Prey (2009)

Simply A Masterpiece

There is, somehow, an interesting story here, as well as some good acting. There are also some good scenes

The movie's not perfect, but it sticks the landing of its message. It was engaging - thrilling at times - and I personally thought it was a great time.

The movie really just wants to entertain people.

Six obnoxious friends take a trip across the outback where they stumble across an ancient curse.The utter confusion of Outback's opening scene, which features bad CGI serpents and a naff green-eyed zombie, had me concerned, but I knew that I had picked a total stinker as soon as the film began to introduce its unlikeable central characters using that tired technique of freezing the frame on each person as they are doing something that typifies their personality, applying a distressed filter to the still, and then stamping their name next to them in a grungy typeface. The use of that particular uninspired editing gimmick always sets the alarm bells ringing…But that's just the start of what proves to be one of the most irritating, ill-conceived, poorly directed and generally unfathomable movies that it has ever been my misfortune to see. The novelty editing and directorial affectations continue unabated (split screen, grainy B&W filters etc.), director Oscar D'Roccster clearly under the impression that he's Tarantino, Guy Ritchie, or Robert Rodriguez, and the film only gets more bewildering as time passes, the true nature of the curse never being adequately explained.One-by-one, the horrible characters are bumped off by unknown forces, the lead girl (Natalie Bassingthwaighte) gets sweaty, bloody, takes a shower fully clothed and changes her sexual orientation (!?!?), and the optional extra of a chainsaw on one of the 4x4s comes in extremely handy.

Somehow I was under the illusion that Prey was in some way based on an aboriginal legend... Funnily enough not one aboriginal person was to be seen throughout the whole film. It was by far the worst Australian made film I have ever seen. Not one redeemable feature to be seen and the CGI snakes just topped it all off. Audio quality was slightly better than a cassette recording from the early 80's, which was most helpful in muffling the atrocious dialogue that plagued this drivel from start to finish. Characters were the kind of stereotypes that give stereotyping a bad name, and the only soundtrack that could be mustered was the occasional Rogue Trader's track obviously donated by the hapless lead NatBass. For a budget of $4m++ the producers would have been better off putting the cash into an ING account and at least getting the interest on it - not to mention saving all concerned the embarrassment of having their name to the film. I can only assume that some of the positive posts on this site regarding Prey are the contrived efforts of those responsible for this diabolical abortion of a motion (as in bowel motion) picture. Avoid like syphilis.

This was the best thing about Christmas this year, being stuck in 200 feet of snow and ice in my relative's crummy house in Buffalo for the holidays. My cousin brought the DVD from Sydney, Australia and was going gaga over the lead actress. She didn't know the lead actor was an American, Miami Vice Don Johnson's son. I went into this expecting something like a low budget Aussie Donnie Darko meets Plan 9 from Outer Space and loved it! I don't understand some of the plot lines why these kids all knew each other, but who cares? Stick a bunch of hot looking guys and girls in some aboriginal sacred sight with a nutcase and a curse and chainsaws and aromatherapists and was a lot more enjoyable than Transformers 2 for my money! The music rocked (Ladytron!) and it was pretty funny and there were two pretty good scares though the girls were pretty freaked out most of the way through. The end credits and 'making of' were very funny and all in all the best 90 minutes of Christams 2009!I'm still not sure what exactly what we saw but we're gonna see it again with a living room full of beer!

I have never felt the urge to write a comment on IMDb before because i either like a film and vote or hate it enough to enjoy it and vote and leave it at that. Until i met Prey, that is. This is the most inept piece of film making to come out of Australia since the good old 80s 10ba system was throwing us some trash. there is nothing redeeming about this film and at 76 minutes it has overstayed its welcome by a good 20 minutes. The entire cast is Australian but for reasons never explained, of the 6 people 4 of them are Americans in Australia (you know they're not really because the accents are atrocious). This film, and i call it that loosely, was developed with Film Victoria. How? Why? I cannot comprehend. This is a movie that is begging for a bit of T & A but can't muster the courage to be the blatantly exploitative movie it needs to be. For gods sake you can even see people swearing when the rerecorded voice is trying to cover it up. This is a testament to Australian film-making at the moment. no courage, no balls and no talent. No matter how flawed they may be, indie produced no budget genre fare (like Gabriel, Undead and The Dark Lurking)are at least trying to be a hell of a lot more than the sum of their parts should be, and for the most part they are succeeding. No wonder all these guys are trying to get to the states, and good luck to them i say!