The Lonely Ones (2006) User Reviews

Passable indie horror outing

[Woodyanders · 5/10 · 16 March 2015]

Nine college student friends decide to lodge at a remote cabin located deep in the woods of Northern Arizona. The group find themselves trapped in a struggle for survival when several ferocious carnivorous creatures lay siege to the cabin.

While writer/director David Michael Quiroz Jr. deserves some praise for developing the characters with admirable depth and complexity as well as for going with the novel premise of flesh-eating ghouls over the usual vampires or zombies (most surprisingly, the ghouls are depicted as a lot more than just the expected vicious and hateful beasts), he alas lets the plot plod along at an often painfully draggy pace and, crucially, fails to generate any much-needed tension or creepy atmosphere. Moreover, the droning piano score proves to be more irritating than effective and the cinematography has an unattractive fuzzy look. Fortunately, Quiroz Jr. does deliver a handy helping of graphic gore along with a few genuinely startling moments of sudden savage violence. In addition, the acting from the competent cast is generally acceptable, with especially solid work from Devanny Pinn as the cunning and duplicitous Tifa, Heather Comforto as the sweet and sensible Rinoa, Jose Rosete as rugged hunter Blake, Vince Reign as the sullen and regretful Cid, Deanna Moraga as the studious Thessaly, Ashley Fisher as the troubled and fragile Mary, and Michael De La Tore as the rowdy Dante. Okay fright fare.

MINOR PLOT SPOILER REVIEW

[nogodnomasters · 4/10 · 17 June 2019]

Cabin in the woods. Cue spinner and we get...ghouls! That is a little different. This is a low budget indie production that takes a decent idea and kills it. It suffers from most of the problems of low budgets. Bad acting and bad dialogue. One scene the dead girl moves her eyes, in another the camera lens was either dirty or had a glare in the middle of it. The soundtrack was lame and with sour notes. In the opening scene Little Tarantino experimented with a top/bottom split scene, which worked half-well, but they never did that gain.

The action doesn't take too long to happen. The gang gets to the cabin and before they have time to play truth or dare, strip poker, or shower, the ghouls arrive. They seemed to have arrived too early as the chase/kill scenes got boring.

Parental Guide: F-bombs. No sex or nudity. Guy getting head ripped off. blood and gore.

To those giving this a 5 or better...

[stpebelhar · 1/10 · 23 October 2006]

I want some of what you're smoking. This movie bites the big one. Horrible acting,story,cinematography,etc. etc... Yes it is original alright. Originally retarded. Someone give me 100 grand and I will make a film to blow this one straight to DVD. I have seen so many movies reviewed here with a 4 or 5 rating and thought wow, that movie was better than that. So when I saw the rating of above seven for this I thought it must be really good. I couldn't have been more wrong. Maybe if it didn't take itself so seriously and had some comedy injected into it, it may have been better. Easily one of the top 3 worst movies I have seen this year.

poor everything

[greenflea2 · 3 March 2007]

Well this movie is a shocker, and the camera shots rite from the start are shocking, like who is the cameraman?? Low budget, poor acting and a recyled story line. Its about a ghoul hunter taking on a pack of ghouls, well they don't look like ghouls to me, aren't ghouls suppose to be similar to zombies, yet these ghouls look like they fresh out of high school, well spoken, and well dress. One of the ghouls wearing a clean suit, even gives the victims a warning, like why is that, since they are his dinner. The camera work is a shocker, its all over the place. No boobs or sex, so if you looking for this, forget it. If there was boobs or sex in this movie, it be the highlight.

Keep away from this movie, its crap, poor production, low budget and even high school efforts are far better than this load of crap.

More zero budget horror crap.

[poolandrews · 2/10 · 10 September 2007]

The Lonely Ones is about a group of friends who decide to spend some time in a log cabin in the woods, unfortunately one of their number is a flesh eating Ghoul who has purposely led the other's there so other flesh eating Ghouls can eat them.

Written, produced & directed by David Michael Quiroz Jr. who also has a small role in the film as the guy who is walking his dog I thought The Lonely Ones was a terrible low budget shot on a camcorder type amateur made horror flick that I didn't like at all. For a start it goes on forever, it's so boring, it takes ages for anything to happen, the character's are annoying American teens who you actively want to die & the story isn't anything special either. I'm fed up with watching glorified home movies with awful acting & tomato ketchup style special effects & I don't want to waste my time either thinking or writing about The Lonely Ones.

