Guardian of the Realm (2004)

Why so much hype?

Save your money for something good and enjoyable

Admirable film.

Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

"Guardian of the Realm" is a digitized mess with a few pretty decent moments.**SPOILERS**A year after being resurrected, demon-possessed Nikki, (Lana Piryan) is on the loose and is being targeted by Josh Griffin, (Glen Levy) an agent for a special police task force that deals with demons loose in the world. Another agent, Alex Marlowe, (Tanya Dempsey) arrives to help out the case, which she feels is connected to a recent robbery of occult merchandise in the area. With agents Roger Bannon, (Tom Seymour) and Max Patterson, (Robin Raedeke) giving them help, and a vicious crime spree from a gaggle of loose demons terrorizes the city. Trying to get a lead on the stolen artifacts, they manage to come upon a special sect that is connected by to Nikki and her gang of followers. Launching a round of retaliation, the demons strike back and lure the agents into a series of traps and are able to take out most of the field agents as well as themselves. Making a last-ditch effort, the remaining agents gather their arms and begin a war against them before they are able to harvest their powers and take control of the dimension.The Good News: This wasn't as bad as it could've been. One of the best points is that there's a lot of action in here with a lot of confrontations between the sides. There's a whole large amount of gunfights in here, and the several in the warehouse near the end are quite thrilling. The few fistfights are quite acceptable, and the main fight between four demons manages to look quite good for the kind of film this is. Between these and the several other main fights in here, this one manages to stay pretty quickly paced and manages to remain watchable throughout due to it's pace. The demons here aren't that badly done, with traditional distorted features, fang-lined jaws and the emphasis on a certain facial feature to the point of parody. This one has the eyes, and they look creepy at first but become a little comical after awhile, which makes them look funny. The last really big plus is that there's a really high body count, which allows for some great kills in here. There's several that have their chest torn open and have their hearts removed, another has their face broken and smashed completely in, another has a dagger thrown into their chest, a stomach and chest is brutally ripped and clawed open and the most violent one, where a sword is slammed into a head vertically and stops at the neck, slicing the head open. That's not to include the non-violent ones as broken necks and off-screen ones come into play as well. The twist involving the one main character is a complete shock that makes perfect sense but comes out of left-field, but otherwise that's about it for the film.The Bad News: There's only one really big thing in this one that doesn't work. This is the absolutely cheesy and terrible looking CGI used in the film. This has no real chance of impressing anyone with how terrible it looks. Several affects scenes, including any time a victim is set on fire or have any sorts of wounds on them are rendered in computer effects so bad that the digitized pixels are quite easily visible as it's so obvious that's how they were created. That this is done for every single instance manages to take the viewer out, as there's no possible way to overlook this. They look absolutely terrible, and will in no way convince anyone they are anything more than what they are. That it continues throughout the entire film for practically anything that requires a special effect, be it wounds, background or enhancement of demon-makeup, the CGI is used and it's terrible and quite distracting. There's a few other little flaws in this one, but that terrible, low-grade CGI is what's going to be the main focusing point of hatred for this film.The Final Verdict: This is a pretty hard one, as those who are going to be put off by it's one big flaw will use that as the excuse not to get into it at all. It's still watchable despite it, so if you can overlook that huge flaw, give it a shot as it's not that bad outside of a stylistic choice that really hurts the film.Rated R: Graphic Violence, Graphic Language, Nudity and a mild sex scene

I bought GUARDIAN OF THE REALM because I know the special effects supervisor Tom Seymour. I have to admit that I'm proud of the St. Louis natives Tom, Ted Smith and Wyatt Weed for crafting an entertaining film. It had humor, good makeup, limited but effective fight scenes and decent sound effects and music. The actors did a fair job with the material, which avoided most clichés. Glen Levy was a real surprise with his charm and humor, but especially good in his fight choreography. The armored demon was impressive, but overall, the set design and props were excellent. You can't expect too much for a movie of this nature, and the makers stretched the budget to the limits. You can tell that they love the genre, and for the most part, it was artfully done.

Guardian is what I always looked and hoped for when I was as kid - a buried treasure, a hidden surprise. Remember when you took a chance and rented those films with the questionable covers, and nine out of ten times, you got burned? Not this time. Guardian is obviously a labor of love, by people who love the movies, and that love, passion, and fun shows in every frame of it. Yes, the flick is low-budget, but it does amazing things with what amounts to pro-sumer equipment that most anyone has access to. Young filmmakers, take note: you will spend many viewings trying to figure out how they did some of this stuff. Most films operating at this level are simple dramas with talking heads, or make no attempt at large-scale stunts or effects, but not the guys who made this flick - they went nuts. Check out the references to Johnny Quest, Anime, Mad Max, Chop-Socky, Ghostbusters, South Park, and if you look very closely, even Blade Runner! Never mind all of that, however - just enjoy the flick. Glen Levy is charming and aerodynamic, Tanya Dempsey gives a star-making performance and is one of the most beautiful actresses to come along in a long time, and Lana Piryan is dead-sexy, with an accent that makes you really not care if you get possessed by a demon or not. The rest of the supporting cast is either funny, handsome, or sexy, and the plot, although a bit derivative of other things, is very well constructed, and some of the dialogue is quite funny. There is a gag involving a bottle of ketchup that has to be seen to be believed.Guardian may be the first low-budget, indie feature that I have seen try a "Hollywood" style approach to everything, instead of hedging its' bets every step of the way. Not perfect by any means, but the best "B" flick I've seen in a long time, and hopefully not the last feature that Ted Smith will make. "Stay sharp - like a razor."

Saw this at a St. Louis film festival. The movie is sort of a cross between "Men in Black" and "Buffy the Vampire Slayer". The timing seemed a bit off, especially in the dialogue - you are aware of discreet events and lines being delivered rather than a consistent flow. The martial arts and swordplay were good, but their ability with guns was not even near the same level. You would expect super demon hunting agents to be good with all their weapons, right? At the end of the movie there were some computer generated special effects that were noticeably pixelated. Also noticeable were sound effects that were identical to those in some popular video games. One last thing that stuck out to me was a house, supposedly in LA, that had "Gateway Security" - a St. Louis firm if the giant Gateway Arch logo was any indication. Despite all this, still a good movie, especially if you enjoy the genre.