Dawn of the Beast

Well, "Dawn of the Beast" wasn't exactly a grand experience within the horror genre. Sure, the movie was watchable, but it just didn't pack enough punch to be an outstanding horror movie.

And why is that? Well, because the storyline was actually so simplistic that it was sort of becoming boring to watch. The writer, Anna Shields, just didn't offer enough of anything overly interesting or exciting to the audience, which ultimately made for a rather mundane experience. Not to mention predictable as well.

I suppose that director Bruce Wemple was making due with the limitations imposed by an inferior storyline and script. You can't make diamonds out of water after all.

For a horror movie then "Dawn of the Beast" was just a very forgettable movie. I hadn't heard about the movie prior to sitting down to watch it. And I can honestly say that this is not a horror movie that I will ever be watching again, as the movie failed to provide proper entertainment the first time around.

The characters in the movie were not properly detailed or fleshed out, which meant that I didn't really invest any emotions to them, nor did I care whenever they were killed. It should be said, though, that the acting performances in the movie were adequate, but the actors and actresses were just severely hindered by wooden caricature characters.

It should be noted though, that the wendigo and the creatures that followed the wendigo around were actually rather interesting and nicely enough made. They definitely made the movie bearable to watch. And I do like the way that they were always skulking about just at the periphery of the grounds. Now, as for the sasquatch - or bigfoot - well, that was not nearly as interesting as the wendigo and its creatures. Sure, it was watchable, but no, it just didn't bring as much satisfaction for a horror viewer as the other creatures did.

I managed to sit through this 2021 movie, and it is not an overly great movie. Sure, it was watchable, but hardly outstanding or memorable. My rating of "Dawn of the Beast" lands on a four out of ten stars.

Choosing a movie to watch typically I try to do my best not to be shallow and prejudiced. So, coming from my experience, cheap looking posters, obviously bad acting in trailer, no trailer at all and low rating not always can speak for movies' qualities. Onlly such indications as presence of Eric Roberts or others, who discredited themselves, among the cast and rates drastically lower than 4 guarantee a movie a rejection. Sorry, can't watch everything... Besides all this sometimes when I see Uncork'd Entertainment's video introduction in trailer or in a movie's opening I can have doubts about the whole idea of watching it. Fortunately Dawn of the Beast is not the case. Not to say that this one is great, it's not. But still I don't regret spending my extremely precious time on it.

Where the movie succeds is it's ability to look original within horror slasher genre. It follows all slasher trops but manages to deliver something new as well. 5 kinda youngsters or middle-aged students (sometimes it's hard to tell, which category they represent), professor who leads the expedion (typical drunkhead), cabin in the woods (pretty original, ha?), opening scene with some entities, lurking in the forest (which tension managed to give me thrills though)... we've seen it all. But here we have a little more than that. For instance makers' approach regarding the final girl and the crucial battle with upbeat soundtrack closer to the end. All that along with impressive for a tight b-movie budget special effects, created eerie pressing atmosphere, not a bad acting of the cast and obvious dedication to the filmmaking process from all members of the crew make Dawn of the Beast a standout among other cliche'd stereotypical horrors.

On the negative side... Some script decisions are rather questionable, especially when it comes to the way they decided to eliminate a couple of characters in somewhere in the midle of the movie, too boring to my liking. Even though the acting isn't terrible, still it has its downs. Such as implausible screaming and big speeches right in the middle of the blood bath. The second one is more about flaws of the script too, but still. Also unlike the first part with all its tension and macabre atmosphere, the second one is not scary at all. Constant running around the house and hiding become annoying. Overuse of depressing soundtrack, designed to convey the proper mood, with the tension gone makes it irritating. Hopefully closer to the end movie gets back on track and keeps its pace and quality till the very closure.

All in all Dawn of the Beast is a good example of low-budget indie flick, flawed, but with heart. All envolved in the process knew exactly what they were going for, despite lack of money and, probably, experience. So...there you have it)

Very, very basic horror movie with too much ideas and ambitions and not enough money nor competence. There is too many different monsters which make the result very messy. They probably had not enough money so they shot most of the movie indoors or in the woods, especially in the woods in the night. The result is not scary, just very messy and somehow bizarre. The movie could be way better if the authors focused on just one storyline, instead of trying to build multiple lines that even do not connect at times. It feels more like a mashup of at least two different movies, maybe even three movies at the same time. As a whole this simply does not work, because it jumps here and there. In the end it is confusing but not scary.

At last, from all the dross cheap horror comes a fun, well-acted, well-scripted horror film. It is probably 1 out of every 20 of these cheap independent films worth watching. This is a good, fun romp. It has good characters, gory practical effects, fun moments, people you like, and a beginning, middle and a good end(someone survives) and no attempt to push a sequel.

I enjoyed the film.

The "other" creatures people talk about are also Wendigo. If you missed that, you weren't paying attention. The story was well done, as it explained everything, didn't leave any loose ends. Dialogue could have been improved, but wasn't bad, just very typical of character archetypes.

Anyone rating this under a 7 probably hasn't watched many low budget movies. This is extremely well done for no budget.