The Ferryman

I have enjoyed limited movie offerings from New Zealand, with the likes of the romantic comedy Sione's Wedding and horror comedy Black Sheep, and for my horror double bill this weekend, I wouldn't have wanted to miss The Ferryman.

In western folklore, the Ferryman is the one responsible for transporting the dead to the nether realms, where souls would be judged (so you'd better start chalking up those brownie points). Ferrymen had been depicted in movies before, be they just a background character like in Woody Allen's Scoop, or becoming a point of contention in the Pirates of the Caribbean movies with crew of The Flying Dutchman. Think of it as the equivalent to the Chinese folklore characters of "Cow Head" and "Horse Face", where they will visit the body at the point of deaths to escort the soul to the depths of Hell for judgement.

2 couples (two of whom are Craig Hall and Amber Sainsbury whom we will get to see again in 30 Days of Night, in which Ben Fransham who plays The Ferryman will also appear) signs up for an adventure sail from New Zealand to Fiji, where a luxurious spa awaits their tired bodies after their "homestay on the sea" stint. Before everyone, including the captain his wife and their pet dog, can get chummy with one another, their ship receives a distress signal, and the laws of the sea dictates they get themselves into unknown trouble by picking up a survivor from a non-working vessel. And like all hitchhiker styled movies, there's always something strange about the hitcher (played by John Rhys-Davis) you pick up, especially when the weather's all foggy and he starts to give everyone the creeps.

The Ferryman turned out to be a rather interesting concept movie rather than outright horror with shock and awe moments. It doesn't scare, nor does it follow the recent trends in gore and with torture porn. What it's more akin to is a good old fashioned thriller with supernatural elements thrown in for good measure. Some might complain that nothing much really happens, with the usual hack and slash, but I'd argue that it had a very novel take on the theme of longevity, especially when it starts to play out in full. While it certainly isn't something new, the way it was executed (pardon the pun) mattered, and its ending will undoubtedly leave a wicked smile on your face, at what had transpired, and the loads of potential should you possess such capability.

Not without loopholes though, but I thought it could be glossed over given its supernatural slant, unless you choose to harp on it, especially when it didn't get developed properly. In short, The Ferryman still qualifies for an entertaining afternoon matinée when ticket prices are cheaper.

In New Zealand, the couples Tate (Sally Stockwell) and Chris (Craig Hall) and Kathy (Amber Sainsbury) and Zane (Julian Arahanga) come to the yacht Dionysus to sail to Fiji Islands in a romantic trip. The skipper Big Dave (Tamer Hassan) and his girlfriend Suze (Kerry Fox) welcome the quartet with their beloved dog Rolex. On the second day, the Dionysus receives a distress signal in Morse code and Dave head to a mysterious fog to help the ship. They find a fishing boat adrift and Chris and Zane row a small boat to the vessel to avoid reefs. They find a crew member (John Rhys-Davies) near death and they bring him to Dionysus. Sooner they discover that the man is possessed of a demon and he uses a dagger to cheat death and switch bodies with his victims.

"The Ferryman" is an underrated horror movie based on the legend of the Greek mythology of Charon or Kharon, the ferryman of Hades that carried the souls across the River Acheron to reach the world of the dead. His payment was a coin in or on the mouth of the dead person. In the introduction of "The Ferryman", there is a narration in off telling that "in ancient times there was the legend of the Ferryman. He took the dead to be judged into the afterlife and his prize was a coin in their mouth. If anyone tried to cheat death, they would also be cheating the Ferryman and they could never escape for the Ferryman would hunt them forever." The screenplay combines the foregoing legend with "Dead Calm" and "Fallen" and the result is a good gore film. In the end, I was surprised since I had the lowest expectations based on the IMDb Rating. My vote is seven.

Title (Brazil): "A Vingança do Demônio" ("The Revenge of the Demon")

Going out on a trip together, a group of friends takes a multi-day cruise from New Zealand where they learn they are the target of the Ferryman, a vicious supernatural killer collecting souls for the afterlife, and must resort to a never-ending series of tactics to outwit the body-hopping killer.

