Review: Under the Mountain

Under the Mountain is underwhelming. The first truly disappointing movie that I've watched in 2010. Oh, wait, I saw Lu Pikirlah Sendiri in 2010 as well. Boy, do I wish I could get back my afternoon...

I am a massive fan of the supernatural/fantasy genre... especially if there's a horror twist to it... like Lord of the Rings, Spiderwick, Harry Potter, Eragon, Golden Compass etc...

First saw the trailer for this movie when I was watching The Wolfman... I was so excited to go see it... for a number of reasons...

1) Fire wielding twins

2) Some sort of zombie creature as the villains

3) Volcanoes

Who would not want to watch this right? Okay, maybe some people won't want to but I was looking forward to it...

So when this movie was released, I went to Pavilion to go see it. With a colleague...

THE GOOD

1) The storyline... fireraisers, Wilberforces, Gargantuas, Twin-ness... nice touch...

2) The actors that play the twins and the comic relief cousin...

3) Luscious views of New Zealand

THE BAD

1) The storyline... a bit draggy and forced at times...

2) Sam Neill has the same look on his face throughout the movie... (maybe he's thinking "What the hell am I doing in this movie?")

3) The villains are lame

4) Not enough fighting... and definitely no big battle at the end before the heroes emerge victorious...

The movie itself is not a bad production but the bad points dragged its level of enjoyment down quite a lot. I think it would have worked better as a TV movie. Or a miniseries. Yes, miniseries where they can expand on a lot of things and have the twins battle it out more or even have the Gargantua rise or something.

But I think we're spoilt for choices already in this day and age so Under The Mountain seemed tame compared to all those other movies.

I do think if they were to make it more fight-y and less kiddy, the movie would have improved leaps and bounds and would have satisfied the supernatural buff within. :)