fun situation with little danger level, with a dark and nefarious subplot which unfolds throughout the film and ends in a shocking and edge-of-your seat climax, which offers up a clever twist or two. It's definitely a movie worth seeing atleast one time.
Positives:Good story, great action scenes, very edgy directing, great sound, and a terrific finale.
Negatives:Like I said, the motives and overall plan of the games overseeers was too "Hostel"/"Saw" entrenched to be as original as it needed to be.
Overall:Three and a half out of four stars.
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