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Memorable, crazy movie

Fresh and Exciting

I wanted to like it more than I actually did... But much of the humor totally escaped me and I walked out only mildly impressed.

One of the most extraordinary films you will see this year. Take that as you want.

I remember viewing this little gem many years ago during the late 90's early 00's wave of slasher movies. And during that time a lot of junk came and went and very few stuck in my head, but this was the one that stayed in my mind and I was so glad that I got to view this again.I'd to say that "Kolobus" is very stylish and effective movie that tells the story of 5 people people enter a reality based TV series house where they hope to gain fame and fortune, including one of the characters is already an actress, a fallen actress with a hope to regain her time in the spotlight. But as soon as they arrive they are locked in with a sadistic killer who has set up an array of gruesome traps.The movie has a eerie nightmarish quality to it and the sudden darkness with just flashing red lights adds a great creepy Gothic tone to the proceedings, and especially when the characters sets off the one of the traps which are very nasty and effective and adds a brilliant amount of tension and fear, especially when the first victim gets sliced apart in the first trap as it totally comes out of the blue and the gore is really unsettling and brilliant. The others include eye impalement, disembowelment and an acid shower each done brilliantly.Amy Weber is a definite standout in the cast as the final girl and gives a good chase at the end and shows layers to her character throughout the movie. Illa Volok as Faceless the killer was very menacing in his little screen time which made his character all the more scary too much of him would have lessened his creepiness. All in all "Kolobus" is very tense and unsettling, although it doesn't keep it up all the way through and the last 40 minutes does try to pack too much in, but the twist ending is very well done though that was a real head scratcher.

Kolobos might have been a pretty good little horror flick if it had even a half-decent ending. It's got a talented cast, a script with a nice beginning and middle, above average gore effects and a distinctly 1970s vibe to the look and rhythm of the production that sets it apart from most of its low-budget kin. It does have too much annoyingly stereotypical "scary" music on its soundtrack, but I was able to put that out of mind after a while. Unfortunately, all of the quality work here is just build up for a big conclusion that falls flatter than western Nebraska. This movie has one of those finishes that leaves you saying out loud to the screen "Wait…that's it? Seriously?" It's the sort that leaves you so let down and disappointed, you almost forget everything you liked up to that point while being reminded of all the loose ends and holes in the plot. I don't know what these filmmakers thought they were doing with this ending. All they accomplish is betraying their otherwise admirable efforts.The story is about 5 people who agree to live in a house for some kind of ill-defined experimental film. No one ever references or even alludes to MTV's Real World or similar such reality television when talking about the project, which is part of the 1970s feel to Kolobos. There's little about this film, either culturally or in technique, that brands it as being from its particular era. If you'd told me it was made in 1978 instead of 1998, I would have absolutely believed it.In the house are Kyra (Amy Weber), a young artist with psychological problems; Tina (Promise LaMarco), a sassy kid with a zest for life; Erica (Nichole Pelerine), an ambitious and somewhat full of herself actress; Tom (Donny Terranova), an assertive but unfunny standup comic; and Gary (John Fairle), a pretentious college student. The tale is told in flashbacks as members of the group are killed off one by one while Kyra has hallucinations about disembodied voices and faceless figures. The flashbacks end with Kyra leaving the hospital after recovering from her ordeal, and that's when the wet fart of a conclusion kicks in.Now, maybe I'm missing something so I'll lay it out for you. Kyra is specifically and repeatedly described and portrayed as having serious mental health issues. She's tried to commit suicide, is generally skittish and emotionally shaky and constantly sees and hears things that aren't there. So, the mindblowing twist at the end of Kolobos is…wait for it…Kyra is crazy. No, I'm not leaving anything out. The crazy chick turns out to be crazy. That's it.I'm at a loss because the rest of the screenplay is rather well written, at least for this kind of thing. It's not high art but the characters are clearly established and their interactions are relatively believable. The scenes are solidly constructed and the direction, while clearly bound by financial limitations, is intelligent and sharp. The five main members of the cast all come off like folks who should be acting for a living, which is not something you can say about a lot of low-budget cinema. Promise LaMarco appears to be someone who could have a good career as "cute horror chick".Yet all that leads to closing scenes so awesomely lame that I almost lost the use of my legs through osmosis. Something else…hell, literally any other type of finale would have been better than we get. I went into Kolobos thinking it was going to suck. I'd never heard of it or any of the people in it before. The DVD had a lot of the signs indicating cheaply made gunk. When I popped it into my DVD player, it doesn't even have a menu with set up options or scene selections. It's just an image of Kyra and Tom, the title and the word "play". As I watched it, however, I grew more and more pleasantly surprised and interested. It seemed to be a hidden gem. Then the last 5 minutes left me thinking it should have never been unearthed.I can't call Kolobos bad but I also can't recommend something that falls down so severely at the end. Decide for yourself and don't come complaining to me afterwards.

