Tuesday 1 March 2016

"Landmine Goes Click" - Review

Director Levan Bakhia's ("247°F") twisted new horror "Landmine Goes Click", which has been playing the festival circuits to much acclaim, finally gets a UK release this week at VOD outlets, courtesy of Frightfest presents...

3 American youths, Daniel (played by former "Glee" actor Dean Geyer), his girlfriend Alicia (Spencer Locke - "Resident Evil : Afterlife") and their friend Chris (Sterling Knight - who's probably best known for the US series "Melissa and Joey") are out hiking through the mountains of Georgia in Eastern europe, when Chris get a nasty surprise as he steps on a landmine.

Unable to move, as he fears stepping off the device will cause it to detonate, Daniel goes off for help, leaving Alicia with him for company. But it soon becomes apparent, Daniel isn't coming back and the couple are stuck there.

As luck would have it, a passing local, who's out hunting, chances upon them and after some discussion, initially offers to help. But it seems he's really not interested in helping and the film takes a rather nasty, sadistic twist as the film moves into its second act and becomes increasingly difficult to watch.

I'm not going to spoil the plot for those who are interested in seeing this, but whilst film starts well as they're establishing the story, I felt the film became rather tedious once the hunter arrived, and whilst this second act did prove extremely uncomfortable viewing, it also became extremely tedious, as it seemed they were trying to pad the plot out, and I found myself looking at my watch to see how much longer we had left as it didn't seem to be building to anything.

HOWEVER, the film then takes a sudden and unexpected twist with the surprise introduction of a third act, in which the unlikeable Hunter character from earlier on, suddenly finds his past catching up with him...

The film is a bit of a mixed bag, again it started well with breath taking views of the Caucasus Mountains as we're introduced to the characters, but I got so fed up with the middle act dragging on that I nearly switched the film off, but then found myself (rather sadistically) enjoying the finale.

I'd say the film is worth a watch, and don't let the lead actors previous TV credits put you off, but this is a difficult film to sit through in places. Partly because of some rather uncomfortable scenes of humiliation and partly because it seemed they were trying to drag the plot out. Though it did redeem itself somewhat with the exceptionally twisted ending when one of the characters finds things aren't so fun when the boot is on the other foot.

The film hits UK VOD outlets March 7.

View the trailer on YouTube


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