Unnatural

Unnatural has the feel of a 90's horror. There's a straightforward simplicity and almost an innocence about this film that sets it apart from the standard 21st century fare.

Lets start by stating the obvious. This is a "B" movie and I'll review it on that basis. Its in no way exceptional but in one sense its refreshing. Its not gratuitously violent and it has a simple premise thats not really all that new but it is moderately entertaining.

The cast do a reasonable if not exceptional job and for myself I rather enjoyed this film. I also liked its message about the responsibility of corporations and science to be good governors to the planet and not destroyers.

All in all, a nice little horror flick. Don't come to it with exaggerated expectations, its not a horror master class but it is certainly watchable. Six out of ten from me.

I saw this boring B-movie under the title MANEATER and whichever title you give it, it's a real dog of a film. And that's coming from a reviewer who can gain mild enjoyment from the usual kind of monster nonsense churned out by the likes of both the SyFy Channel and Asylum, so I feel like I've got some experience with the genre.

The story is about a group of researchers in Alaska who uncover a nefarious government conspiracy style plot involving genetic testing on polar bears, of all things. What this boils down to, somewhat inevitably, is seeing a bunch of has-been actors being chased by a polar bear. Said actors include the likes of James Remar, Sherilyn Fenn, Graham Greene, and Ray Wise, all of whom look very tired and bored by the production. It's probably only the thought of their slim pay-cheque getting them through this.

By B-movie standards, MANEATER is a dull film. There's little in the way of genuine tension or horror and the action scenes are very badly staged. The special effects are really poor as well so it's little surprise that the actors are menaced by the unseen for the most part. This is a truly terrible film though and even with a decent monster it would have been poor.

This is an attempt at a classic creature feature. And it has all the Grade B elements to make it successful: hybrid alpha animal, secret machinations, vapid and ignorant characters, and the locals with intelligence trying to stop damage. Plus, there is some cultural referencing given actors appearing together from cult classic shows.

What is missing is greater plotting and character development to give Unnatural any sense of structure that compells the viewer to care about any characters or plot points.

Acting is decent from most of the people minus the "trapped in a stereotype" male fashion photographer. Production looks good, but once the animal starts attacking, we are in the deep night of an Alaskan winter. We can't see much of anything. It was easier to listen only to the film. In fact, maybe it was easier to listen to the film than watch it overall.

Every winter I gather together some christmas/winter/snow themed horror flicks to watch. "Unnatural" had been on my radar for the 3rd winter already, so I finally watched it. Now I don't understand how could I think that there was something good behind the bad ratings & unpopularity. I'd like to note that I do enjoy a good b-horror flick, practical fx creatures features & all that stuff, but "Unnatural" falls below many b-horror movie standarts.

"Unnatural" a.k.a. "Maneater" is an utterly bad and cringy piece of horror. I'm guessing they spent all the money on James Remar, because this was cheap as hell. James did not save anything trying to act out an underdeveloped, badly written main character. Firstly, the story can be told in one sentence, it generates literally no interest in the viewer and has a very high predictability factor. Secondly, do not expect great gore, action or dope looking killer bear - "Unnatural" is seriously lacking all of those things. You're gonna get a shady looking bear that you can see maybe 3 minutes in total & a few dark, shaky & blurry action sequences. There's also the awesome snowy setting of which's potential the filmmakers used about 5%. Even the things that cost nothing were not used efficiently. The characters were probably the worst. Annoying, unrealistic, cringe-worthy writing.

"Maneater" is 80 minutes of pure boredom that can maybe be saved by a few beers & a friend or two. I'm giving it a well deserved 2/10 & that's only because of James Remar and his bear killing tactics.

"Unnatural" could have been a better movie if there was more of what people watch horror movies for. Morbid as it may be, horror movies focus on gore and blood and disfigurement, but "Unnatural" fails to provide much of that. Aside from a cast of mostly unlikable characters, except for the role played by James Remar, one doesn't really care much when each one gets eaten up along the way. The trouble is most of the gore occurs in the dark and basically all you see is the blood. The villains in this movie are generally not the focus, and it is unclear exactly what the company at hand was trying to do when it seems their mission was to preserve species. I was surprised who survived these attacks but all in all, a disappointing movie.