The Devil's Carnival (2012)

Sorry, this movie sucks

Good movie but grossly overrated

Very interesting film. Was caught on the premise when seeing the trailer but unsure as to what the outcome would be for the showing. As it turns out, it was a very good film.

The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

I'll start off by saying that even as a huge Repo! fan and one of its biggest supporters as far back and the trailer's leaking in 2007, I was rather mixed with my feelings towards this movie. While I was happy to see the two Darrens and Terrance even getting any work at all. I'm friends with all 3 of them on Facebook and followed their updates about this religiously, but even then I couldn't help feeling a bit on edge about this filmFor starters, I think the biggest problem can be found in its length: 55 minutes. For one, a film that has the mercy if being this short shouldn't feel padded out. But the problem is, it does. It runs 55 minutes and you'd think that should be more than enough time to fit an actual story, but the problem is, there's little story and tons of character porn. Character porn is a term I use to describe a production that has so many characters that it's practically overflowing, and that's exactly the problem here, instead of trying to focus on a story, it forces all these extra characters in and it feels excessive. Which is a shame because watching it, you get the sense that this production has tons of potential with it's fascinating concept of 3 people sent to hell and sent through a carnival where they're forced to face their sins and how they died- each set piece is a metaphor for Aesop's fables. The fables aspect is interesting but wasted here considering the only major tale touched upon is The Scorpion and the Frog, which leads to a rather unsavoury song called "Trust Me"Speaking of which, the music. From what I hear, at the tours if you wanted to get an autograph from the folks attached, you had to drop 20 bucks on a soundtrack. Well, no bloody way could you force me to drop 20 bucks on this soundtrack when the music is so... dull. Part of Repo!'s charm was that it tried various styles of music- Italian folk music, industrial metal, electronica, punk rock, dance-pop and as many styles as there were, it all came together to form one extremely cohesive piece. Here, it's all carnival music and while there are a few good pieces, it feels like they went way too far with it. Some tracks don't even need to be songs ("MISS ME, MISS ME, NOW YA GOTTA KISS ME!"). The final track "Slither in the Mud" is a weird mix of awesome and terrible at the same time- it's always lovely to hear Zdunich's deep and velvety voice, but it can't elevate rather insipid songwriting. Oh and the credits. If I heard "la la la, it's off to hell we go!" Or "you're in the devils... CARNIVAL!" again I was going to murder everyone in the roomIt's a shame because there's so much potential. Darren Bousman is extremely talented and sophisticated as a director, and Darren and Terrance are unparallelled as opera songwriters but when it comes to writing a more traditional musical they can't manage. The cast is impressive with Emile Autumn, much of the Repo! cast and Sean Flanery, but they're wasted and I didn't care about any of the main characters. It's pretty looking and has some interestingly entertaining bits but not enough

I happen to be a huge fan of "Repo! The Genetic Opera" and when I heard Terrance Zdunich and Darren Lynn Bousman were working on a whole new Gothic horror musical I was excited. Then I watched it. Now it is one of those "wait until the end of the movie to fully understand," but so well worth it. Also it may help to watch it more than once, which since it's a cult film, it's great to do that as well. The music mixes well with the story and some of the songs are very catchy and who doesn't LOVE Terrance Zdunich's singing voice. I recommend this movie! Oh, and another good thing is a sequel is coming out soon which that movie takes place in Heaven! I can't wait!

Just because your movie brings together two fairly unrelated genres doesn't mean it is free from criticism, and "The Devil's Carnival" is bad, bad, bad, bad, bad.The film follows the tales of three people as they explore the titular Devil's Carnival and they replay three classic fables. An interesting set-up with a lot of potential, but the writing is so heavy-handed that the message falls flat on its face.As far as the plot is concerned there are a lot of good ideas, but watching the finished product is like a slow-motion train wreck. Nothing ends-up coming together. It doesn't matter if you have any good ideas for your movie if they aren't executed well. For example, there is this one gatekeeper-type character that keeps banging-on about "the rules" sporadically throughout the movie, but this never ends-up coming to anything and is left as one of many loose ends.Most of the actors seem to be phoning it in for most of the film, which is particularly sad because there are a few people in this movie that working their hardest at giving a good performance.All the shots are the same cookie-cutter bore: close up of the singer, cut to carnival audience, back to singer, slowly pan up from ground, repeat. This movie is "safe"--it takes no risks and gets nothing back from the audience as a result.The music all sounds the same and the lyrics are not clever nor engaging. Rocky Horror Picture Show is a masterpiece of film, and I actually feel bad for having to compare it to this nonsense. Rocky Horror was clever and energetic--Devil's Carnival is just plain boring, with immediately forgettable song-writing and lacking any "spirit" of its own."The Devil's Carnival" is a terrible movie. Good makeup and good ideas are completely overshadowed by clunky writing, samey lyrics, unremarkable songs, and terrible acting and execution. Give it a miss.

Before I say anything this should be known. DO RESEARCH. Terrance Zdunich does NOT write for a main stream audience. This movie doesn't cater to a wide audience because it was not created for one. It was created because Zdunich wanted to make it. I found the use of Aesop's Fables clever. I found that the lack of character development was purposeful. Most characters didn't even have names but titles. Which I found effective. There wasn't much of a plot. That's because it was Aesop's Fables. What is my problem with the film though? Too short.. Though I am more okay with this because this is a trilogy which in my opinion excuses the brevity. The movie is chaos because its a carnival in hell and I think a lot of people miss that point. Is this movie great? no. Is it worthy of a 1 or 3 star rating? GOD NO. The film is just really okay. Nothing more but nothing less.