Grizzly Park

source: Grizzly Park

Moviecut—Grizzly Park

The excellent Glenn Morshower was my main reason for watching this film. Over the past few years he's cornered he market on stoic, dependable, "down-home," authority/military types, with his performance as Secret Service Agent Aaron Pierce on, "24," being the pinnacle of that particular type and a true highlight of that series. Therefore I was naturally excited to see that he had finally been given the lead role in a movie (as opposed to standing behind the lead, usually in a military uniform). It would seem at first glance those doing the casting had a keen sense of humour, having Glenn doing his, "stoic," bit as a park ranger to a bunch of Community Service teens being stalked by a grizzly in the wilds providing a funny dynamic in a well worn horror staple. How wrong I was. The film itself suffers from a terminal case of slowness, with scenes that should move along with pace (as should the whole film) being bogged down with performances where everyone....pauses...before....saying....their...lines in response to another characters remarks, almost like the editor just couldn't quite bear to part with those few seconds between the director calling, "Action," and the actor remembering their lines. As a result already stilted performances are made even worse by long bouts of silence. Endless scenes of walking through the woods before we actually get to any action doesn't help either. The cast of young actors are also undermined by the list of stereotypical characters they are given. Granted, this is a horror movie, they deal in stereotypes, but in this case it just comes across as incredibly lazy and tired. Making them, "Young Offenders," in an effort to add depth to the proceedings is a total waste of time as nothing is made of it. It literally doesn't matter. As does the subplot of the, "Escaped Maniac." Quite why he's in there I have no idea. Reading the synopsis, it would seem to be to add another element of danger to the story (If the bear doesn't get them, the killer will!) but the fact that he is eaten pretty much straight away kind of undermines that attempt at, "tension." He could quite easily have been the Corrections Officer whose identity he steals in the first place (and, in a totally logic defying decision, whose job collecting a bunch of kids from the local cops, who one would presume are all looking for him, he decides to carry on with) and it would make no difference to the story. When the bear finally does arrive the level of the effects just makes the whole thing even more laughable, with paws that don't look all that more convincing than those on, "Trickster's," bear costume (which must have had some kind of inflatable head given the size of it in comparison to the backpack he's carried for the rest of the film) dragging poor teens through cabin windows. In the end it's only Glenn who comes out of this whole thing with any kind of dignity intact, putting in a performance worthy of a far better film. Reading the trivia section for this film on IMDb, I see that the director got his break by thrusting his home made movie into the arms of the producer and it endeared it to them so much they gave him his shot. Perhaps next time the producer could just smack him over the head with it and tell him to go practise some more before letting him loose on another movie.

It seemed like this movie was a PG-rated family comedy for most of the way through (save for language and a few sparse kills), and then they set a hungry grizzly bear loose on the characters in the last ten minutes of the movie. I would not have had a problem with this if there had been more character development, but the first half of the movie was wasted with the group walking around picking up trash, without much suspense or dialogue. Although Glenn Morshower was the star of the movie, I thought his time on screen prevented the development of the other characters. It also seemed like they killed some of the more interesting characters too early in the movie. All in all, I felt that there was more that could of have been done to make the story and the characters more interesting. Grizzly Park is by no means a masterpiece of cinema, but it did keep me entertained. It's a good movie to watch with friends and laugh at or make sarcastic commentary. The movie was not terrible, but there was definitely room for improvement.

I've come up with a new term for anyone involved in art who seems to think that the amount of money they spend will somehow buy him talent. I call them "gearsl*ts". They're everywhere. A guy who buys the absolute BEST camera and thinks he's a great video producer now. A guy who buys the absolute BEST guitar and somehow thinks that earns him respect as a good guitar player. The writer and director of this film is one of these people. I can tell. Because he's surrounded by talent that completely outshines him, but his part in this project was so miserably sub-collegian that nothing could save the film. The photography was great. The sound was top-rate. The acting was B-class but marred by a terrible script that made the job difficult for the newer actors to deliver. The money was there. He bought out all of this talent around him. But like Uwe Boll, that can't save him. This is by far one of the worst screenplays I have seen come to life with so much talent laboring desperately to make it in any way adequate. Well, it didn't work. 2/10

Along with being definitely one of the worst movies I have ever seen due to its terrible acting, complete lack of story, and confusion on what type of genre it wanted to be, this movie had the worst soundtrack I have ever heard. It featured what must have been some friend of the producer's original music and it was incredibly bad. It was along the lines of a Trey Parker and Matt Stone original song for one of their movies, only the comedy was missing. Dreadful. I usually enjoy watching movies that are this bad, but this is in a whole different ballpark. The attempts to include humor soured any moments that would otherwise make you laugh due to its awfulness. I wasted 95 minutes of my life, don't make the same mistake.