Made on a budget of about $100,000 this is amateur hour with awful photography, a rubbish fuzzy camcorder type picture & muffled sound. Forget about any gore, there's a decapitated head & someone gets a spike in her neck & that's about it.

The Lonely Ones is not a film I could recommend to anyone looking for a decent horror flick, I could recommend it to masochists though.

Pretty Bad

[duckman_079 · 2/10 · 21 June 2020]

Aside from the unnatural dialogue, we have to endure relationship problems and bickering. When the overacting nerds show up, acting like vampires (even though they're ghouls), I'm still irritated by the first half of the movie. I didn't give it a 1, but a 2 because through all of this, I liked the idea of making a movie about a pack of ghouls and a plot element that I won't discuss because it would be a spoiler (that comes out about 3/4th through the movie). Also, 1 of the producers' name is "Aaron Rottinghaus". What a great name for somebody who makes horror films!

low class trash

[dutchchocolatecake · 1/10 · 15 February 2017]

Full disclosure: I specialize in reviewing movies that are low budget and in unusual niche genres, and I am willing to give a low budget film a 10 if they've put effort into the final product. So when I give a film 1 star, it's for a pretty good reason.

I am going to be one of the unpopular "haters" and give this movie one star. I simply cannot bring myself to give it any more than that. This movie makes the same mistakes Grave Encounters and other low budget movies make by trying to appeal to the "cool teens are self-righteous buttholes" sclock. No, I don't think your characters are cool and no, it doesn't make your movie hip and interesting. It makes you look like like a backwards dolt who can't write actual characters, so instead you make them as offensive as possible thinking the rest of us won't notice. Dropping the b-word bomb every two minutes does not make me think you're awesome.

This movie is sadly sexist, racist, and unbelievably boring. The black characters are among the first to die. Really? I thought we'd gotten past the 1990s but I guess not.

The movie actually could have been good since the actors weren't half bad. While the premise is fairly creative with the untapped ghoul genre, the overall end product fails to deliver anything but annoyance.

My advice: re-make this movie as a found footage film (you could write a character that has a dedicated and monetized YouTube channel and sets up cameras to create a silly moment compilation to post online - giving a reason for the cameras to be rolling) no b-word bombs (grow up already), and ditch the Terminator type "hunter" character. Write a script with less characters that have more maturity, because being able to take characters seriously is the key to creating suspenseful scenes. Since the sentimental scenes weren't half bad, you could keep those in and make it like a weekend "couple's retreat" or something. Making the ghouls talk takes the scariness away. Keep them silent and more menacing. As far as the 1988 split screen disaster, just leave it out. And don't put into idiot words like "sororitutes" which is just offensive.

In conclusion, with whatever you do next, stop creating obnoxious butthole content and I'll give your movie more stars. Deal?

Deserved a bigger budget

[slasher921 · 7/10 · 30 October 2006]

As other reviewers have already pointed out, this is a low budget movie - the listed budget is $100,000 I've seen movies with a tenth of that budget and similar production value. With the grainy digital video, bad or non-existent lighting, bad acting, muddled sound, and cheap-looking FX in the first twenty minutes I figured I was in for yet another microbudget waste of time.

Then, an amazing thing happens, and the movie suddenly finds its stride about 1/2 way through. Right as I was getting ready to write this one off, the focus shifts from the melodramatic coeds (there's one giggle-inducing scene where the main girl shows her ex boyfriend the shirt of his that she's kept - LAME!) to the lonely ones - a group of creatures that live in the forest. The flat film-making suddenly steps up as the victims start getting picked off and from here on out there's actually some good camera-work throughout the rest of the movie. Even the performances and FX pick up, and as someone who has seen a lot of shot-on-video productions, I can safely say that the second half of the film carries it above most of its peers.

I won't ruin anything for the viewer, but there is a very well-built story here that is worth checking out. What I thought was a boring and drawn-out setup (honestly, it could have been trimmed down here and there) actually ties in to the film's payoff and unlike some other movies I've seen, the movie's loose ends are actually tied up very well in the finale. There are some twists I didn't see coming, and some of the characters' actions surprised me as well.

Unfortunately, the very good story is hampered by the low budget pitfalls described earlier. Also, one of fights between a lonely one and victim plays out like a lame backyard wrestling production, and some of the kills should have been more graphic. The main thing is that the monsters in the film aren't much more than people in fake blood and rubber teeth. I know that the movie was concentrating more on the creatures' personality and stuff (a novel concept for today's horror movies), but this would have been a better movie if the makeup effects had lived up to the descriptions we get of the monsters during the setups.

