Sunday 30 October 2011

Turistas

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Year:2009
Country of origin:Chile
Director:Alicia Scherson
Genre:Travellers beware
Starring:Melissa George, Josh Duhamel, Olivia Wilde, Desmond Askew, Beau Garrett, Max Brown
Rating:2/5
IMDB link:http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1368447/
Tagline:You'll be dying to stay
Favourite line:None worth mentioning

Desperately disappointing modern horror that has a reputation which far exceeds the sum of it's parts.

The plot:
A group of backpackers find themselves stranded in a remote coastal region of Brazil when the bus they are travelling on is involved in a serious accident and slides off a cliff. As luck would have it, all passengers were able to escape before the bus was lost and, luckier still, they are just a few minutes walk from a beautiful, isolated beach that, for some weird reason given the solitude, is also equipped with a staffed bar. Thinking they have landed on their feet, the tourists stay the night, drinking into the early hours but, before the night is through, they are drugged. Awakening to find all of their possessions gone, with nothing except the clothes they are standing in, they head to the nearby village for assistance but are brushed aside. Only one native will offer help, and he leads them through the jungle to a house, where a terrible fate awaits them.

Whilst the acting and production values are of a decent standard, the real problem here is that there is simply not enough storyline to justify a full length feature.
Hell, this would struggle to fill a forty five minute run-time for a TV show.
As a result, the first forty minutes is spent on establishing the characters - too long - before the horror reveal then, once the reveal is complete, the final forty minutes is spent with Our Heroes being chased around a bit.
And by all the Christ's on this Earth, it's dull.
People run.
People scream.
People run some more.
People shout and caterwaul and run and scream.
Bored the living teats off me, and I tend to like seeing people suffer.
With some beautiful scenery, some decent underwater filming and a healthily good looking cast, this should be far more gripping than it is.
Don't bother with it.
Note: In the UK and France this is known as Paradise Lost. In Japan, as Blood Paradise.
Don't be fooled by the alternate titles. They're all the same deathly dull movie.

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