I watched this movie a while back and when it came to an end I was puzzled. Usually, I have a pretty strong reaction to a movie: I know if I've liked it or not, or if I've been bored with it, or if I've been bothered by it. I know something about my reaction to it. When I watched this a while back, I had - honestly - no reaction. I didn't know if I had liked it or not. So it faded into the distant past and I moved on, until the opportunity came up to watch it again. I decided to watch it again. Sometimes a movie that doesn't really strike a chord with you will do so on a second viewing. So I watched it again. And I have exactly the same reaction - I'm not really sure if I liked it or not.It's a schlocky monster story, where a scientist invents some sort of cure for a disease that a multi-millionaire wants, but he forces the scientist to try it out first - with really bad results. The mutated scientist then encounters a maintenance crew in underground tunnels where he was forced to try the cure, there's a lot of blood and gore and death. What else is there? Really - not much.It wasn't horrible. I'll say that. It's a basic, run of the mill monster story - and those can be OK as time wasters. Aside from Tom Sizemore, who played the head of the maintenance crew, the cast was pretty anonymous. And, as far as Vince (played by Sizemore) was concerned - how in the world could he have been a POW in Vietnam? Sizemore is nowhere near old enough to play a guy who would have been a POW in Vietnam. That grated on me a bit, even though it's a throwaway part of the story.I guess I'll give it a 5. Right in the middle. Because I honestly don't know if I liked it or not.
... View More"Bottom Feeder" is a decent if not entirely spectacular killer rodent film.**SPOILERS**Working on a clean-up crew, Vince Stoker, (Tom Sizemore) and his crew Otis, (Martin Roach) and Callum, (Joe Dinicol) welcome his niece Sam, (Amber Cull) when they are assigned to a new job. Arriving at the facility, an abandoned medical testing lab, they go through the facility going down into the tunnel system below. While searching through the facility, the group is soon ambushed by a large creature living in the tunnels. They soon find the source of the giant rats as being the cause of a chemical drug used by the ailing Charles Deaver, (Richard Fitzpatrick) who had requested the drug to help him but a side-effect of them caused a mutation that turned them feral and huge, and are the cause of their slowly-disappearing numbers. Finally finding a way to stop the creatures, they set out to get away from the sewers with the creature crawling around killing everyone it can.The Good News: There was some good stuff to this one when it got around to it. One of the better aspects is the film's incredibly creepy location, which is quite a big plus. The fact that they're in a sewer, which is already creepy, but it looks really great here due to the fact that this one is well-handled, effectively looking like an abandoned building should've been, with the appropriate amount of decay present with the other little things, such as what would be found in a sewer to begin with but simply rotted away due to time, is a very nice touch. That it's also dark most of the time seems to work well for this one, meaning that it's just an incredibly suspenseful location, and mixed together with the corridor of tunnels down there and the overall look to it, this one comes out rather nicely. There's also a nice bonus here in that, although it deals with a giant rat, it's not in the traditional sense of how it came about and instead is brought about through the chemical affected another party than what would be the norm, and it is much better than having a gigantic swarm of rats doing the killing. The confrontations with it are even better, as the encounters down in the creepy sewers provide a lot of fun times and generally seem highly enjoyable. The car-park one is one of the best ones, and the shootouts in the corridors work amazingly well at getting a lot of good action into this one. Even the surprise jumps from the creature attacking generate some fun, and the conclusion scores rather nicely before veering off. The last plus here is the film's incredibly high gore content, which is much higher than normal. There's an arm sawed through with a drill, a messy decapitation, several limb amputations, a saw through the chest, scratches across the face and chest with deep gouges through them and a lower jaw completely ripped out at the seems, among others in here so this one gets really bloody when it wants to. These here the film's good points.The Bad News: There was a couple problems for this one. One of the biggest ones is that the film really doesn't have a whole lot going for it when it comes to the beginning