adonis98-743-186503 Long ago in the Iron Age, a shadow loomed over a lonely village. For generations, the village youths are stolen from their families and delivered as sacrifice to a mythical beast - the Minotaur that dwells beneath a great palace. Theo, haunted by the loss of his love in an earlier sacrifice is convinced that the beast isn't real, and that his girl still lives as a slave within the palace. Minotaur was one heck of an awful low budget film, the creature looked better than usual but still not good enough, the perfomances were horrible especially Tom Hardy's and the film was more on the romantic side than the horror one that it needed. Definitely one hell of a horrible horror sci-fi movie. (0/10)

Scott LeBrun In an ancient time and place ("Minotaur" was filmed on location in Luxembourg, both interiors and exteriors), people that tended towards "hedonism and greed" needed a god that was somehow more tangible, one of flesh. So they contrived one by impregnating their Queen, who gives birth to this thing. Naturally, things get way out of control, and soon a regular requirement of sacrifices of the young comes about to keep the beast in check. One young man, Theo (Tom Hardy of "Layer Cake", "RocknRolla", "Bronson", and "Inception", etc.) is led to believe that a lost love of his, a past sacrifice to this thing, is still alive so he agrees to take on the challenge of determining if the Minotaur is really so much of a "god" and can actually be killed. Normally, when we watch stuff like this, we expect a lot of silliness and a lot of cheese and know not to take it terribly seriously. "Minotaur", however, which is inspired by Greek mythology, does go out of its way, for a while, to keep these elements at bay and deliver a somber, moody, foreboding kind of tale - and it works pretty well. Granted, before too long, the mostly inane characters cease to maintain any sort of interest and it becomes tedious watching these people get picked off. The actors who come off the best are Tony Todd (not surprisingly), who's magnetic as usual even if there's a definite feel of Candyman to his performance, and the absolutely luscious Michelle Van Der Water as the sister to Todd's character (one fun kinky touch is that Todd loves her more than as just a sibling, which doesn't exactly sit well with her), who's tired of the senseless deaths and tries to defy him. The actors playing the would be victims don't have enough to work with to register very strongly, but there is the attraction of seeing some veterans in the form of Rutger Hauer (whose disappearance from the story is rather disappointing) and the legendary, sultry Ingrid Pitt, who's actually unrecognizable, buried under heavy makeup, as the cave dwelling Leper. The creature gets a reveal sooner than this viewer would have liked, but it's reasonably impressive - big, bad, and ugly, and done with both digital and practical effects. There's some nastiness for gore hounds, although a lack of real detail (there's too much stuff taking place off screen, for one thing) will likely leave them less than satisfied. Not exactly that good, but not all that bad either; it may amuse the genre fan who doesn't demand too much from what they watch. Six out of 10.

bluemagus I've got a bit of history with the SciFi original movies, I used to watch them all the time whenever there was absolutely nothing on TV, and nine times out of ten that was the case. But I saw previews for this movie and said to myself "that looks interesting, I think I'll watch it." I think the SciFi channel(now re-titled SyFy and they're constantly ridiculed for it)has a lot of problems with their original movies. Whenever they have to create an original idea, well you get stuff like Dark Relic, Riverworld, Ice Spiders etc. But then there are movies like The Wraiths of Roanoke, which is pretty damn good if you ask me, Abominable, which I regard as one of the best Bigfoot movies ever even if the Monster looks goofy. Minotaur if you ask me is one of the HIGHLY superior original movies. It does move a little too fast in the beginning and it's not really all that intriguing but when you have Tony Todd play a villain things always get more interesting. The characters in this movie are all likable to some extent, well okay maybe not the screamer girl but to her credit she does have a Lesbian scene for what it's worth. The story in this movie is a retelling of Thesius but done in the way a Monster movie is. That's kinda genius, sure I can talk all day about how the Minotaur from Greek Mythology doesn't look a thing like the one in the movie, in fact the movie Minotaur is more like a big ass bull with a skull face than anything, and he's supposed to be half man/half bull. But I can forgive that because the special effects the use for him are surprisingly top notch.I don't know why it has such a low score on IMDb, I'm guessing it's more critics whining about what they think it should be or something, when you get to the bare bones of this movie(if you watch it that joke is actually kinda funny) is this. It's a monster movie version of Thesius, you really can't do any better than what we have here.

Paul Andrews Minotaur is set many 1000's of years ago in an age when the world was ruled by a dark empire from an island palace called Minos, these people worshipped the most powerful of all Gods the Bull. In a horrible act of worship the Queen (Shiva Gholamianzedah) offers herself to the God & is impregnated with a hideous Bull like creature called the Minotaur which she gives birth too, every 3 years 8 youths from the village of Thena are taken to Minos to be sacrificed to the Minotaur & that time has come once again. The ruler of Thena Cyran (Rutger Hauer) has a son named Theo (Tom Hardy) whose girlfriend Ffion (Donata Janietz) was taken 3 years ago, Theo hears that she may still be alive so in an effort to find out he makes sure he is one of the 8 sacrifices who have to face the horrors of the Minotaur & it's labyrinth...This English, German, Luxembourg, French & Spanish co-production was co-produced & directed by Jonathan English & while it isn't going to win any awards Minotaur turned out to be a lot better than I had originally anticipated. The script by Nick Green & Stephen McDool takes itself very seriously & even though it's based on the Greek legend of Theseus & the Minotaur it actually bears little resemblance to it in truth, the film moves along at a nice enough pace, it never bores to the extent where you feel like switching off, the character's are pretty good even if most of them don't do much, the dialogue is alright & the Minotaur itself is a pretty impressive beast. There's some nudity, there's some gore, there's lots of special effects & the story isn't too bad either. Don't get me wrong, Minotaur isn't any sort of masterpiece, far from it in fact but it's a decent watchable & quite fun sci-fi horror film that overall impressed me more than I thought it would. However I did feel a bit sorry for the Queen, I mean she lets herself get impregnated with a deformed bull creature & what thanks does she get? None, they cut it out of her with a knife & let it feed on her blood, now that's gratitude for you.Director English does OK, the MTV style quick cuts & shaky camcorder syndrome are thankfully absent here & you can actually see what's going on at all times which is nice. The film has a decent enough atmosphere to it as it's shot in nice golden candle lit hues & tones while the period setting is well realised. The special effects are surprisingly impressive here, the CGI computer effects are excellent in fact & the Minotaur looks the absolute business even though those looking for a faithful representation of the half man/half Bull Greek myth may be disappointed. The puppet effects are also very good, the two techniques are used well together & compliment each other. There's some gore here but not much, most of the gore consists of the Minotaur impaling people on it's horns although there's a fair amount of blood splatter as well.I was somewhat surprised to see this had a healthy sounding budget of about $7,000,000, I must admit that sounds like a lot of money for what ends up on screen impressive special effects apart. It's certainly well made with good production values but seven big ones? Not that you would know but Minotaur was actually shot in Luxembourg. The acting is OK, genre favourite Tony Todd has put on some weight since his Candyman (1992) days, Rutger Hauer is here for rent money & Ingrid Pitt is unrecognisable under lots of warts & wrinkles playing an ugly old woman while babe Michelle Van Der Water provides the good looks.Minotaur is a decent creature feature with some nice gore & impressive special effects, it won't change your life but it's an entertaining way to pass 90 odd minutes. Certainly better than I expected & better than most creature features such as Python (2000), Crocodile (2000) or Cerberus (2005) to name but three...