Storage 24

Lots of people get trapped in a building, with an alien beast on the loose. One of them has just broken up with his girlfriend. She's also stuck in there, along with the guy's best friend, who she was having an affair with. TENSION!! There's also an eccentric gentleman in an ugly dressing gown who might as well be followed by a huge neon sign which says COMEDY RELIEF, A gruff engineer trying to fix the strange power cuts which have been going on and off all day (guess what happens to him) and some others who can charitably be described as 'cannon fodder'.

Basically, this is a creature feature, the sort they've made for donkeys years... albeit a British one. The chases down narrow tunnels, the sight of disembodied limbs and torsos scattered about, even the fiend itself... are 'borrowed' from a million other movies... most specifically, a certain series starring Sigourney Weaver. This doesn't make it a bad film per se, but it's not one to fire up the imagination in any way (HEY THAT RHYMES!!). It provides a few cheap thrills, but you probably won't recall it a week from now. Or indeed, the next time you go to the bathroom. 5/10

Storage 24 tries so hard to be Alien for this generation, but sadly fails on pretty much every level except this film does have a pretty cool monster.

This may fail in trying to be alien, but i would not say this is a terrible movie. the acting is generally OK through out with some less than desirable moments . But Noel Clarke is continuing to develop into a decent leading man. the claustrophobic nature of the story does add an extra element to the movie building up to some pretty decent jump scares and also providing a decent amount of gore, but not going to far for the sake of it. surprisingly it managed to make me laugh on more that one occasion.

One thing i have to praise is that being a low budget sci-fi/horror it still managed to be shot in a decent way so i could see what is going on. Many films now a days, especially horror films like to play in the dark and shadows so much that can barley see or make out what is going on.

Negatively some of the story points really annoyed me, and i found them distracting. the ending tries to end on a larger scale. when it would have been better off keeping to it's smaller premise. It doesn't offer much either in the guessing game of who's going to live and who's going to die.

Overall a fair effort, but pretty standard low budget British movie.

Quite well made with some nice creature effects, but I'm afraid it has little else in its favour. Yes, there are a few 'jump out of your skin' moments, but it really doesn't do anything we haven't seen before. For me, they revealed far too much of the creature far too soon; for horror to work well, it needs to be in the shadows. It's what the audience doesn't see that scares them; the imagination is a very powerful thing if manipulated correctly. The performances were all decent enough although nobody really stood out. On the plus side the running time was nice and short and the pace was kept pretty high throughout. Oh, and I have to admit, I love the ending!… Sadly not quite enough for it to get my recommendation though.

SteelMonster's verdict: NOT RECOMMENDED

My score: 5.6/10

You can find an expanded version of this review on my blog: Thoughts of a SteelMonster.

It should be no surprise that a former (and still working SFX man) was at the helm of this movie. You can clearly see his handwriting or rather effects writing or whatever you want to call it. Unfortunately the script and the characters do not hold up to his effects standard. And while the movie is not bad, it's not really good either.

You get cardboard characters and story developments that are easily guessed by anyone watching the movie. It's still a neat ride overall, but never a really completely satisfying one. I don't really blame the actors too much on this, because I've seen some of them in better movies and with better performances. If the focus could have been on other things than the effects and the set pieces, there might have been a chance this movie would have gathered a larger following.

The plot: A few people get trapped in a warehouse after a military plane goes down.

Storage 24 is a low budget, generic Alien clone. It's not really all that good, but I couldn't bring myself to hate it. For one thing, it's got Geoff Bell, the security guard from Botched, in a minor role. That brought back memories of Boris and his awesome lines. Besides the cult actor, there's also a cheesy alien who looks like a bizarre ripoff of several iconic aliens. The most obvious influence seems to be Predator, but there's also a lot of District 9 thrown in, too.

The acting and writing are uneven, but for grizzled genre veterans, this surely won't be a show stopper. If you've sat through Syfy original movies, then you've probably seen worse, though the competition is certainly going to be fierce. There's a bit of misogyny, macho posturing, and bland hero-making (where a whiny everyman transforms himself into a manly hero), but the biggest problem is that not too much happens for the first half of the movie. If you're the type of person who hates sitting through boring character development in a movie where you know that the characters are doomed to die soon, then you'll probably be a bit bored and restless. The deaths are a bit repetitive and not very original, but they're gory enough to keep the attention of most horror fans.

If you're looking for something deadly serious, I'd skip this movie. It's too cheesy and quirky to really take seriously. I have to wonder if they realized they were making a bad movie, then decided to just add a bunch of silly scenes, like actors feeling up mannequins and playing with toys. Well, for some people, that seems to have utterly ruined the movie, but, for me, it actually managed to save the movie. I really can't hate a movie which has actors copping a feel on a mannequin.

If you're the kind of person who needs high brow entertainment in his science fiction, you should definitely skip this movie. If you're looking for something to tide you over until the next direct-to-video ripoff of Alien comes out, then you should give some thought to watching this. If you're like me, then you've sat through much worse, and you'll probably be able to salvage some degree of entertainment from Storage 24.