THE FOREST OF LOST SOULS (2018) Should have stayed lost...Official Review!

Take a good look at the above screenshot. Everything you will get from this film can be gleaned from this single shot.

I am just going to say it...this movie pisses me off! Granted I knew going in that it was a WILD EYE RELEASING (cousin of Uncorkd?) film and that it probably wouldn't be very good. Well friends, it drastically underwhelmed my expectations so greatly that this entire review will be to tell you just WHAT is wrong with it and to get you to avoid wasting 71 minutes of your time. So what is wrong with this movie...plenty! Hell even the running time is a joke. after credits you have a tad more than an hour long film and even THAT is too long. This might of worked as an 8 minute short film...but that's a stretch.

Damn, I know that ring is down there somewhere...

1. BLACK AND WHITE DOES NOT EQUATE TO ART

Sometimes yes, black and white can work to the subject matter as in THE LITTLE GIRL WHO WAS TOO FOND OF MATCHES and THE EYES OF MY MOTHER. But both of those films contained serious drama and raw brutality offset by the soft black and white production. Here it is just drab, plain, film school quality blah...an old grey blanket thrown about with little care to look or feel. In fact the whole thing looks almost too clear, where as black and white should be a mood bringer, source of angst or woe, here it is merely a colorless palette version of a cheap color production.

Oooh that smell...can't you smell that smell...the smell of death (of a movie) around you.

2. BORING BORING BORING

I like sleepers. Slow and absorbing is okay. But good god man, there has to be a point of interest. Something that draws your attention away from staring at the walls (which in this case would be just as exciting). The dialogue is dumb and sparse, the characters are paper cutouts with no dimension and the chemistry between the old man and young woman is non-existent. I tried to garner some feeling for either of them but there's nothing there. Yes it's a forest of lost souls and people commit suicide there yada yada yada. This slow dreck swill is so mind numbingly boring you may want to go check out the forest yourself...for personal reasons!

Sitting on a giant skull, smoking a cigarette in a shrouded forest looks great...but has NOTHING to do with this movie!

3. GIMMICKS DO NOT FOOL DISCERNING VIEWERS

The above poster sums up the gimmick tools that companies like WILD EYE and UNCORK'D use to sucker would be viewers in. Anyone can have a cool poster designed for their movies but good filmmakers put their efforts into the film itself. I would wager that the cost for this promotional poster was more than the entire budget of the movie. We are not children, do not taunt us with treats. Showing us a grade A rib steak before serving us a can of Dinty Moore stew is an atrocity.

Watch the trailer carefully and know that every intense scene in the film has been edited together to craft an experience you will NOT get while watching it. The nods from EW and Newsweek are a joke and most likely were bought and paid for.

4. A PROMISE, BROKEN

I like indie, foreign films. Love them in fact but this one reeks of Wild Eye cajoling the locals to forego their artistic notions and shoestring the budget into something less than watchable. The film is boring, makes little sense and looks like a cheap postcard on glossy paper. What is worse it lessens the appeal of other great foreign efforts in it's shameless grab for a quick buck. I would have given this a 2/5 if it had at least looked like effort was made. As it is, I cannot condone or commend something this shallow and pitiful. And so as I only reserve for the worst of the worst, the cream of the crap this one gets...

0/5 and a middle finger to Wild Eye Releasing.