I wish the filmmakers would have tried to get a bigger budget before filming this because the potential is there for a really good movie, but it seems like they bit off more than they could chew with this one. Still, the story alone is worth the price of a rental so long as the viewer can get past the production value. One of the websites said this movie hits more often than it misses, and I agree there.

Goes beyond your typical dead teenager movie

[roldog27 · 8/10 · 3 September 2006]

Lower-budget production is the only flaw that has me grade this film down to a B+. Starts out w/ many horror clichés: Sorority girls murdered in the 1980's; but no trace ever found. Today, city kids drive up to remote cabin in Northern Arizona forest for good time. This is the same area where the sorority disappeared. There are romantic and sexual tension in the air. They start partying, get drunk, and start to freak each other out w/scary stories. What's next is beyond unpredictable and is why this film stands out above your typical trash. Things turn out to be much more complex than they seem. No this is not a grade A film like Alien, The Grudge, The Dark Hours, Saw, The Exorcist or something. But it's not a C grade or worse film either.

Nice work!

[ant-man · 7/10 · 22 June 2007]

I have seen a lot of low budget horror films; even though most of them are pretty bad by any standard. "The Lonely Ones" is exactly the sort of quality effort that keeps me on the lookout for rare cinematic gems. It has a very well written plot, some very good performances, fairly grisly special effects and much better executed scares than any of Hollywood's PG-13 so-called horror films. Kudos also for making use of a mythological monster that exists in almost every culture, but which I can't recall ever having seen used in a horror movie. Well worth checking out; especially for real horror fans! I look forward to seeing the next project by Mister Quiroz.

Reference to Final Fantasy

[brandon_g1234 · 7/10 · 30 September 2006]

I thought that this was an OK movie. I did, however wanted to point out all (or some) of the references to Final Fantasy. Like for example, Rinoa's name in the movie is the same as Rinoa's name in Final Fantasy 8, and Tifa's name is in Final Fantasy 7. Also, one of the character's name is Cid Barret. Cid and Barret are two different characters in Final Fantasy 7. AND, the song the girl was humming in the beginning of the movie is the tune used in Final Fantasy X-2. There is just too many coincidences to be just coincidences. Someone was obviously a definite Final Fantasy fan. Overall though, it was pretty creative, and had a pretty sad ending, but a movie worth to watch.

Doubt you haters can do better.

[fierceblaze · 10/10 · 15 November 2006]

Let me start of saying. The whole thing looks like it was shot through a web cam by nervous kindergarten students. Gotta give you haters that much. The camera and sound guys should be made to go through the gatherer trials as punishment for this or be made to watch their own work which is worse.

For you complaining about getting better for this budget? Let me see you try. You might be right but just try to get this many of your friends in one place long enough to shoot anything longer than a trailer. If you are not paying them you ain't getting much done. Even then try to get them to take it half as seriously as these actors tried. That location didn't look like they had a McDonald's near by either they definitely had to spend a little money here on food and lodging. I don't know about 100,000 though what they do buy the cabin? Probably the most expensive thing to get right was that HEADSHOT and even then I guarantee you that they overpaid for those effects. They definitely didn't spend it on equipment. And don't play me with that 20 days to shoot bull this did not take more than a week. With 14 days or more even Ed Wood could get better shots.

The story starts off slow (and ends a little slow) but I have to say the story was deep enough and it definitely had me. I think it was original and very well thought out very well written. Note to the editor. PACING... look it up trust me. The long dramatic pauses and scenes play out nice on paper but they where bad here.

Oh, yeah and I wouldn't mind taking a bite out of Devanny Pinn (Tifa)

much better than i expected

[Bezenby · 6/10 · 29 October 2015]

Here's a low budget film that manages to entertain despite the low budget. A bunch of the usual folk you see in these types of film head off to a cabin in the woods to get drunk, bicker, make the beast with two backs etc etc. You know the drill. They stop off at a gas station where they meet at least two sinister folks giving them the evil eyeball. Then it's off to the cabin we go for the usual slasher film.

Except The Lonely Ones decides to become really good by not being a slasher film and instead having our annoying youngster being attacked by a pack of flesh eating ghouls! So instead of wandering around a house looking for each other and being picked off one by one, we instead have our actors being laid siege to while they watch the ghouls messily eating one of their own (and this guy gets his head torn off for good measure).

