akudiva
It was thrilling to watch 4 the first 10 minutes. But it went downhill for the next 1 hour 10 minutes.
Yes it was nice from 'fantasy' point of view. Yet it failed viewers frm reality stance. I was left baffled with how this movie effectively made the entire enforcement bodies such as police and detectives looked like a complete fool, or useless.
Those murders were poorly premeditated and should have left trails all over the place with DNAs, CCTV evidence, chatroom conversations etc!!! How he got away with it was beyond my comprehension. How this movie won awards, certainly beyond my imagination.
Not 2 mention the way that rope dancer running away frm the train station to the car park while she should have called the police with her mobile phone have made this movie looked far more idiotic. This movie should have its title changed to 'Scary Movie 6'
michaeltrivedi
I have been giving out a lot of 7's lately, so I am going to purposefully give this a 6. It definitely has it's boring points, but it depicts a serial killer in Los Angeles, bored with ordinary life. I can't really say it's a good movie, but it does it's job. It was fun to watch, but it wouldn't even be in my top 10 random horror movies to watch on a random Wednesday night.6 Stars
lojitsu
A-Z Horror Movie of the Day..."Maniac" (R - 2012 - US)Sub-Genre: POV/SlasherMy Score: 7.3Cast=6 Acting=9 Plot=7 Ending=8 Story=7 Scare=7 Jump=5 F/X=8 POV=8 Blood=8As he helps a young artist with her upcoming exhibition, the owner of a mannequin shop's deadly, suppressed desires come to the surface. "Please don't scream. You're beautiful." The opening scene of this film is one of the best I have ever watched in the genre!! After that, it kind of levels off and never peaks again. The POV scenes were really well done and Elijah Wood was great in his role. I did not see the original, so I can't say how this one compares as a remake. As a standalone horror film, however, this is well worth a watch!!
Leofwine_draca
MANIAC is an unwanted remake of the classic Joe Spinell video nasty of the same name from 1980, a film about a psychopath with a habit of scalping women. This new version follows exactly the same story (right down to the horrific nightmare climax) with 'improved' CGI gore effects over the original, although I have to say they're nowhere near the quality of the much-remembered Tom Savini prosthetic effects work.In any case, this is an incredibly dark odyssey of murder and madness. I thought the material would have been watered down but this is just as grisly and depressing as the original. There's plenty of reason to watch, not least Elijah Wood who makes a good psychopath (as he did in SIN CITY); the whole film is shot through the killer's point of view which gives things an edgy, fresh feel. I loved the use of music and cinematography throughout, which reminded me of Refn's style in DRIVE, so it's a little bit of a shame that the story is so unrelentingly dark and miserable. I'd love to see an action or martial arts film done in this same POV style, though.
AD
