The Circle

I really did expect something a little dull, but watchable, instead it was an hour and a half of atmospheric, interesting, and pretty deep horror drama.

Quite clearly the makers didn't have the biggest budget, but they made fine use of what they had, at times it looks very impressive, with some decent special effects.

Not particularly scary, but there are a few jumps along the way, this is more about the atmosphere.

Hard to fault, 8/10.

Amateurish but better than average teen scream with relatively few of the errors that make a lot of horror just annoying.

What it excels at is rich characters I (mostly) really want to root for and I genuinely had the impression that none of them were ever totally safe. Like a lot of horror lately it feels a bit like two movies slammed together: the archaeological horror on one side and the relationship drama on the other but it was actually rather alright with the jealous ex-bf who I can so believe could be a rapist. We use the word "creep" way too liberally but even I was thinking it here.

With a cool setting and pretty girls, it's not too much of a chore to get to the third act but it does eventually get pretty cheesy and the ending is just bonkers and not in the good way.

I will say this: with all the really dumb horror out there I would rather you saw this if you were in the mood to scrape the bottom of the barrel.

I honestly liked The Circle. It is a movie that came with a good script, better than your average actors, and a well crafted execution.

The story is there, with more layers than one, the characters are quite ok developed, not the greatest visual effects but they blended them nicely with the dark, and everyone involved in the making of this little horror seemed to know what they were doing. I really do hope others will learn from such small gems, because you can keep the viewer interested as long as you got a good story behind you and you know how to tell it right.

It will be one of those movies that I have to recommend, one that made the absolute best of its small budget, and surely something that I will use as a mark when comparing to other future low budget/ in the woods horrors.

Cheers!

Despite the small budget of the film (which is noticeable), done well! The acting is good and does not cause rejection.

University professor Karl Markusson (Edward Baker-Duly) takes 4 archaeology students on a field trip to a remote Scottish island. On arrival at the island they discover that some of the rocks have cryptic writing on them and slowly they all start to gain an understanding of these mysterious scribblings. However, as they begin to learn more about what has happened on the island the group start to fear that they may all be in danger...

The Circle has clearly been made on a limited budget featuring a group of actors who I've never heard of (the only name I was familiar with was Ross Noble). However, low-budget doesn't necessarily have to equate to low quality or low entertainment and a film like The Circle doesn't quite fail in this respect, but it doesn't quite succeed either...

A couple of immediate problems with this film have been addressed in my review summary; the acting here is pretty poor with all 5 of the actors showing very limited range and I found myself struggling to engage with any of the characters. With the exception of Melody, I found the characters to be annoying and self-centred which resulted in me not having the vested interest in what happened to any of them.

Some of its strength lie in the fact that the film has a reasonable story attached to it and some of the night time sequences are suitably tense and there are some moments of suspense during the day time as well. Director Peter Callow does an OK job at creating a sense of isolation and given the limited resources and budget it isn't too bad overall.

If you can get past some of the annoying characters and the generally wooden acting then what you're left with is a watchable film that very much does exactly what it says on the tin.