Ferocious (2013)

Absolutely Fantastic

This movie was so-so. It had it's moments, but wasn't the greatest.

It really made me laugh, but for some moments I was tearing up because I could relate so much.

A great movie, one of the best of this year. There was a bit of confusion at one point in the plot, but nothing serious.

The role Kim Coates has been dying to play, I'm sure. Another bad guy. Joke. But seriously, this isn't the regular bad guy. Coates plays someone much more sinister than usual and he clearly has fun with it. The plot has the lead character (Amanda Crew) return to where she was born to see her parents. She's a famous actress and is doing a hometown appearance. The media is all over her. She plays for the camera. She's good at it. But later, she heads to a night club. She's looking for something and we have to guess what it is. It must be important, or why would she go there. I'll confess that I saw it coming a mile away, but there are enough twists to hold my interest. Some of the dialogue stuck out and bothered me. But other than that, I enjoyed the movie. It's small, with only a few characters. But I like that sort of thing. Where everyone has to use their wits to survive. Directed with appropriate tension and good acting.

Leigh is an actress. A famous one by the looks of it. But she still finds time for the fans and to return home. But things are never so perfectly laid out. Darker tones come into play as we learn there may be an ulterior motive in her return home. I'll stop there, but as you can guess, things go wrong, both for her and everyone she comes into contact with. In a way, this is very timely. But sometimes it also feels like it's been done. Not saying it has been done, but that it felt like it had. Ferocious has a small cast and not much of a budget. But there's bang for their buck. Kim Coates steals the show. He's creepy as all get out. The other actors are good too, though I don't know any of them. I'll give it a 6. It's not incredible, but it's better than most thrillers which are increasingly paint by numbers.

I'm a fan of thrillers that take place in one place. Cube, Buried, movies lake that. This is mostly similar as it takes place in a bar in a small town. Lee (Amanda Crew) comes home to where she grew up and has to get something sorted out from before she was a famous actress. She's a TV star. That takes her to the bar where Kim Coats works. Kim Coats is Dennis Hopper good. Could watch this guy all day. It's a creeper pot boiler. Pacing wise, I get what the director was trying to do by pacing it slow. That's a cool thing. BUT, sometimes it's a bit too slow. Matbe a result of lack of budget? I don't know. Could have used a bit more gore. But Kim Coats as the baddie is a no lose scenario.

I've seen many bad movies this year, and this one ranks right up there as one of, if not the worst yet. The wooden acting and dialog along with the incredible plot elements are so unbelievably bad that I found myself laughing and shaking my head in disbelief, most likely at parts that were not supposed to be funny.Amanda Crew stars as Leigh Parrish, a famous and successful TV star, with a very wholesome image, who is returning to her hometown with her manager Callum Beck (Dustin Milligan). She is trying to promote her "good girl" with small town roots image, starting with a local TV interview.Leigh mysteriously cancels a dinner with her parents, packs a large knife in her boot, and sets out from her hotel to a club called Shaker's, which is undergoing reconstruction and set to open soon.We soon find out that the owner of the club Maurice (Kim Coates) has been blackmailing Leigh, as he has possession of a porno tape that she made before she became famous. When Leigh offers him a final large payment to end the extortion he refuses. After things get dangerously nasty, a young woman named Tess (Katie Boland) emerges from the shadows and clobbers Maurice and kills him with a large blunt object to protect Leigh. You see Tess is a terribly devoted fan of Leigh's, and she had been at the club to apply for a job but then when she saw Leigh there followed her upstairs. However, Tess is also totally impulsive, unpredictable, and actually quite "crazy".Without revealing more, let's just say this will lead to a long, long series of events where bloody murder and mayhem will ensue. Other characters come into play as the plot continues. There's Eric (Michael Eklund) who's the manager of the club and not the "brightest bulb" on the block. He's also the former boyfriend of Leigh before she left him to pursue her career.The strangest and most diabolical character of all is Sal, the brother of the slain Maurice, who's also played by Kim Coates. I guess nobody noticed that Sal looks exactly like Maurice, and has the exact same speech and mannerisms. Maybe no one bothered to care.Overall, I felt this film was absolutely terrible with incredible plot machinations and completely non-believable decisions by its' characters. If it was meant as a "campy" joke let's just say I didn't get it.