Unearthed

Unearthed was shot on digital video on a modest budget. If it had been filmed on 35mm, you'd be enjoying it in theaters already. It's science-fiction at its modest-budget best, with accomplished actors and great camera work by writer/director Craig Kovach. The locations and sets are first rate and the story is compelling.

The Movie revolves around an Indian artifact 'unearthed' during a construction project. Strange characters (some good, some bad), populate nearly every scene as the hunt for the artifact accelerates through the highways and byways of Tampa. Flashbacks to previous lives drive the protagonist forward in search for the truth about the artifact. There are some unique scenes i guarantee will surprise even the most ardent IMDb fans and keep you interested through the final reel.

A must-see for any sci-fi or horror junkie.

The non-Hollywood fuzzy camera first put me off, but the initial action fight-chase scene had me wondering what was happening and why.

Then you go to the daylight scene with the Archaeologist, which seems totally unconnected to the opening scene and as you watch Dr Page go hot and indignant against the Developer, you wonder how in Hell are the two connected. Plus, despite the low-budget indie effort-- the actors are all putting serious feeling into their roles.

Last-- you come to the Police teams and the unexplained problem of dead homeless people-- and now you have a Mystery. And you will want to see how everything ties together. Then comes the Alien Voss, who is searching for something and he's a nasty piece of action.

Just as the Opening scene showed, this flick will jump into action, shootouts, car chases and confrontations and a lot of Fatalities. There is some ick-horror embedded here also-- and a little humor, but never overdone.

The ending will not exactly follow your expectation. Nor will everything be neatly explained-- but the flick will leave you with gaps that a Sci-Fi fan can fill in the blanks with his or her own theories.

In short-- I don't necessarily call the LACK of a coherent explanation a Negative: It's a Mystery because you will never really know what you were involved with, especially if you're only concerned with getting out Alive.

I was genuinely Surprised and intrigued. And at the end-- Not Disappointed.

Give this one a shot on a Friday Night. I wouldn't call this a Main event movie, but a thought-provoking Indie dish when you want to try something different from the normal polished Hollywood script.

If this is a First Effort, the creators of this movie will definitely be coming round again for more.

This is the type of movie that makes you think.

Remember how you felt at the end (last 10 minutes) of the movie 6th Sense? Unearthed is a movie that will have you thinking the same way. Full of twists and turns, this movie gets better each time you see it.

Excellent performances by John Bernath (Voss) and Slake Counts (Pinder) make this a great movie for either Horror or Sci-Fi fans. It does not fit neatly into a genre category and as such defies traditional movie plots that seem all too predictable.

Well done and well worth the watch. Low budget doesn't have to mean bad movie any more. This is a film you will enjoy seeing more than once. Excellent Cinematography and a driving music score. Blood, guns, fast cars, alien warlords, dark cityscapes and women hanging on hooks.....what more could you ask for.

REVIEW BASED ON SCREENER COPY OF UNEARTHED 2005

I've only had a chance to see the hour teaser that was shown at a convention that I was attending, and i was impressed at the quality of work that an independent film company could produce. The name Tom Savini sat me down, but I think it was the guy who played Jeff Juransky that kept me in my seat, I'll certainly keep a look out for him in future films. I won't spoil the plot, but it's apparent that a lot of time and effort went into this film, and since they don't have the money to drop on the "special effects that can make you forget that there's no plot" concept, there is a lot of time devoted to developing and furthering the storyline. Hat's off to the cast and crew of this incredibly talented group, I look forward to seeing more from these talented individuals!

I feel compelled to comment on this movie, since the other comments presented here must have been made by people involved with the film. This movie is beyond bad. I saw a preview screening of it at Horrorfind Weekend back in 2004. Now, granted, it was an unfinished version of the film, but it remains the first, and only, movie that I have ever walked out of. I was not the only one thinking, "abort! abort!" either, as at least half of the audience had left by the time I made my way out.

The plot (what there was of it) involved a construction crew uncovering ancient Indian artifacts, one of which is a metal tube of apparently alien origin. Two different sides then vie for possession of the tube, the first comprised of an archaeologist, a shot-first-and-never-ask-questions cop (Savini, the only "actor" of note in this film), and a "mysterious" (read: boring) vigilante who may or may not be an alien. The second is a gang whose members don't die very easily and their alien leader, though no one seems to really care or notice that he's an alien.

The overall premise is okay, but the execution falls completely flat. The director, in his introduction before the film, stated that his intent was to make something of a "moving graphic novel set to music" (I'm paraphrasing). Well, one has to remember that, in a graphic novel, the sections with no dialogue or narration can be taken in in about thirty seconds, literally. In the movie, they drag on for about five to ten straight minutes. It's as if the movie wasn't long enough, so the director decided to throw in two or three music videos in order to lengthen this clunker.

The script, while horribly convoluted and needlessly confusing, is bearable. The actors, however, fail to play their parts, but they more read them to the camera and each other. Savini, who we all know is not an actor by trade, is unfortunately the best one on display here. The rather ham-fisted editing further adds to confusion, with sequences ending to suddenly, settings changing without proper establishment, and events being referred to which the audience never saw take place (though, this may be since I saw an incomplete version).

I sometimes question where filmmakers such as these get the money for there productions, as I'm sure a much better movies are floating around looking for financing. Do yourself a favor and track down a little known good movie, one that holds your interest as opposed to being so ridiculous and mind numbing as to make an avid movie-goer abandon ship halfway through.