funkyfresh91 I've been half-asssedly reviewing all the SyFy movies I've been watching, and every once in a while I find real gold- Sands of Oblivion had a great, cheesy story, some goofy characters (although not quite on scale with "Sand Sharks" band of loons), the occasional bit of inspired dialogue amidst plenty of throw-away material. But MORE importantly, the "action" was hilarious, and had some very surreal gore that unless you're giving the movie proper attention to, you're liable to miss. Yea, it's a stupid movie. One that you'll never see outside of the SyFy channel, and maybe never again afterwards. But for those "Wtf just happened" moments, some goofy violence, increasingly poor decisions and that B movie vibe, SandsofOblivion will kill 2 hours, AND give you some attractive people to root for.

mergatroid-1 When I saw this movie in the bargain bin at Wal-Mart I really didn't expect much. However, they did have a couple of actors from Firefly/Serenity and one from Supernatural. Of course George Kennedy is an excellent actor. So, there's no complaint about the acting.The story is pretty good (a movie-set from early 1900s is being rediscovered for relocation before the area it is located in is flooded, however the artifacts are genuine Egyptian artifacts and one allows the release of an ancient Egyptian God. Let the blood flow.) My main beef with this movie is the same old beef people have had about low budget productions since they began filming them. The big monster is once again a guy in a cheesy suit. Of course, people like me who grew up on Dr Who and Star Trek are used to the actor in the cheesy suit syndrome, however I had thought that in the 21st century we would be seeing more cheesy computer effects than cheesy monster suits.This monster suit is as bad as any I have seen. Complete with the stiff lower jaw that moves up and down like, well like a bad movie monster suit.For producers who might per chance be reading this, please spend less money on hotels (you can get tents cheaper), food (I hear snake meat tastes like chicken) and bottled water (hey, just cause the water in the bucket is brown doesn't mean you can't drink it)and put the savings into making your monster look more real. A more realistic monster in this movie would have made the entire production better.Hell, just making the monster headpiece more articulate would have vastly improved the movie.So, if you're the type of person who can enjoy a play with bad effects, then maybe the monster suit won't bother you much and you can enjoy the rest of the movie. I got quite a laugh out of it myself, especially when the monster bit off George Kennedy's arm. It looked like someone had his arm in a stuffed crocodile's jaw, very funny stuff. Of course, I don't think it was MEANT to be funny. The rest of the movie was OK.Once again, for people saying this is the worst movie, or second worse movie they've ever seen, I can only say they haven't seen very many movies. I can pull out 30 or 40 movies from my collection of over 500 that are WAY worse than this movie.To put it into perspective, one day when I'm bored I might pull this DVD out and watch this movie again.

Matthijs This must have been one of the worst movies I have ever seen.I have to disagree with another commenter, who said the special effects were okay. I found them pretty bad: it just wasn't realistic and they were so fake that it just distracted from the actual story.Maybe that distraction is the reason that I did not fully understand the story. The archaeologists are looking for "the set". They do not bother to tell what set, or what is so special about it. That also makes it unclear why they search for it in California, while the intro of the movie takes place in ancient Egypt.If you're shooting a movie that takes place in the desert, take the effort to actually go to the desert. The beginning - the ancient ceremony - looks like it was shot inside a studio instead of a desert.The action-level was constant throughout the movie, no ups and downs, no climax. It made the movie look short, and that's certainly a pro for this particular movie.

pandax Watching the first 30 minutes of Sands of Oblivion gave me high hopes. It seemed I was in for a cheaper version of the Mummy. The setup was promising, in the 1920's Cecil B. Demille makes his opus of the Ten Commandments. It seems in using real Egyptian artifacts for the movie set they unleashed an ancient and terrible evil (don't they always?). Aware of what had been unleashed DeMille orders the entire set buried instead of the usual practice of tearing it down. Hopefully the evil will be buried with it for all time. Then we switch to present day where a team is attempting to excavate the site (the movie's first mistake, but hey those period costumes are expensive and this is a Sci-Fi channel movie). The first sightings we get of the Anubis monster are well done and it's a costume that they put some effort into and not the usual cheesy CG effect. Then the body counts starts. This is were the movie went south for me. The reactions to the fact that people are dying in gruesome and strange ways gets a strangely subdued reaction. Once they realize that the ancient evil has again been unleashed and is on a killing spree what do the stock issue leading man and lady do? They make the usual stop to the "guy who knows the truth but never told anyone". After getting that vital information do they share it with the comrades at the dig site? No, they stop off at a hotel for a refreshing shower and some pleasant small talk. Really I'm not the most motivated person but if I knew a demon from ancient Egypt was on the loose and killing everyone in sight and would be coming after me I'd put a little hustle in my step to solve the problem. After this overlong and pointless middle section they get around to destroying the Anubis monster in the usual way, by racing around in dune buggies and shooting it with a rocket launcher while it's standing by a pile of phosphorous grenades. For a Sci-Fi movie it was above the usual crap they put out, which isn't saying much at all. What disappoints me is this could have been a lot more if someone had wrote a decent script for it.