The Last Seven (2010)

Please don't spend money on this.

Perfect cast and a good story

If the ambition is to provide two hours of instantly forgettable, popcorn-munching escapism, it succeeds.

While it is a pity that the story wasn't told with more visual finesse, this is trivial compared to our real-world problems. It takes a good movie to put that into perspective.

This is one of those movies where you are drawn in by an intriguing concept, slowly making you wonder how it all fits together. It then proceeds to annoy you by failing to deliver on it's premise, which soon wears thin. Confusingly marketed as post apocalyptic, this movie quickly grows dull as soon as a man walks around the empty streets of London for fifteen minutes before anything happens. The seven people don't meet up until halfway through the film, by which I had lost all interest.It got worse when the 18 rating seemed to promise many startling, gory moments, yet nothing in the film comes close. It fails to be scary when it should, with only a few scenes being even remotely tense. What I was led to expect was a terrifying post apocalyptic horror with suspense elements, yet what I got was one of the most half assed efforts in recent movie history. This is only made worse when the demonic presence hunting the seven is actually an angel taking them into the afterlife, which removes any intensity the movie had to begin with. The worst part was that even after all of the story is connected, much is left that doesn't make sense. This is made worse still by unnecessary religious imagery that does nothing to advance the already nearly nonexistent plot. It does keep a nicely creepy atmosphere, yet too little happens for this to remain effective.In all, The Last Seven is a boring, confusing movie lacking decent plotting, acting, gore effects and scares, ruining an amazing premise with inept direction and a nonsensical script. This does get a 3 because it does have a few genuinely tense scenes and a story that makes you feel great to be able to piece together. Another strength is that despite it's post apocalyptic premise, it doesn't go for the obvious and predictable. Maybe, one day, this premise could be made into something worthwhile. Overall, it isn't the worst thing ever made, but considering the cast, premise and ideas behind it, it should have been much better.Also, this movie should have been 15, or 12 without language. Nothing in here is really harsh or violent.

Seen some reviews that criticise the locations used or how easy it would be to use the locations due to weekend filming etc - what the hell does that have to do with the film ? Yes some of the actors are wooden and poor, however the story and plot is excellent - i'd compare this to the brilliant early 2000's John Cusack film 'Identity' - rather than the usual mindless violence (& yep I love that as much as the next guy) this movie makes you think - you have to think about previous scenes etc but the excellent use of flashbacks (& later realised 'flashforwards') it all fits into place. Occasionally movies should be about making you think and not just being dumb spit dribblers - I love the all action movies but occasionally some thought provoking movies don't go amiss. As for Danny Dyer - he's had his critics for generally portraying a mindless football hooligan etc, however his brief involvement in this does show more to his ability. Guys if you're going to grab a DVD for a night in with the other half, give it a try - but make sure you do a little homework first, it's not a zombie / action / horror / etc etc film - it requires some thought and raises some discussion points - be prepared !!!! All in all I'd watch it again (and have done so) - if you want other thought provoking movies grab 'Moon' as well - another well under rated movie that deserves more.

Reading the synopsis I had quite high hopes for this movie which was rapidly vanishing after the first 15 minutes which consisted of a bloke walking around the deserted streets of London's financial district. The long drawn out fifteen minutes of nothingness may impress someone who has never walked those same central London streets at Dawn on a Sunday morning but it doesn't really work for someone who has. I got the distinct impression the makers were trying to force a point here which went way past its premise of a deserted major City. The obviousness of it had me concerned for the rest of the movie.Eventually our lone walker meets up with a trio, and they meet up with another trio and from there on in there's a lot of long drawn out scenes with intermittent quick flash editing that was intended to scare or intrigue. Im not really sure which but it didn't work.While I have no doubt most of the seven cast have decent acting abilities, their performances were wooden. Mind you its not as if they had anything meaty to really bounce off so those performances were really down to the directors vision. You cant just put some people in front of a camera, give them some lines and hope for magic, particularly with a movie like this which should provoke the audiences senses. Then again a number of lines in the script are quite appalling, as if they were written by a secondary school drama club. But surely the director must have known those lines were just plain bad and could have done something about them.For me the movie just plodded along until it came to a point where I was jeering for it to end. I had twigged on quite early their particular circumstance but how it lead to that I didn't know until the very end, so I do give the makers some points for that. In general though it was a rather garbled affair. Yes, it has a sense of continuity but it wasn't glued together very well. Its a movie that may very well have looked just smashing on paper, but hasn't translated so well to the screen.As indie movies go it is by no means the worst, far from it. Its shot quite well, does have some atmosphere, and can keep you interested. If you haven't seen something in this genre before it may well keep you very interested. But I've seen a lot of these psychological horrors flicks and this one falls short of the mark. Compared to another one I reviewed 'The Broken' now there's a movie that really gets to you on a psychological level. One of the death scenes in that movie still makes me feel uncomfortable a year after watching it. There no gore, its just incredibly moving? or disturbing? I cant really describe what it is. If The Broken cant scare you nothing will.I cant recommend the movie and I cant not recommend it. As I said, if you haven't seen this type of flick before you may very well enjoy it.

I found this to be an enjoyable film, well acted, filmed and with an intriguing story which takes some time to develop and also to fully comprehend.The scenes showing a London devoid of people were amazingly well done and set the tone and feel of the film rather well.This film did however, in my opinion, seem to borrow heavily from two other films, 28 Days Later and the New Zealand film entitled The Quiet Earth. To be fair, any film set in London where the population has disappeared is going to inspire comparisons to 28 Days Later.If you are looking for an action based film like 28 Days Later you will be disappointed, this film centers around the effects on survivors rather than horror, although there is an underlying threat ever present throughout the film.The ending contained a little bit of a twist but it made sense when taken into context with the rest of the film. In conclusion, I would happily watch this again.