I'm sure I'm not the only one who has thought that the installation of deadly booby traps into the next Big Brother house would be an interesting idea: it would certainly help the show's falling ratings if Davina's irritating, fame-hungry contestants died horribly live on TV (hey, maybe they're going to do that for the final series next year... y'know, go out in style).Well, in Kolobos, that's exactly what happens—a group of young hopefuls enter a plush, Big Brother style house to take part in an experimental film, but become trapped and meet gruesome fates as they accidentally activate spring loaded circular saw blades, acid showers, and ankle mangling pincers, before being finished off by a mysterious killer known as Kolobos. At first it seems as though the director of the project has tricked the house-mates into becoming the unwitting stars of a snuff film, but when he also meets a sticky fate, suspicion falls on contestant Kyra (Amy Weber), a mentally disturbed 'artist' (I use quote-marks because her drawings are crap!) who sketches twisted images, and suffers from terrifying visions.For the most part, this is an entertaining affair which reminds me a little of the British horror movie My Little Eye; the trouble is that Kolobos decides to get a little clever for its own good, adding a large dose of psychological/split identity guff (ala John Cusack thriller Identity) and becoming all too confusing in the process. By the end of the film, I was unsure as to who the killer was or whether the events shown had ever actually happened.Was there really a faceless monster named Kolobos stalking the house? Was Kyra the murderer? Or had she conjured the whole thing up in her mind as a test run for the Real McCoy? And whilst I'm raising awkward questions, how the hell does someone go about converting a large, suburban property into an escape proof, metal clad prison without someone questioning your motives? And am I the only one who reckons that the film's music rips-off Suspiria's soundtrack?Anyway, despite all of the unanswered questions, general confusion, and ambiguity, I still had a reasonably good time with this film: the girls are cute (Weber has the beautiful weirdo thing down pat, and Promise LaMarco, as ditzy Tina, is blessed with a lovely set of dimples); the gore is impressively nasty; and directors Daniel Liatowitsch and David Todd Ocvirk manage to deliver enough effective scares and creepy atmosphere to make it fun while it lasts.

Nearly everything about Kolobos is poor. The direction is mediocre and the acting, dialogue and script are so incredibly bad that the film becomes a real test to sit through. The filmmakers have literally lifted ideas and scenes directly from other great horror films and placed them in theirs merely to fill up time in the silly plot. I don't mind when a film pays homage to others but this one often enters into artistic plagiarism. Even the opening song is a near-copy of the witch theme in Suspiria. There are also many scenes in the film that have no relevance and/or make no sense once the "surprise" ending is revealed. If you actually look back at it after viewing the film, you'd see this. If I was Dario Argento or Claudio Simonetti and found out about this film I'd want to file a lawsuit. Even so, despite the filmmakers using the lighting of Suspiria and a key scene in Opera, they screw it all up by making it obvious where they've placed the lights (instead of mysterious and supernatural)and adding strobe lights and laser optic beams shooting through the air. It may as well be a 70's disco club. The main actress is the best of the bunch but since every actor/actress overacts (though some appear to not be acting at all), spits out bad lines, and manages to not even create a character, it could have been improved if it starred puppets. I don't mind some weak low-budget horror acting but this is well below that level. Nothing is quotable in the movie because the dialogue is typically generic though sometimes exaggerated, pointless and/or laughable. The plot and ending aren't as original or fascinating as people would have you believe either. In fact there is hardly anything original about this film that is good at all except that it's perhaps the first 'reality show' horror flick made…but is that really a good thing? Gore you say? Yes it has some low-budget gore but these scenes usually are not even shot or edited right to where it should shock you. Regardless, if you want to see Argento films (including the gums-to-shelf corner scene in Deep Red), Candyman, Cube, The Beyond and much more crammed into an incoherent amateurish mess then this is the film for you. I kept watching it just hoping they would stop stealing constantly from other horror films to enhance their own weak storyline about a teenage girl who sees strange faces (including a man who removed the skin on his face) while hanging out with some other teen idiots being filmed ala The Real World at a 'Cube-like' house. This isn't a 'fun' low-budget horror film – they actually tried to make a scary hour-and-a-half showcase. What they ended up with is a hardly seen flick doomed to collect dust at the video store on the bottom shelf…and that's exactly where it should stay.