Cerberus

A lot of sci-fi movies have been made lately, some okay, some terrible, and overall better than the badly scripted ones of the prior three decades. This one had all the better elements of B movie sci fi. A lot of adventure, a cheesy but likable plot, cheesy but likable characters, action, character, atmosphere, and well written and played humor in the right spots. The plot is made to be so hokey that we know this is supposed to be an unbelievable situation, so you have to accept this unbelievable world much as you would a Tolkien world. The unbelievability is more in line with a Bond world, however. If you like Bond movies, you would probably relish this movie. The sword of a Hun leader (the most famous one of course), is stolen from the Roman God of war, Mars, and guarded by the Greek three headed dog, Cerebus, in a village straight out of the Bavarian-Romanian Dracula type movies. So clearly, the writers had a ball putting this together, and no one is expected to take it seriously. Just sit back and enjoy the fun. The lead characters are very extreme, much like James Bond characters, but though the roles are unbelievable, the motivations and actions of the characters ring true in their predicaments. Each of the minor characters is presented with a bit of witticism, mystique, and integrity. No one is a wimp in this movie. And the decisions of the characters are well timed in credibility, which makes this a superior B movie. There are some great humorous moments, such as the bit when the girl suggests using the method of Orpheus to combat the dog beast. And we all know what the other characters think when she suggests a lyre. One of the best scripted pieces done in science fiction. This is what some of the more celebrated and high budget movies wanted to be, but failed. Entertaining and likable.

Cerberus seemed like a good idea in hindsight, but when it came to seeing it the execution spoilt any potential the film had. It does get points for the idea, some splashes of silly fun in the second half and for the hotness of Emmanuelle Vaugier. The rest however was lacking for me, and the jaw-droppingly cheap design of Cerberus is not the only bad thing. There is also some choppy editing and the film is dully lit a lot of the time. But that's not all. The dialogue is trite with very ill-judged comic relief, the climax is abrupt and devoid of thrills or tension, the story is muddled(with the second half only a little bit better than the stodgy first half), dull and often ridiculous, the characters are poorly written clichés especially the villains and on the whole the most inspired the actors get is mumbling their lines, nobody seems engaged at all with their characters or even in the film. Overall, a really mediocre movie, could've been worse but there was no real excuse to not put more effort in. 3/10 Bethany Cox

S10 Rating: * * 'Cerberus' is a pretty typical SciFi Channel presentation. An interesting premise of the infamous mythical three-headed dog protecting a sword that render the possessor invincibility. The sword was used bu Attila the Hun so that explains his conquering of the little people of his time. As usually a nefarious scheme is hatched by an equally nefarious madman who then sends some mercenaries to grab the little party favor. Of course the lead merc enjoys his taste of power and commences to do his thing while the good guys and girl deal with the dog and now the greedy merc turned madman. Oh the joys of paint-by-numbers made-for-TV cinema. The acting was ho-hum and the direction is plain. The effects were bad as you'd expect but for whatever reason I found it still watchable.

This film is a poor mans cross between James Bond and King Kong. I'm do believe this movie could have a great action horror movie, if most of the movie was related to Cerberus its self, than bothering with crime lords, spies, CIA, etc. The first half of his movie was more of a b-grade spy movie, and the second half is horror.

It seems in these sort of movies that Romanians don't have much in a police force, why aren't the local police called out when people start to drop off?? Why do local Romanian townspeople must always take the law into their own hands to protect themselves, were they simple can called out the police or even the military if need be.

The movie is rather stupid and I'm seriously question, the mentally of the director, like this mother couldn't even film a kids birthday party with-out screwing it up.

A great idea, screw by a low budget and a dumb director.

If nothing else I have to hand it to the creators of Cerberus who managed to mix the religions and legends of several cultures into one wild modern day plot.

Cerberus of Greek mythology as we know is the guardian of the Underworld or Hell as we call it. It seems as though back in the day or back in another day, Attila the Hun made a deal with old Scratch for an invincible sword which is said to be buried with him. But his resting place is both lost to history and is guarded by Cerberus lest someone else get Attila's invincible sword.

Well now a renegade North Korean general with a resemblance to Fu Manchu is played by Garret Sato wants the sword. It's all he needs to start on his road to world conquest. He hires an American mercenary in Greg Evigan to help get the magic blade, but the Evigan starts getting ideas of his own.

You need an archaeologist with a working knowledge of the Balkan legends to help find Attila's grave so that's where Dr. Emmanuelle Vaugier comes in. They kidnap her brother on the pretext of a gambling debt so she comes along. And Evigan has some US Army Special Ops folks looking for him headed by Sebastian Spence. They all meet up with that nasty three headed Cerberus in, where else, Transylvania.

It's imaginative, but in the end Cerberus is still utter claptrap. They should have left the poor beast alone with the Hercules series.