Pod

source: Pod

Paranoid Schizophrenic guy with a gun (hey that's a great idea!) wandering around in the snow and obviously not hunting stumbles over something. Maybe real maybe not. Who knows. Calls his brother and starts babbling. Brother goes to sister's apartment because he wants to gather up crazy brother and....... The screaming starts. Actual no-dialog top of the lungs nonstop your skin is on fire screaming. There's almost no written words to the script after this point. Whatever happens after this is irrelevant to the movie. The movie is about screaming. Just screaming. For an hour. No joke.

How to describe "Pod" ? An experimental short film with hysteria as a central theme? Or is the author trying to visualize a personal nightmare? Looking back, it wasn't really an exciting film . And personally, I think the used argument that it's reminiscent of the best of the X-Files is a little exaggerated. The episodes of the X-files at least had a decent storyline. "Pod" is a simple linear story without significant highlights and a total lack of explanation. The film's pace is the same as the credits in the beginning. Reading all the names was practically impossible. But perhaps that was intentionally. The complete story can be summarized easily since the content is really brief. Everything starts after an alarming phone call from Martin (Brian Morvant) to his brother Ed (Dean Cates). Martin is an ex-marine suffering from PTSD (I assume anyway) who's dumped in the family cottage. Ed begs his sister Lyla (Lauren Ashley Carter) to go to the cottage and check on Martin and see if his condition is really worsened. Once there, they find Martin as mad as a hatter, telling a confusing story about secret experiments and disappearances during military missions. He claims that he trapped something called a "Pod". He was able to overpower it and lock it in the basement. Is it reality or a chimera playing tricks on Martin because of his paranoid phase? Looking at the state Martin is in, manic and confused, you can only conclude that he's ready again to be taken to the nearest madhouse in a straitjacket. But to be honest, his brother and sister don't seem to be mentally stable either. Lyla has or gets an alcohol problem. She'll react in a hysterical way very quickly and immediately she believes the story of Martin. So get ready for some continuous hysterical screaming and wailing. Also the relationship with her brother Ed is not really that great, which leads to constant bickering between the two of them. Ed is a control freak (that's probably why he's a psychiatrist) and doesn't believe in the hallucinatory story. Logically, he's the one entering bravely the cellar to prove that it's all poppycock. Does the film have anything to offer? In short, nothing really. In terms of performances only that of Brian Morvant is commendable. He's very convincing as the lunatic brother. Cates and Carter are simply irritating. As a short film it has its charms and technical it looks, even with a limited budget, not so bad at all (nice shots at times). But as a film it's inadequate in many ways. The cabin-in-the-woods theme isn't exactly original anymore. Though there's a paranoid and claustrophobic atmosphere in the house thats covered with aluminum. And it all feels pretty chaotic. But you can't call this really horror. And which relationship there is with the X-files, I can only guess. Furthermore, the creature looks awful. The rare moments you'll catch a glimpse of it, the screen becomes all blurry and shaky. The moment Larry Fessenden appears, the story takes a different turn. Don't expect much explanations or insights. It all remains fairly vague. And it all ends with a very predictable scare moment. Before you know it, you're watching the end credits. Maybe the story is explained furthermore in Pod II. More reviews here : http://bit.ly/1KIdQMT

If you can make it past the first 15 minutes of introductory character development this movie totally pays off. The film is not trying to tell a story of alien origins or explain the master plans of an alien life form, its a monster movie that uses four actors to deliver a suspenseful, enthralling and honestly creepy story to the viewer, who is brought into the story by the interactive camera angles and movements. It exceeded my expectations. Decided to watch it one day along with Almost Human (2014) I highly recommend this title. Don't watch a trailer, don't do any more research past this review. Go watch it, enjoy it, and judge for yourself.

Yes, X-Files episode, The Outer Limit episode, but that's it just an episode, and trust me, not one of the better ones. Half the movie, three people are talking. And that's it. After it, things start to happen, you get a nice jump scare, some explanation, kinda over the top acting, especially for this movie and then a rushed ending. Little to get from Pod. Only if you're an Alien die hard movies, and I mean Alien as in an alien, a regular one, not those made by Ridley Scott or Cameron. So if you love to see the creatures from outer space and have some time to spare, you should consider something else. Let this be your absolute last resort of passing the time. Cheers!

I decided to put this on after watching Darling on Netflix and subsequently looking up more from Mickey Keating as I really enjoyed that offering. 5 minutes into this movie I was hooked, and stayed that way until the end. The only reason I wouldn't rate this film higher is because it isn't very ambitious, but what it aims for it does pretty well. This is a B movie, and I don't want to say any more than that because I don't want to spoil it. In fact I'm angry at Netflix because the images on the film's page contain spoilers, I recommend going into it knowing absolutely nothing. Lauren Ashley Carter is really good in the film, yes her character is extremely wildly emotional which some may find annoying, but I found her very entertaining. If you go into this expecting a decent B movie with a simple plot then you should be satisfied, there is certainly emphasis here on style and atmosphere, the story won't impress you as its one we've seen countless times before but it does what it sets out to do and delivers a little bit of suspense, mystery and horror on a low budget and at under 80 minutes it's brisk and easy to watch.

