Nightbreed Review

Interest: 7/10

Acting: 6/10

Storyline: 7.5/10

Intensity: 4/10

Fights Guns or Otherwise: 6.5/10

Nudity: 2/10

Action: 5/10

Horror: 6/10

Gore: 8/10

Logic 7/10

Nightbreed is a 1990 Film by Clive Barker. It is an action, fantasy, and horror movie. The runtime is one hour and fourty-two minutes. It stars Craig Sheffer (Known for A River Runs Through It, Nightbreed, The Program, and Demolition Man) Anne Bobby (Known for Beautiful Girls, Voicing Brigid Tenenbaum in the video game Bioshock, Born on the Fourth of July, and Nightbreed.) and David Cronenberg (Known for The Fly, Dead Ringers, eXistenZ, and Crash, all of which he directed). A quick summary of the movie is “A psychiatrist is helping a young man about his problems, a crazed serial killer is hunting down his victims, and a place called Midian are all connected somehow in this crazy tale” Nightbreed looks like it’ll be a good segment from horror into action, boasting both of these things, and seems like just a decent all around, let’s see how it fairs, shall we?

Interest: Nightbreed is a solid movie that keeps your interest. It isn’t utterly gripping, but it also isn’t a snooze fest. The world that is crafted, is also really interesting and a fun idea. The fights are average, the actors do a decent job of conveying their characters, and the storyline is pretty solid as well.

Acting: The acting was good, but there was a lot to desire on the believable side, or even a realistic side of characters. Now I do understand that this movie is fantasy, but the disconnect from the range of motion of characters is bad. And I think this is a problem with most movies that are Clive Barkers, he has an interesting plot (because he’s a writer) but his characters in the movies, just don’t quite add up sadly on the big screen. And it is a shame, because I really like the movies, but always have a reflection moment like this, and go the actors were almost corny.

Storyline: The storyline is pretty solid. No glaring holes, nothing that screams foul. It is just solid, fun. You even get some freaky things in the movie but, in a world run by a horror master, things like this are bound to creep up to make things weird.

Intensity: The intensity of Nightbreed may be the thing honestly holding this film back from greatness. The intensity never gets to build up to any sort of substantial size. Everything goes from point A to point B with very little getting in the way from point A to point B. As in if there is a gun, It’ll be used by the next scene, let alone the second act. Only at the end would I say it does this well, and that’s because there is a surprise that I think most people see coming.

Fights, Guns or Otherwise: I think the movie does well in all facets of this category, there is some blood and gore and physical fights, verbal lashings are a little light but fun and even mentally the movie is good with fights. Physical fights, there’s some actual fights plus some weaponry make it a fun thing to see. The verbal lashings are a little lacking, but when they do happen they are fun, and mentally, the characters have some anguish to overcome and deal with, which is fun and interesting.

Nudity: There is no conventional nudity in the film, there is a creature who comes out topless in one part of the film, and while it is “nude” Has no nipples or anything, it’s a weird wash honestly, but creepy, so idk, just take it for what it is.

Action: So Action is decent in the movie, but it isn’t great. It is fun, and entertaining, but it isn’t a blockbuster action movie. You aren’t getting car chases and a gun shootout that takes 5 or 10 minutes. It is all quick skirmishes or a quick crazy thing happening, but otherwise the big pay off is near the end, but it really is a very long wait for the pay off that isn’t quite worth it.

Horror: Nightbreed does well in being creepy and spooky, but I wouldn’t say it quite hits a high note of actual horror. What I mean is that, the atmosphere, and even the creatures or mutants are scary, the one surprise is probably a good in a horror sense, the movie never feels like it’s taking itself seriously enough. And it’s a real shame because I want it to be better at it. And in the end I think it’s creepy, but not truly scary I suppose is the real word I am looking for.

Gore: There is a moderate amount of gore and freaky things. The actual gore aspect of it, it isn’t a overflowing bountiful amounts, it is a moderate amount though, with depiction of crime scene photos, and people being stabbed and some other things of that nature, but it is all fairly realistic. The freaky things is just the “mutants” that exist in the world of Nightbreed. They are all strange weird and creepy. They feel like they are almost deskinned beings at time, and that is just eerie.

Logic: The Logic of the film is okay. For I’d say ¾ of the film, everything is good, but the end, the humans really get really weird and become a huge mob. No investigation no anything, but never reading the book this is based off, I have no idea what got cut out of the translation from book to movie. I suppose to me, there are things missing, that made me go “why didn’t this happen?”

So did I enjoy the film? It wasn’t bad, it wasn’t great, but it wasn’t bad. It fell short in a few aspects, but it carried itself in others, and was fun along the way. Do I recommend the film, sure, at worst you watch it alone and watch how probably an excellent horror novel got turned into a almost uninteresting film, or at best you watch it with friends and you guys rip on it, or you watch it alone and enjoy it. I scored it a 59.5%, which seems low, but this I honestly think that it deserves this. I don’t hate it, but it doesn’t falls short a bit for a horror movie. Well until Next time!