Being as it may I'm writing my own script, and of course I've never been to film school and I can't go because I require a grade 12 certificate which I don't have thanks to an entire staff of a**hole teachers, so when I saw GRIZZLY PARK and noted that it was produced by people that did go to film school, I actually gained a little more confidence, just because this movie sucked, its probably the most idiotic film I have ever seen. Apparently you have a serial killer thrown into the mix that is so useless during a bear attack, of course not a lot of people know what to do to avoid a bear attack, but this moron kneels down in front of bear's face pulls out a knife and utters the words "I'm gonna stick you" all the while this bear always stands in front of his potential victims and roars and makes funny faces, if the bear had any lines in the film it probably be something like "roar roar look I'm scary, roar roar do I have something in my teeth?" to add to the stupidity of this film, at the very end a news reporter states that the escaped serial killer murdered the group and made it look like a bear attack, how the hell do you murder someone and make it look like a bear attack? Before you know it serial killers will be able to murder people on the top floor of a ten story building and make it look like a shark attack, people should stop watching these types of films, it'll give them ideas. This film might be considered dumb fun, dumb it is, fun it is not, a film which is part of the SCI-FI channel's man eaters series called GRIZZLY RAGE is way better than this, its not a masterpiece but its better.

I wasn't expecting much when I rented "Grizzly Park." I'm not a fan of horror movies and only rented this due to the presence of Glenn Morshower as Ranger Bob. After reading a lot of reviews I was expecting a total mess of a film; it wasn't quite that bad. The idea of characters getting killed as punishment for their misdeeds isn't a new one in horror, or even in mystery (see "And Then There Were None"), but I liked the idea of this group of offenders being given a chance to repent their misdeeds. Needless to say, they don't. "Grizzly Park" is also beautiful to look at, as it was filmed on location in a couple of state parks (quibble: the movie is supposed to be set in a California state park, but the vegetation is clearly Eastern, witness all the deciduous trees changing color. It obviously isn't California). Some horror film aficionados may have downgraded the film due to its lack of sex and minimal violence - for a horror film. There are a couple of fairly graphic deaths for those who enjoy that sort of thing. Glenn Morshower turns in a great performance and I think his presence is reason enough to rent the film. It actually would have benefited from being longer, as we really don't get to know the characters very well. One of the extras on the disc includes interviews with the actors describing their characters as "deep" and "troubled." I'd call them "sketchy" myself. The so-called twist ending really didn't come as a surprise, but it was very rushed; not enough time was spent on it for it to be believable and it really felt tacked on. A couple more minutes would have been better here. Overall, if you're a fan of Mr Morshower and cheesy movies I think this is worth your time on a slow evening. I've certainly seen worse.

Great title and cover art, but a poorly executed movie. Eight troubled teens are sent to the woods to do community service, accompanied by Ranger Bob (veteran character actor Glen Morshower). Soon enough, they are being offed one by one by a very large bear -- but not before they get to deliver lame lines and act like they're appearing in a high school play. The level of acting, except for Morshowe, is abysmal. The bear is portrayed both a live bear and various prosthetics that do not match the real bear particularly well. The only reason for watching this turkey is to see Ranger Bob in action, as Morshower has this kind of role down to a T. And if you do make it through to the very end, there is a nice, macabre twist awaiting you. Oh yes, there also is one female whose perky * out-act her.

That pretty well sums up this movie. Okay, you know the plot. A grizzly bear kills some kids. There is a stupid subplot involving a homicidal maniac or two. I won't spoil the end. But, yes, everything is just as you predicted. You will be hoping that the "trick" ending you know a no talent movie maker would use, won't be used, but it is. Every single stereotype you can imagine. A few things really bad about the movie: Gore for gore's sake. Some scenes just there for goofy crack heads to laugh at, the usual decapitations and guts and stuff. Another stereotype is that the director,eager to join in the already flooded market of Nazi movie makers, shows the brunettes dying in gory detail. Yes, this hack director-writer does get his Nazi merit badge and join the ranks of thousands of movie makers without an iota of originality. Ho hum. The dumb twist ending also doesn't make sense, since it involves the killing of a park ranger, which doesn't fit into the twist. Also, the movie looks like a glamor shoot instead of a group of juvenile delinquents. No one believes juvenile delinquents spend that much time in aerobics, jogging, or at the gym. There is a reason no one believes it. Because it doesn't happen. The worst casting job since, well, ever. Pathetic. I gave it a 2 instead of 1 only because of some guidelines the ranger gives for actual camping (such as not packing food or scented materials around grizzlies). A few common sense commentaries, and that is all the movie has to offer.