LD 50 Lethal Dose

This isn't Scary Spice's (Melanie Brown) first movie. That would be Spice World, not that I would ever admit seeing that. It is her first movie since then, and she was an interesting character that met an unusual end.

The Brits are famous for horror. Remember Hammer? Now, it seems they are famous for movies about radicals releasing animals. We do that here, but I don't know that we make movies about it. I don't think that many people really care over here, so we leave it to Peta.

The thing is that the group left one of their members behind on a raid and he got three years. He sends them an e-mail about a secret lab that they should check out. That is when the fun begins; as this lab is underground and some really strange stuff is going on there.

Now, I won't spoil it by saying what is going on, except to say that it was an interesting concept. The problem is that I really didn't care about the people in this film, and whether they lived or died. Maybe Katharine Towne (But I'm a Cheerleader), but even that is stretching it.

Don't just scare me, but make me care.

I found this a really interesting and challenging film, not like your usual run-of-the-mill horror movie. I'm not going to give anything away because I think it is worth seeing, but there were some very clever plot twists that took me completely by surprise! The acting was good, I thought that all the actors really pulled together as a team and that really shows (also the mark of a good director!). I also think the direction itself was really tight and perfect for the creepy, slightly claustrophobic nature of the scenes underground. The supernatural elements were fascinating as well, a very modern take on a popular genre. All in all a really good evening's viewing, and well worth seeing! I would say don't miss it!

A group of animal rights activists' trespasses a lab to release animals, and a bear trap catches Gary (Ross McCall), one of the members. He is arrested but he does not denounce his friends. He goes to jail alone for a three years sentence and the team disassembles. One year later, they reunify and become aware that Gary was a volunteer of an experiment to reduce his period in prison. Later, they received an encoded message from Gary asking for help. The place where he is lodged is an abandoned laboratory and they decide to rescue him. Once in the location, weird events happen with each member of the group. This movie has a good premise, but something does not work well. For example, why the guys decide to smoke grass during their assignment? How and why exist live animals in a desert place? This forgettable film can be recommended for killing time only. My vote is five.

Title (Brazil): `A Ameaça' (`The Menace')

The premise of this movie is seemingly solid, and it begins like "28 Days Later" Animal Rights Activists break in to a lab and free the cute and fuzzy bunnies. One of them gets captured, and then it turns into some kind of "Altered States" heist movie.

Seems our Activists are now set on freeing their captured comrade from the lab where he has become the focus of a new experiment that is gradually stripping away his humanity in a "Lawnmower Man" kind of way.

Sounds cool, right? That's what I thought. The problem is that once the heist portion of the movie starts, it goes nowhere fast. There's a lot of pointless screaming as members of the crew start turning on each other. It's another entry into the current string of U.K. funded programming that features people turning on each other. For more of the same, watch "The Bunker". The Bad Guy doesn't make an appearance until the last ten minutes of the movie, and it's a pretty dull ride up to that point.

In short: lame first 30 minutes, super duper middle 30 minutes, super duper lame final 30 minutes. That's it, in a nutshell.

Mel b can't act, and so can't the female lead. The male lead was Shinzon in Star Trek Nemesis, incidentally. He looks weird here, probably because the film had zero character development. And the girl using yoga to beat the bad guy at the end was funny. Funny in a "ha ha, that blows" sort of way, mind you.

The film currently has a 7-something rating. This is due to a low voting count. When more people see the flick, I suspect the rating will go down. Around 5-point would be my guess. Myself, I am giving it 6/10, just for the spooky middle. The rest isn't worth spit.

My grade 6/10, just cause I dig horror flicks, even if they're mostly lame.