Tremors with a great twist If you remember the movie "Tremors" staring Kevin Bacon, you will like this movie. It is a rather another version of underground "creatures" but are much more gruesome than those in the other movie. Set in the froniter day, just like a certain sequal, this movie seperates itself in a couple of aspects, first because the native americans know of these creatues and have even already given them a name and secondly the creatures are way more out of this world. The design concept of the creatures is outstanding and the way the director intermingles them with the actors is done magnificently. The acting is above average, the down side is that the movie becomes pretty predicatble and the ending is somewhat the same as most of these types of movies. It does have plenty of moments of brilliance and is worth watching, however, if you are looking at this as a true horror movie, then you will be disappointed, it is more of a thirller movie.
Monsters Meet Cowboys/Cavalry/Indians This monsters meet Cowboys/Cavalry/Indians movie was disappointing.
Good Points
1. Good film backdrop. The surrounding scenery was as dead looking, desolate and as ugly as the monsters.
2. Several characters were likable such as the forlorn love lost cowboy looking for his girl, the young cowboy and the black ex-slave cowboy starting his life over.
Bad Points
1. At the start of film a family of 1 man, 2 women and 2 children run and hide in a cellar while 1 man stays behind to fight. The wooden cellar door has obvious cracks and those hiding can clearly see the sky/stars. They also hear the scuffle and the man left above screaming in agony and fear. The viewer cringes at the obvious stupidity of the hiding people who instead of shutting off their lantern instead allow the light to SHINE up into the night through those cracks to pinpoint their exact hiding place.
2. The young cowboy taking the paralyzed girl (from toxin the monsters gave her) removes her from the wagon so both of them could sleep far apart on the hard cold ground with no blankets and a fire. It would have made more sense to sleep in the wagon close to each other for body heat and safer also monster or no monsters . With the horses still hooked up to the wagon and them laying in the wagon bed, if the monsters attacked, the spooked horses would have warned them awake giving the cowboy time to jump to the seat and get the horses to run. The horses may have bolted away on their own also so all the cowboy had to do was crawl from the bed to the seat and grab the reins (loosely tied to the seat). Either way, they get away. But then the point of the movie was to have them laying on the ground so the monsters could get to them easier since they are ground burrowers and are not very tall or built to climb into a high wagon bed, or chase a wagon pulled by horses.
3. Film Inconsistency #1: The Burrowers are supposed to bury their victims alive and eat them only after decomposition has begun. Yet on several occasions, including the young cowboy (fingers moving as being eaten), the cowboy on the fallen log (actually screaming while being eaten) and the young paralyzed girl, the victims are eaten alive.
4. Film Inconsistency #2 When forlorn cowboy leaves his shot in leg cowboy friend and 2 Indians for help, he is seen riding off with TWO horses. But, later is seen traveling towards the Army camp with just one horse. What happened to the 2nd horse?
5. The army and the cowboys grab the first Indian they find in this vast wasteland and torture him by cutting off his testicles (? Couldn't watch this scene) to get him to say where the 'kidnapped" family was when the army had no clue if this Indian was even involved in the kidnapping. The cowboys stood around and let it happen and only the black cowboy had the heart to try to feed the Indian.
6. The forlorn cowboy acted stupidly by bringing back the army (when he knew what happened to the first Indian #5) to "help" the uninjured female Indian (they captured her but she helped them anyway to save herself), the male Indian injured while trying to kill the cowboys but who saved all their lives by telling forlorn cowboy how to kill the creatures and the black cowboy who was accidentally shot in the leg. I KNEW watching this film that if he didn't find a settler family or Indian family to help them and brought back the army, the army would kill the Indians. Sure enough the next scene is the 2 Indians hanging side by side from a tree. The forlorn cowboy knew the army doctor was little more than a quake so there was nothing they could do for the injured Indian anyway. Logically, he should have told the 2 Indians to stay put and left them one of the 2 remaining horses. The injured cowboy and forlorn cowboy could have ridden out on the last horse for help. If the Army was all the help they could find, then forlorn should have secretly ridden back with food/water to at least give the Indians a chance at life. In retrospect, the black cowboy didn't fare so well under the army either as they killed him cutting off his leg. The only person who benefited from getting the army was the forlorn cowboy.
7. All the decent people died in this film except the forlorn cowboy. It would have been a nice touch to see that arrogant cruel army leader eaten by the monsters and some of his cruel men with him.
8. Lame rather abrupt ending.
Awesome western creature flick! Finally, another western horror to enjoy once again, and this one is very a interesting creature flick in the huge world of horror films! To a lot of people, this flick reminds them of 'TREMORS', another creature feature dealing with monsters that seek underground as a way of shelter and hunting their prey. To me, I can see why most think that but I mostly think of it to really be its own horror story. I feel the same way about 'The THAW' and how so many people think its a rip-off to 'The THING', but I wont go into all that much further since it has nothing to do with 'The Burrowers' haha. I just love the time this story takes place in and the pace isn't too bad. The ending for me is a real payoff! I LOVE how the creators behind this film decided to choose puppeteering and old school makeup effects instead of the low-budget, cheesefest CGI that we the audience are mostly dealt with in with viewing these low-budget horror films these days! Way to go on that!!!! The creatures are fantastic! I would of gave it five stars but it did take awhile to see these awesome creatures come on screen. The story is a little slow for my taste but I could easily enjoy watching it again with family and friends. Amazing Indie Horror Film From my review in RedFence Magazine:
"The cinematography in this piece achieved a level far beyond most indie fodder. Likewise, the filmmakers have fashioned fresh dialog, true characters, and time-period detail without succumbing to stodgy, history-spouting caricatures. J.T. Petty wrote a daring plot, opting for a series of late-night suspense sequences rather than the normal sweeping flow of most Westerns. This keeps the audience lost in the dark, placing them inside the exhausted heads of the main characters as they fight a losing battle, night after night.
On the whole, this film may be too bleak for its own good. When a Native American reveals that the burrowers eat human flesh because the settlers depleted their normal supply of buffalo, the film turns into a not-so-subtle metaphor for Manifest Destiny, and I found it hard not to squirm with physical and philosophical discomfort as the burrowers crept through the tall grass to claim their victims.
With modern audiences moving away from darker fair, and the constant battle for ticket sales that Westerns have fought since the 1970s, it's no wonder The Burrowers dug itself deep to the bottom of the DVD clearance pile at Wal-Mart.
But it's a shame. When great underground films stay below the surface, we're left with the hollow reboots and remakes that live in the neon lights of sprawling, corporate mega-plexes."Interesting Idea... This one has one thing going for it and that's its setting. The horror western is a virtually unsuccessful genre with few entries of note save "Curse of the Undead" and "Ravenous". The creatures are fascinating but highly derivative of the alien in "Xtro", sort of like Linda Blair's backwalk down the stairs in "The Exorcist" or the quickly glimpsed creature from "In The Mouth of Madness". They aren't shown in detail enough and when they are the facial features look a bit crude and unfinished. Worth a look for creature feature fans but some of the acting and characters had all the appeal of a TV miniseries. Always good to see Clancy Brown though... even as a a good guy.