This here was a potentially interesting affair, as there was some good stuff here. One of the film's best features is the setup of the killer and his rules, which are quite new and original and really have something going for it. With the rules following along closely to the real-life persona it's based on, namely the reaping of souls for the underworld, gives it a nice touch that really makes it seem that much more like a legitimately imposing force. That there are also rules that go along with how to get possessed to what happens during that time and how to get rid of the force within works here by adding a really interesting twist on the slasher-among-a-group-of-friends that really scores well. The other likable feature here is that the setup also ends up giving the film some nice momentum at the end when it's revealed what's going on. After initially starting off as being obvious behavior differences no one else catches onto, the gradual reveal of the possession and body-hopping allows those scenes, which start off as backstory revelations but turn into big brawls, to be even more entertaining and exciting putting in a touch of energy missing from the rest of the film as well. The last plus here is the fact that the kills aren't that bad and quite bloody, which is a big plus. There are several beaten up and viciously bruised, an eyeball bludgeoned out, a beer bottle bashed against the head, a slit throat, and another is set on fire. These here are all that work right for this one. There were a couple of rather big flaws in this one. One of the main ones is that the film is just so utterly boring that it's quite impossible to make it through most of the beginning of the film. As it sets up the characters and their relationships with each other, it doesn't really start getting to business until an hour in, which is a criminal mistake that really takes its toll on the film. It sets up almost nothing as it's just random scenes of people acting mysteriously around each other and then everyone else trying to figure out what's going on, but none of this is done with any care towards making it interesting. They just go around talking about anything and everything, which is quite boring and makes for a dull time. This isn't helped by the fact that there's just a high level of confusion around the film, as hardly any of it makes any sense at all. There's very little reason given as to why the killer is going after any of the people here as it was given that there was a target which makes this all-around confusing. The scenes among the group earlier when trying to figure everything out are just as bad as they manage to just spout off anything that sounds logical and not really piecing anything together coherently, adding to the dullness and boredom that permeate the film. It's almost over before we get any kind of idea of what the official killer is, an explanation about it, or why it's important to the film, all of which come a little too late to be of much help and never really comes of anything. These here are the film's problems.

Rated R: Graphic Violence, Graphic Language, Brief Nudity, and animal violence.

Three couples embark on a six day romantic boat journey to Fiji and their differences ensure that personality clashes abound.However all that is put to one side when they encounter a seemingly abandoned boat in dense fog.They find a living stranger on board and rescue him,however the terrifying consequences lead to plenty of gore.It seems that the ship is deserted apart from the mysterious sailor lying half-dead under a tarpaulin(played by horror regular John Rhys Davies).Rhys-Davies' body is actually home to a being who can shift between bodies swapping souls.This soul-swapping is achieved with the aid of the magic dagger-if he stabs somebody with it,he instantly becomes the victim.He's doing this to avoid a demonic entity called 'the Ferryman' who has been chasing him through thousands of bodies over many years.In "The Ferryman" each victim in turn becomes the killer.The killer always has a snakelike tattoo on their back,which is the symbol of infinity.During the first 40 minutes the action moves slowly and the legend of Ferryman is slightly confusing.Still I enjoyed this quite exciting,gripping and bloody horror flick.7 out of 10.

OK well I was expecting a little bit of entertainment from this movie but not much because after all it is a straight to DVD horror film and I watch a lot of those and I am often disappointed all the same but I watch them anyways just to know if they are good or not. But this one was rather good compared to some of the other garbage that I have seen, I enjoyed the horror elements even though they were rather brutal and uncalled for at times. The ending was sort of confusing, but I liked seeing the face of the real ferryman rather than just a knife through the whole movie. Overall I gave it a 5 out of 10 because it was sort of entertaining, but some parts were just weird and unnecessary. I wouldn't recommend it, but if you're bored then go ahead.