The Depraved

Berlin has many abandoned underground places. Kris leads two couples on a spooky tour. The three groups have never met each other before. Marie and Juna are friends. Lucia and Denis are a couple. They encounter dangerous men and dangerous situations.

This German English film is also known as Urban Explorer. This has a nice setup for a small indie horror. I'm ready to go on a tour, but problematic writing starts infiltrating the movie. As soon as the group gets confronted by the thugs, any sane person would leave the tour. Instead of thugs, the group should be trapped somehow underground. They should definitely stay together. That is probably the movie's biggest sin. It tries to build up some chemistry within the group and promptly breaks it apart. Maybe if they're not strangers, the separation would mean something. The movie falters and falls apart in the second half.

A group of people take in an underground tour of the tunnels beneath Berlin. All is going relatively well until their fairly enigmatic guide suffers an unfortunate accident. If being lost in these deep, dark, endless maze of tunnels weren't bad enough, they also happen upon a deranged nut-case/former border guard.

I thought I was in for yet another low-budget, badly acted horror flick of little real value, but as the movie wore on, I found, much to my surprise, it to be fairly well done. Highly derivative, but well done nonetheless. I actually found myself caring if these characters survived or not, no small feat as most of these type of films have such one-dimensional cardboard characters that I usually can't be bothered. Which I guess is also true here to some extent, but I was drawn into the story regardless.

I think this could have been an engaging flick. It has some good character development and an interesting premise. The acting is acceptable, and the filming/directing is solid. With that said, this movie does suffer an identity crisis – even the title shows the problems in the movie. The Depraved – Urban Explorer says it all. The movie is not really either, but a poor cross of both. This is not the traditional slasher, gore fest circa Hostel or Turistas. Nor is it an adventure film with Nazis and underworld crime, rather it is a blend that does not succeed in either genre.

The movie starts as a group of tourists is lead into an underground tunnel system under Berlin. There are plenty of interesting red herrings, and exciting action as they descend deeper and deeper under the city. This goes on successfully for nearly 2/3s of the movie, and I was engaged enough that I forgot that something 'depraved' was going to happen. It does, and when it does it is pretty lame.

The movie then turns into a cliché horror with all the classic conventions – girl getting tortured, cell phones dying at the right (wrong) time, the 'is he dead?' bad guy. However, there is nothing overly interesting or unique about the depraved or the situation. I kept wishing they would get back to the interesting tunnel system to explore.

As in all slasher movies, the ending is underwhelming, but by then I had pretty much tuned out. This movie could have been pretty entertaining, and starts off enjoyable, but can't decide what it wants to be. I would have been happy with just the Urban, keep the Depraved to yourself.

This movie deserves much more then a 5.2 rating on IMDb. I'm not saying that you will get great dialogs or deep conversations and that's not the point. This is a horror/thriller and so you don't need that. The only thing you need with a horror/thriller is suspense, creepy background sounds, a nasty villain, a lot of screaming and blood. And all that you will get with this movie. The actors were not bad at all, especially the German subterranean psycho played by Klaus Stiglmeier. You will need subtitles for this movie because at the end there is quite a lot of German language. I thought the underground sceneries were perfect for this movie so that you would get the feeling that there is no escape from that weirdo. Great entertainment if you like that kind of movies. Certainly much better then the usual stuff we get in that genre.

If all you want is a spooky movie with monsters and atmospheric settings, this is as good as any. If you expect anything like a logical story, well, maybe not so good. The film depends on a common misconception; every big city has endless tunnels beneath and they are all connected as well as lost and forgotten. And this is nonsense. Unlike Paris which has quarries beneath it, most cities do not have anything like a connected maze of tunnels. And most tunnels, even abandoned subway stations, are used for something and are well documented.

This film, like others of its type, substitutes basements or even abandoned factories with their windows covered for underground areas. One look at the brickwork of these phony tunnels is enough to reveal the sets are ordinary locations dressed as spooky tunnels. The huge size of many of the locations should tip off the viewer that they are seeing nothing more mysterious than an old warehouse.

And our explorers are totally unprepared for their adventure. The have no hardhats, no first aid kit, no proper clothing, nothing but a few dinky flashlights. If not for their "guide" somehow toting 5 sets of rubber waders in his tiny backpack they would never have made it through a flooded tunnel. We are further told that scrawny teens can climb 50 feet, hand over hand, on a thin rope. And thats up and down. Small wonder the actual climbing is not shown! And of course the abandoned tunnels are full of improbable characters who survive on.....what....rats? If you like to suspend your disbelief totally, you will probably enjoy this film. But if, like me, obvious plot holes spoil the experience you may wish you watched something else.