Pod is proof that anyone can make a movie. It's also proof that Netflix has no set standard for what content they will stream. With a total of five credited characters this low budget indie film failed catastrophically. About a psychotic ex-army man who has captured a "pod", the movie looks like something dug up out of the discarded ideas of X-Files. I half way expected to see David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson. Martin (Brian Morvant) did his best Brad Pitt 12 Monkeys impression to convince the audience he was really crazy. Me, personally, I can only listen to so much rambling and incoherent speech for so long before I start to go crazy myself. We have to endure a good chunk of the movie with Martin rambling and his brother and sister trying to convince him to leave his home in the woods. The bulk of it is pure cacophony as it's difficult to make out anything any of them is saying. Then to add to the headache inducing noise was a terrible musical score. The music was horribly loud and misplaced. I don't need "scary" music when someone is simply driving from one place to the next. I don't need more overbearingly loud stringed instruments when people are talking. They tried to use the music to set the mood which would've been OK if the mood was annoying. To further the chaos the cameraman would zoom in and out and shake the camera to simulate fear, angst and panic. It looked more like someone following a police officer on foot in an episode of COPS. As if they didn't know if they wanted to be a traditional film or a POV film. Besides the picturesque views of the lake and other shots there was nothing satisfactory from this movie. It wasn't scary, it wasn't unique, it wasn't thrilling, it wasn't even comedic in its failure. I'll end my review with this one quote to give you an idea of the "quality" of this movie. Ed (Dean Cates) says, "If dad saw this place he'd be spinning in his grave." Really!?

Acting : zero of 10. Script - the same. A less then low budget B-movie, something like the 1 hour of 12 years kids playing Halloween with a camera in a bad day. All the movie are 3 peoples acting not just bad but terrific, a shaking camera, red lights or no light at all, and 2 more peoples with 2 minutes roles each; all common places, no ideas at all, nothing original and just an awful movie. I can say its the worst movie of the year, by far. I give 1 star, but the real value should be 10 negative stars. Save your time and take the kids to a walk on park, or the dog - no matter, anything its better then this 1 hour + of torture.

This is my first IMDb review; however I'd like to think I'm a film aficionado with good taste in movies. I'm the type of viewer that, if watching from home or online, I will only give a movie a few minutes to catch my interest before turning it off or switching to something else. I thought this film was extremely well-acted, well-shot, and just overall well-done. The scenery and setting of the film was outstanding. The cinematography was great, and the acting was very well done as well- especially from the character Martin. The movie had a unique plot, and the antagonist was very unexpected. If I wanted to dig real deep, I might actually be able to find some sort of political statement being made about the effects of war on our veterans, PTSD, and the harsh methods that are sometimes used to treat them; but that might be digging a bit too deep. My only complaint is with the arrival of the final character. His acting, though brief, was the worst of the bunch; along with his $5 Walmart walkie-talkie, cliché trench coat and fedora, etc. The ending of the movie is definitely a cliffhanger and more than invites a sequel. Overall, I thought this was a pretty good horror/sci-fi film (leaning more toward sci-fi), and most definitely worth a watch.

I have a theory on why the credits went by at such incredible speed at the start of the movie: Everyone involved with this movie was embarrassed by it and didn't want their names mentioned more then they had to. The characters: The constant arguing between the brother and sister was just irritating. From the beginning we get it that Ed is an asshole, obviously; and we also get that Lyla is very hard to get along with. For whatever reason these two have a horrible relationship. Fine. Got it. But the constant back and forth, the constant screaming, the constant bickering, the constant everything between the two just got down right annoying. The only character I actually some what enjoyed for a brief second was Martin. At least that character was somewhat watchable. Yes, he want on tangent rants about god knows what; but he did it in a way that kept you focused and interested, at least for more than ten seconds. The cast: Easily the worst cast I have ever seen together. Again, the only one who did a decent job was Brian Morvant playing Martin; but even he got hard to listen to after a while. He does play crazy well, and both his facial expressions, and his body language played into his character. Lauren Ashley Carter has the worst scream, and the worst cry, EVER. They were both very monotone and obviously fake. Her crying scene played on way longer than it should have; however, even if the scene lasted two seconds, it would still sound obnoxious. Both Dean Cates and Larry Fessenden put on horrible performances as well. There is a difference between acting and over acting, and they are prime examples of the latter. The story: Seriously, what is POD about? I am all for not giving out all the information and leaving some things to the imagination; but, please, pleaseeeee, give us something. The poster makes it look like an alien movie; even the ending of the movie kind of alluded to that fact; but I need more than that. I need to be given something to at least point me in some kind of direction. Maybe I'm a gluten for horrible movies on Netflix. I can't highly suggest against watching this movie enough.