Under the Mountain

I attended the North American Premiere of "Under the Mountain" at the 2009 Toronto International Film Festival. The film is a love song to New Zealand's volcanoes. Jonathan King's fantasy tale is "Lord of the Rings" meets "Alien" -- it may be a bit scary for younger kids, though. Sam Neill does a star turn here as an aging wizard-like Fagan. Only he has the knowledge to help save the world from the evil Gargantua. But it's up to teenage twins Theo and Rachel (young newcomers Tom Cameron and Sophie McBride) to wield the power. The charming kids steal the show here and couldn't be more engaging. The multi-layered story more than held my interest -- there's plenty here for adults and youth alike. Production values are stellar with mind-boggling visual and special effects, and "Under the Mountain" boasts one of the best scores I've heard in a long time. The lush cinematography amounts to a New Zealand travelogue. The film is dazzling and puts many others of its ilk to shame. "Under the Mountain" should do well among family audiences.

There are only two reasons why i would waste my time writing about a movie. It is either because its brilliant or because it's a terrible waste of time! This movie falls into the latter category. Halfway into the movie, i find myself looking at the clock. Unfortunately, it didn't get any better. Wow, such great premise, how the hell did they miss the mark? The director is to blame here. It was so so lame and boring. The actors did a good job, though i would have to say that sometimes the reaction factor is kind of weak. Example, when Mr Jones was trying to heal Rachel, flames of fire came out of his hand, in reality any tom dick and harry would find this amazingly unreal and you would expect them to react in disbelief, but on the contrary, the kids are acted like they have seen this before. Wowsers! This movie gets a C from me.

This movie have some good things and bad things to it.

Let me start with the bad thing. The movie seems much like a movie that would have been spawned in the success of the "Harry Potter" movie. I know this is not the intention of the movie, nor does it have any connection to it. But the characters and the story seems like something taken out of the "Harry Potter" universe.

As for the good things. Well the movie was interesting and fairly entertaining. There were pretty nice effects throughout the movie as well. There was also a somewhat Lovecraftian Cthulhu-feel to the movie. The concept with the Gargantua (Old Ones?) and the servants (much like the 'fishmen' of Innsmouth). That part, however subtle or intentional it was, was not lost on me, and I liked that part.

The cast was good, and they performed well in their roles. Of course, Sam Neill was great, as always.

This movie provides wholesome entertainment for the entire family, young and old alike. I am sure that the young audiences will like the magic and effects in the movie, while a more mature audience (like myself) might take a liking to the dark mood of the movie (and the Lovecraft inspiration).

"Under the Mountain" is definitely worth checking out.

I remember reading the book and watching the TV series as a child, so when I saw this was out in the DVD stores I was excited to revisit a part of my childhood.

Unfortunately, this film compares poorly to the 80s TV series. The 80s TV series had a darkness and chill surrounding the Wilberforces that had shades of Doctor Who about it. A lot of the darkness and suspense is lost in this film. It spends a good 40-50 minutes before Rachel and Theo (and the audience) is even let in on the plot. Now this might be excused in some films, if the buildup is engaging enough, but it simply comes across as disparate events that seem to have no real bearing on the story. I felt that they felt obliged to include certain scenes because they were iconic from the TV series, yet they were divorced of all context in this film. Given the length of the film, the twins needed to meet Mr Jones earlier to bring everyone into the plot earlier and allow the suspense to build.

Overall, I would advise anyone to give this a miss and try to find the original TV series - some of the episodes are on google video.

I Went to see this movie to support New Zealand movies.

To my surprise I was very disappointed... Weta workshop did the visual effects which were OK but nothing very creative.

The story very lacking something and the movie ended very quickly and was very basic the whole time it just felt the twins were not twins they were friends having a Tiff.

The Special effects were very good but didn't save the movie in anyway way or forum.

this will be a movie you will forget straight away.

I will say that the actors did a great job which is why I gave 3 stars.