Killing Ariel (2009)

Surprisingly incoherent and boring

Must See Movie...

It's a good bad... and worth a popcorn matinée. While it's easy to lament what could have been...

Actress is magnificent and exudes a hypnotic screen presence in this affecting drama.

Hi Movieman_Kev. Ariel is a succubus not an incubus (male). Wikipedia explains it well here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Incubus. The only major part that might have been confusing is connecting the number of times the protagonist kills Ariel with the women he supposedly murdered in the "real world". I would also add to the time lapse that follows his weekend tryst with the she-mon. It could have been brought out better with the movie directors showing just how much time had elapsed. I was surprised to learn that the cast are acting unknowns, but they did managed to bring out the story well enough. It's an entertaining piece with a nice twist at the end (the son also falls prey to Ariel). It's a good movie that should be reviewed by more people. I award it an eight.

In the summer of 1933, little Ricky sees his mom kill his father before turning the gun on herself. In the present day, a clearly disturbed Ricky is talking to a psychiatrist about whom he deems truly responsible for his parents' deaths (an incubus), he then proceeds to tell of the events that he witnessed in 1973 (where most of the film takes place). Rick, a happily married insurance agent finds his life unraveling after remembering his past, feeling alienated from his family & deciding to take a peculiar young woman by the name of Ariel on a trip to his childhood home.I've seen worse low-budget horror films, and the plot itself is fairly good. But the film just feels fairly repetitive and I found my interests waning before too long. I kept expecting a 'shocking twist' ending that was going to tie the incoherence of the rest of the film together. But when it did finally come I found it to be trite, silly & easily enough to see coming a mile away. Perhaps if the film spent a tad more time incubating it would've been (somewhat) worthwhile, but as it is the film is half-baked.Eye Candy: Lindsley Allen, Axelle Cummings, Lauren Mary Kim, Nyra & Sukunya Wangsomnuk all get toplessMy Grade: D+DVD Extras: A 25 and a half minute Making-of; and trailers for "Hide", "Pandemic" & "Ghost Image"1 Easter Egg: Highlight 'Killing Ariel' in the extras menu for the film's trailer

I can't believe so few people have seen/rated this movie. Judging from the film's website they're still working on getting proper distribution. That is a shame, because fans of the genre deserve the chance to see this. I consider myself lucky enough to have seen this film, which is quite a rarity for me to say when it comes to horror-thrillers, especially low budget ones such as this.I love horror/thrillers, but come out of almost all of them with general feelings of disappointment. Why? Because all I want is something a little bit original that scares me and is at least a little bit believable. Movies continually fall short on either one or, typically, all of these points. Instead of originality and thrills I get recycled bits of other horror movies, a couple spoonfuls of bad acting, and several buckets of corn-syrup blood. If the budget is low then acting gets worse and is then accompanied by campy effects, bad puns, and bad camera work, all of which eliminate any redeeming qualities of the film. I see this time and time again, and I am happy to say that's not what I saw with Killing Ariel. The fresh premise had me interested from the beginning, the acting - while not Oscar-worthy - is far better than most in this genre, (think Jack Nicholson in "The Shining"), and they didn't try to overcompensate a lack of genuine thrills with gallons of blood, although there was some gore. Also, not once did any of the characters do something that they wouldn't rationally do were they in a similar situation. That is to say there are no, "We're in danger...lets all split up!" moments in this film.While not a perfect 10, the fact that it didn't suffer from the pitfalls that even "blockbuster" horror movies out there suffer from makes me tip my hat to all those involved. I can't even say that I was "pleasantly surprised" by this movie because I hold the same standards to all movies in this genre, regardless of their budget or status. It lived up to what I consider to be reasonable standards: originality, thrills, and believability. (A decent plot and acting helped as well).Simply put, if you like horror/thriller, find a way to watch this movie. You won't regret it.

I saw this movie last night with an invited audience of about 100 people. It started out kind of serious and disturbing. There is a scene where a little boy sees his mother kill his father then herself. If that image doesn't disturb you, the boy gets horrified by a demon seconds later and hides in a closet to be found later by his grandfather. This all happened in the first five minutes of the movie!!!!! The story then jumps forward 25 years to the boy, now an adult, struggling, not with seeing his mother and father killed, but with the reality of his "normal" life. He then meets a young woman who he thought he would have an affair with but she turns him to focus on his tortured mind. The audience didn't know what they got themselves into. They were expecting Horror but got a David Lynch type thriller with all the dark humor and violence akin to the Lynch style. Good going guys!!!!