Static (2008)

Best movie of this year hands down!

Very Cool!!!

Thanks for the memories!

It’s not bad or unwatchable but despite the amplitude of the spectacle, the end result is underwhelming.

This is one of the very worst films I've seen in a very long time – and when, like me, you watch bad movies on a regular basis, you know the film is in trouble. Originally titled GLITCH but re-named STATIC for UK release, the re-titling is very apt, I think. This is an altogether static film, where nothing happens for the entire running time. The actors sit or stand in static poses, the camera is always static, and the plot itself is a non-moving thing.The story had potential, reminding me of the Stephen King novel Cell in some ways: mobile phone head implants cause people to go crazy. But the tale never goes anywhere, aside from a very lacklustre confrontation with a 'villain' at the climax. Until then, it's just people yapping away, with the extra low budget so obviously evident from the way in which any key scenes of movement or action are cut away from. Things are so bad that there's only one action scene – a fight between the hero and a corrupt cop, in which the cop gets his head slammed into a car. This takes place at the end, but it's nonsensically repeated at the beginning in an attempt to win the viewer's attention. A really bad idea, as it just shows how diabolical the rest of the movie is.The cast have been imported from Canada and I dare say they'd be okay if they were given a chance to act, but they can't help but come off the worst for this. One guy swears all the time for no reason, as if he's wandered out of a Tarantino set, or maybe the filmmakers were trying to inject a little more event into their production. There are NO special effects, aside from some trickles of fake blood running from noses and some taser use at the film's conclusion. The problem is that it's just so BORING! An endless procession of boring scenes, nothing happening, right until the end. Okay, so this is a TV movie, so what did I expect? Nevertheless even the diabolical television movies on the Sci Fi Channel are better than this rubbish. Director Randy Daudlin is an effects and makeup man, and he should stick to what he's good at.

This is bad in all the ordinary ways. The idea is bad and the general setup. The science is bad.But many of the background characters are worthwhile. The usual pattern for these cartoony projects is to have the main characters operate in an environmental sea of props and secondary characters who are little more than props. If you innovate with the main characters in some way, you never tinker with the background; the more familiar it is, the better.This confounds that approach, because the secondary characters are pretty well drawn and interesting.We have the brother of one of the three main characters. He's a huge, taciturn Baby Huey who has brain damage from combat in Iraq. We have the father of another character, someone written with some sensitivity to the fact that he is a failed neurophysiologist. Though we hardly would need a skilled brain surgeon for the story because so many fundamental necessities are elided, we are provided with one. He has lost his license for substance abuse. That's boring, but everything else about him is pretty interesting — even the set dressing of his cabin. The plot has his handiwork going awry implicitly because of his work with wolves. So if you find yourself stuck in this, look around.Ted's Evaluation -- 1 of 3: You can find something better to do with this part of your life.

I'm still trying to work out what this movie is called (Glitch or Static?), but either way it's actually a pretty good TV movie. About the only lame part of the movie is the credit sequence, which has an early 90s look to it. Other than that, things are pretty good, considering. The characters generally have more of a realistic, down-to-earth feel to them rather than typical Hollywood cardboard cutouts.It did get a little Hollywood-ish near the end with the 'bad guy', but all up the movie held my interest more than I expected.Definitely worth giving a go.