Throw in a couple of twists, some gore, and a nice pitched battle between the norms and the ghouls, and you could have a good time with this one. It's not perfect by the way (these dudes still do some stupid stuff, like leaving a wounded guy next to an open door) but it's unusual enough in it's execution to watched once.

No-budget backwoods monster flick impressively delivers the goods

[Wuchakk · 6/10 · 7 August 2016]

Made in 2004 and released in 2006, "The Lonely Ones" is an ultra-low budget cabin-in-the-woods slasher flick chronicling the adventures of nine college students—five girls and four guys—who vacation in a big modern cabin in Arizona owned by the family of one of the girls. Havoc ensues when they discover they're the prey of a few strange people lurking in the woods or, perhaps, THINGS.

This is the kind of micro-budget flick that rises above its limitations and offers something truly worthwhile. It only cost $100,000 to make and most of that went into lodging & catering for the cast and crew in the middle of nowhere. For the most part, the first 36 minutes are weak with all the characteristics of no-budget fare—dubious sound, bad lighting, fuzzy cinematography from hand-held digital cams, etc. But at the 36-minute mark things spark into motion till the end with numerous effective, moving or thrilling sequences. I'll be honest with you, I was about to give-up on the movie because of its shortcomings in the first act, but I'm glad I stayed with it because it just totally turned everything around for a pretty potent backwoods monster movie. Despite the presence of no less than a dozen characters (featuring a pretty diverse cast) and a non-budget, director/writer David Michael Quiroz Jr. was able to flesh out the characters with a well-crafted and original script. On top of this, there's a varied score that's pretty effective, even though one long sequence in the second act drones on with the eerie piano. Speaking of the piano, one part is reminiscent of Savatage's "Storm," which is good in my book. The score also includes some moving acoustic guitar pieces.

Of the five girls, they're all pretty average-looking (not ugly, just average) with the exception of petite cutie Devanny Pinn as Tifa, who's a unique-looking semi-hottie.

BOTTOM LINE: "The Lonely Ones" really surprised; it's a gem in a sea of micro-budget dreck. But you won't be able to appreciate it unless you can adapt to its no-budget style, which I was fully able to do after the first act (I also went back and re-watched the first act whereupon discovering that it's actually a solid set-up for the rest of the movie). Once the second act started I was gripped to the end and very impressed by the proceedings despite the movie's obvious limitations. This would be a great movie if it were redone with a decent budget. The director/writer should've gone on to better things but, as of this writing, he hasn't directed anything since 2009, and that was a TV episode. That's a shame because "The Lonely Ones" shows that he's got the talent to create greatness. He just needs the funds to back up his creativity.

The film runs 97 minutes and was shot in Greer, Arizona.

GRADE: B+

An oddly uneven but ultimately rewarding experience

[albino_slug-80901 · 7/10 · 19 June 2020]

It's hard to adequately describe what The Lonely Ones does without spoiling it. I was starting to regret choosing this film near the beginning with the cliche college students going off somewhere to get drunk and party. Somehow, and I won't say how, the film unexpectedly improves and becomes a tense but campy fun time. The acting ranged from good to over-the-top in a fun way. The practical effects were genuinely jarring considering the otherwise obvious low budget. I definitely rate movies higher than most since I've seen some truly awful ones to compare, but this is one case where I don't see why it would be given a 1 or 2 unless they turned it off early on.

I'm disappointed that the director barely did anything in the industry after this one, since he made a genuinely surprising and entertaining film that's miles above the trash I expect from the 20-film packs I buy for $5.

Lonely No More...

[azathothpwiggins · 1 June 2022]

Yes, the budget for THE LONELY ONES is obviously extremely tiny. Yes, the acting is stiff, and even comical in spots. Yes, the dialogue tends to be silly at times.

And yet...

The story is -very- innovative and the special effects are gruesome and believable. It's especially interesting to get the ghouls' perspective: What they think, what they say to each other, and what they're planning.

This movie pulls no punches in its graphic portrayal of murder, dismemberment, and cannibalism. Some of the splatter scenes may have you spewing your beverage! Gorehounds should get a warm feeling from this one!

THE LONELY ONES starts out rather slow and mediocre, builds up to an unpredictable middle, and finishes off with a dynamite ending...