The Hunters

Well you can't blame the failure of this film to take off on the cast, because they were a capable and experienced cast, even the younger actors. However, they are given absolutely nothing to sink their teeth into. Everything about the flick is just watered down and meandering. If this had been a Disney or Hub flick it would have worked, or even if upgraded to a full blown fantasy flick, it would have worked, but it feels completely like this is a first draft and not a full fleshed film. The script is thin with stick figure characters, clotted with toss off explanations to move the story and beyond cliché plot points (the Asian assassin was almost painful to watch). Everything it had going for it is wasted.Complete and total lack of backstory. It would have been great to know how Tripp's techie skills and Pax's fighting skills had previously reared their heads, it was screaming for some actual examples of the fairytale items in modern times, and someone with a much cleverer wit to punch up the one liners. It seems like the money ran out somewhere, but there was no going back to get a good finished product. The cast did what they could with what they had.

From the very opening, this had TV written all over it.

The locations imply that production values were good, but the actors, outfits, make-up, etc., all said that there was a second-rate production team behind it (nobody seemed to sweat or get dirty hiking through jungles, for instance, and these little details really take a viewer out of a tale on a subconscious level).

As for the plot: well, it's a very TV-series-pilot affair, with villains who shoot their own henchmen in the backs for no apparent reason (and with crossbows(!) that I imagine were hidden away inside a bra) and action that is neither gritty nor pops off the screen as impressive - actually, think of the kind of bland fights from Xena and just know that they were better...

I suppose that really, this film was aimed at children/young teenagers, so I wasn't the target audience, but from an adult's point of view, there's nothing new and what there is has been done better a hundred+ times already.

I really liked The Hunters. It was fun and action packed with just a little bit of romance. All the actors and actresses were really great and made the story carry well. The story was interesting with the whole fairytale stories coming into real life situations. The characters weren't even annoying and flowed naturally. However, it isn't perfect. The whole thing with the bad guys carrying crossbows and not guns confused me. I thought it was odd how they wouldn't take any shots at any of them. At least someone should have gotten hit to make the stakes higher. Also there were times when I was confused at how they got out of places, or solved a problem. And lastly, the part where Alexa's character is taken just didn't feel right. I mean she can fight obviously but she acted so helpless with guys who held crossbows. But, I still really liked this movie a lot and I think it deserves more credit.

I love the idea of this but I thought they could have gone way farther with the plot, maybe even multiple movies. Half the movie was running and fighting instead of clever traps and artifacts.

I picked up this movie not knowing anything more about it than the short description on the back of the jacket. That being said I thought it sounded interesting, I pick up a lot of movies like this I'm not always as lucky as I was with this one.

The movie was rich with subplots and the main plot itself was quite good. The idea that the items from fairy tales are real and that there is a secret society that collects and protects them without using them is intriguing. The acting was adequate and actually surprising better than anticipated. The locations were nice and went well with the script, not overly staged. I throughly enjoyed this movie!

That being said, I truly felt that the idea behind this script deserved MORE. More everything, it left me feeling like I really wanted the next movie but yet felt more like the budget of a TV show. I think this could be an enjoyable main stream series of movies if there were just more meat to it. I mean, why do they carry crossbows instead of guns? I don't want to give too much out I'm just trying to make a point. This is a good movie but the story line has a lot of potential if they could just give it a little more soul.