Fire City: End of Days (2015)

Great Film overall

I enjoyed watching this film and would recommend other to give it a try , (as I am) but this movie, although enjoyable to watch due to the better than average acting fails to add anything new to its storyline that is all too familiar to these types of movies.

A clunky actioner with a handful of cool moments.

An old-fashioned movie made with new-fashioned finesse.

Atum Vine (Tobias Jelinek) is the leader or feeder of a group of demons who live in an LA apartment complex that contains a lot of sin, fear, and misery which feeds the demons. Prostitution, drugs, domestic issues abound which allows the demons to sate. Then one day things change. All the fear and misery is gone. The would-be child rapist is reformed and out looking for a job. The demons are in a panic. They are not allowed to leave the complex, and their food supply is running low.About 70 minutes into the film we find out what happened to cause the change and there is also a twist.The production did a decent job on the make-up. That is what really made the film. Almost all the scenes were in the apartment building which played against the promise of the title "Fire City" a city that didn't play into the movie. Nor is this an end of days film or a battle for Earth. Those expectations will lead to a disappointment. It is about demons in an apartment complex. Human see them as humans, not demons.A decent film for what it was and not for how it was marketed. The film is about overcoming your demons and finally becoming human.Guide: F-word, sex, FF nudity (Kimberly Leemans- Crystal of Walking Dead)

Short version: this movie is a very enjoyable film noir, with an interesting mystery story, using demons as plot attributes. It's not a demon horror action movie.Long version: First off, this movie is weird. Not just in the sense that it's about "weird" stuff like demons, but in that it's a movie trying to mix film noir, mystery, horror, and drama. As I started watching it, I was expecting it to be some crappy demon-horror B-movie, but I've not often been so surprised (and wrong in my initial judgment). I believe the reason for most bad reviews of this movie, is that people were expecting a radically different movie. The best I can describe it is as a film-noir mystery detective demon drama. If that sounds ridiculous to you (and I can't blame you), then you're probably better off watching something different. If instead you're intrigued by this seemingly random combination of genres, you might want to give it a try.I found the script to be surprisingly intelligent, with pretty few plot holes, and after the first "what the f*ck is this?" moment passed, I really got into the story (which I will not spoil). Most of the movie is very bleak (although it has a somewhat happy ending), including domestic abuse, alcoholism, child rape (although that was thankfully only implied, but never shown), etc., so it's probably not suited for the faint hearted. I found the acting to be much better than I expected: not Oscar nomination material obviously, but it was adequate enough. Also the special effects, being mostly the demons' body prosthetics, were quite nice. At times it was clear they were just rubber masks and floppy prosthetics, but I found the designs very elegant and was impressed with the film's visual style. Overall I would say it's very entertaining to watch and very different from what you would expect from something called "Fire city: end of days". I also found it to be thematically intriguing, and most of all a very original combination of different genres. I would give it a solid 7/10, but it gets an extra +1 because it's really much better than the 5/10 it has now on IMDb.If you're going to watch the movie, just keep in mind you'll actually have to pay attention to the story - otherwise it's just going to seem like a strange, confusing, meandering movie. But believe me, it actually does make sense in the end. Just think of it as a film noir that happens to feature demons, rather than a demon movie, and you'll know better what to expect.

The story had some issues and at times reminded me of a late night HBO flick. There were certain aspects I really wish they had cut out and perhaps elaborated a bit more on others. Even though we spend most of our time with the demons, I never really felt close to any of them with the exception of the main character. I'd have liked to have seen more WHY.What really made the film were the costumes. Nightbreed kept popping into my head as I watched. That's something I give a lot of weight to in a film and for the most part, they were done well. Especially when it came to Vine.Another pro of the film for me was the acting. I just kept hoping for a better, more cohesive story.

Despite the low budget of 200 000 USD, I sat through that movie without, checking my watch, composing grocery shopping list or thinking what will my day at work be like tomorrow. I think its original. There were movies about monsters living among humans but usually its different. Here we have a run down apartment building with different monsters/demons living in it, who have a parasitic relationship with other human tenants where they feed of their misery, pain, anger and fear. It was very clever how all monsters see each other as they are but humans see them as normal people, this is actually explained somewhat. But there are many loose ends and unexplained aspects that drag the movie down.The story revolves around a caretaker of the building, Adam, who apparently is a demon who doesn't need to feed on other peoples emotions and has a soft spot for the 11 year old girl who he protects. In turn he brings down the wrath of other supernatural tenants who begin to starve because of his actions.If anything the violence and misery were not shown vividly enough. It should be more drastic. More severe, more bloody. Horrors are meant to be brutal, this one is not so much. Scenes of violence were theatrical and not to real. Hinting that a big black man(very stereotypical) in a dirty wife-beater is going to rape a 11 year old girl, somehow was done is such a way that it wasn't even disturbing. And its not very disturbing when we find out that he did.The movie is almost entirely shot indoors, most likely on the same floor of an apartment building or set that looks like one. Masks and makeup are pretty nice, not computer animated, some clever others like monsters from Power Rangers. That could use improvement.This is not a movie I would recommend for anyone. Geeky audience will find it amusing. Others might not like it. It is not worse than some TV series I seen, so sit back, pop open a beer and take it for what it is.