sddavis63

From the very beginning there's a bleakness to this movie. The stark sets, mostly in greys and whites; many scenes set at night so that there's also a darkness the surrounds much of this. The movie is about girls who seem to be living in some sort of extreme boarding school or orphanage, where they're never allowed outside and where they're being raised to be good girls in the hopes that one day they'll be adopted. There's a dystopian feel to this. It feels a little bit like "The Handmaid's Tale" - it's something that could easily have com out of the imagination of Margaret Atwood. But there's more. This isn't what it seems to be: the stories of the outside world - where the girls are told that the air is poisoned; the guards who speak Russian; the surveillance used to ensure the compliance of the girls - they all point to something nefarious going on. But what? Is this really a boarding school or orphanage? Or .. is it .. what? That's the mystery. But right off the top you know something isn't right - aren't these girls a little old to suddenly be being adopted into "loving families"?

The story builds perfectly in intensity, revolving around two girls in particular - Vivien and Sophia (Katie Douglas and Celina Martin) - who realize that something isn't right and try to find ways to peel away the layers of the mystery and figure out what, exactly, is the purpose of this place. I imagined many possibilities from start to finish, but the real answer only comes with about 20 minutes left in the film, so you're kept guessing. When the climax of the movie arrives, you're relieved, but you still wonder - what is going to happen to these girls? There are strong supporting performances from Sara Canning as Miss Brixill, who seems to be in charge of this "place: and from Peter Outerbridge as the doctor responsible for the girls' "health." Other characters are minor and not really well developed, so good performances were needed from such a small cast - and they were good!

This is a very well done Canadian movie. (8/10)

It's an open question in my mind as to why I decided to watch this. I saw "Anaconda" years ago and didn't care for it. Not at all. So why I decided to watch the sequel is a mystery that will never be solved. The original left no impression on me. I frankly don't remember very much about it except that the cast was stronger than the cast in "Hunt For The Red Orchid" and the motivation of the group was more altruistic - they were shooting a documentary. "Anacondas" (with none of the cast from the original making an appearance - although there is a reference to the original movie with a line about a guy who took a crew to the Amazon and got eaten by snakes.) The motives of the expedition (in this movie it's to Indonesia) is, are the end, less altruistic. The blood red orchid can produce a chemical that might extend human lifespan, but even with that overhanging the story, it seems to be more of a critique of capitalism (especially in the pharmaceutical industry) and of greed among at least some of the characters.

There's a fair number of snake attacks depicted (the CGI snakes are OK I guess) but the time between the snake attacks isn't all that interesting. There's also a cute monkey in this whose survival you do root for. But, ultimately, this leaves me with basically the same response that I had to the first - it's kind of a silly movie (albeit with a weaker cast but perhaps a little more suspense) and it really didn't leave any great impression on me. In the review I wrote of it fifteen years ago now I referred to the characters in "Anaconda" as "one-dimensional." At least they had a dimension. These characters were bland and largely uninteresting. By the time I wake up tomorrow I'll have likely forgotten about this movie. (3/10)