part of this. It's just far too long and not all that entirely interesting when it presents it's opening. Here, going from the run-down with the chemical to the meeting between the two parties and the aftermath of that to getting into talking about the mission from the crew, it takes about thirty minutes before even going down into the sewers, and the rat isn't the first thing done down there either. There's not a whole lot of interesting things going on through these parts of the film, and it just makes these parts of the film drag on and on for some time before it gets really good. Another problem is that there's not a whole lot of clarity when it comes to dealing with the creature's attacks. Most of them are either over so quick it's hard to tell what happened until the aftermath, too dark to render anything visible, edited so haphazardly it's impossible to see anything, or a combination of them, and a few suffer from all those factors which is really unfortunate as they were set-up to be among the better scenes until the flaws kicked in. The last flaw here is the film's incredibly stupid ending, which has almost nothing right going for it and is just all-around bad, no matter how it's looked at. These here are the film's bad points.The Final Verdict: While it's not entirely bad, there's not nearly enough good points to raise this one into the upper echelons of the genre. Worthwhile look for those that are interested or find these kinds of films enjoyable, but definitely heed caution if you're not one of those who likes these films.Rated R: Graphic Violence and Graphic Language
... View MoreTom Sizemore lends his name to a schlocky, midnight-monster movie that is exactly as good as it looks and sounds. Not to say it is necessarily a GOOD movie, far from it, but take it for what its worth and you will enjoy it.A group of utility workers are trapped in a series of tunnels which, unfortunately, contain a scientist mutated by his own creation. The creature feeds instantly on a rat, becoming what it has eaten.The effects leave something to be desired, although it IS refreshing to see them returning to the monster in the suit instead of leaning on shoddy CGI. The entire film has a cheesy, low-budget horror/sci-fi feel to it. So if you're a fan of monster movies, you could do worse. See it for free but I would hesitate to recommend spending cash on it.
... View MoreThis movie's notoriety comes not from itself but rather as a rest stop in the Twilight Zone that is the life of Tom Sizemore. It was prominently showcased in the VH1 reality show about the events following rehab and the crystal meth induced flashbacks of Tom Sizemore's "Shooting Sizemore". It is clear from watching the show that this movie was not an option for Tom Sizemore. It is obvious that he had money problems at the time and would have done dog food commercials if anyone had offered. It is also the movie he quit two days into shooting. After a lot of soul searching, this movie was filmed and Tom was back on the road. This is a low-budget straight to video type movie. If Tom wasn't in this movie, no one would have probably blinked. There is no originality in anything this movie tries. The elements are piecemeal Frankenstein with Machiavellian conspiracies from the vantage point of custodians. The release of this movie in any form is an accomplishment in itself. I keep thinking this would have been perfect on an adult version of the Sci-Fi Channel. Oh right, thats Cinemax. A scientist develops a Wolverine-like serum with consequences (which are somewhat vague and leave the possibility for a sequel). An offspring of Pineapple Pokopo and Bruce VeSota attempts to get the serum for his own needs. The serum is not tested and the scientist is "volunteered" to test it. The rest is a Predator-like cat and mouse game, in some abandoned sewer-like corridors. First they try and capture it. When that doesn't work, elimination is the next option. Tom does an adequate job with a half-ass story and horrible dialog. This is the kind of dialog that belongs in a Steven Seagal movie. You can tell Tom is just going through the motions and he still outshines everyone else. I am not even going to wonder where they got the fake Jamaican hobo, Sarge. I haven't seen a performance that bad since Jar Jar Binks tried it. This is an appropriately titled movie, since Tom was rock-bottom at the time and everyone else has been scrapping the bottom of the acting barrel for years. I wouldn't be surprised if some of these "actors" had to act for food (a.k.a. porn). It isn't that this movie is enjoyable, it is more that it is not annoying (except for Sarge). Give it a chance as a rental, if you like low-budget modern schlock or Tom Sizemore.-Celluloid Rehab
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