Pontypool

Low on budget and high on atmospherics and originality and yet Pontypool is one of those films which when you recommend you normally tack on a coda of I liked it but you might hate it. The premise seems to be setting up another zombie flick. A snow bound Canadian town an isolated radio station and intermittent news reports of the town citizens in the grip of a blood lust. I am a sucker for a zombie yarn so even if PontyPool had of continued in a zombies surround the radio station and a fight to the death ensues manner I would have stayed on board.

But Pontypool had a few surprises in the way it subverted the premise.
The zombies are not zombies as such. The director Bruce McDonald describes them as Conversationalists. Stay with me.

The What If? of PontyPool is What if a zombie esque plague could be spread by words? Certain words triggering a kind of verbal block in which sufferers repeat words over and over. This block leads to confusion and then acts of violence.
And I guess it is at this point (which comes roughly an hour in) that you willl either jump ship, bemoaning the fact this clearly will not be the zombie flick you thought it would be.
Or you will applaud the filmmakers desire to try something different and give the flick a chance. I gave it a chance and was glad I did.

I was rewarded with a film which dared to have its grey matter kept, for the most part, on the inside. There are deep questions being asked around the theme of communication and the power and responsibility of the media. The tone had a John Carpenter feel to proceedings which made full use of the single studio location which in turns seems claustrophobic and expansive. The performances were quirky and strong particularly Shock Jock Mazzie played by Stephen Mchattie who has been banished from the big city to the sticks. There are moments of black humour a local drama group and the truth about Pontypools supposed eye in the sky!

The appearance of expert Dr Mendez felt a trifle contrived and overly expositional but that is a minor gripe in a film which managed to take my expectations and turn them on their head.

I think the marketing of the film is misleading and may be the cause of many a viewer disappointment but I caught it cold and was pleasantly surprised.

Pontypool gets a 4 out of 5 from me with an added proviso of I liked it. But you might hate it!

when i saw the name of this movie it boded well even though it sounded more like an information video on behalf of the wales tourist board. after watching the movie i wished it had been an information video on behalf of the wales tourist board. on paper it seemed like it had everything i love about the horror genre, a low budget, independant zombie movie. but it just didn't make the grade. the acting was ok and i liked the creepiness of the movie up to a point. but then i felt like it lost credibility when the cliched freudian doctor turned up. it just went a bit downhill from there as far as i'm concerned. the over explanation of the virus between the remaining characters locked in a broom cupboard was cringeworthy. its a shame some movie makers feel like they need to dumb down so that its better understood in certain parts of the world. i was originally going to give this movie 1 star but bumped it to 2 because the idea was good - the execution was the problem.

A good idea but could have been so much better.If you are looking for blood and gore dont watch this. RUBBISH.

Pontypool isn't just for zombie or horror fans. Intelligent, ambitious and with plenty to say, it operates successfully as a thriller, horror and political satire. You could argue that it overreaches and ultimately fails to make good on the grand point it sets out to nail, but then it does try to tackle the nature of humanity, the media, language, and the psychology of language acquisition, so failing to quite make this statement coherently is kind of forgivable! I'm a firm believer that such a worthy attempt should be rewarded. And if all that fails to grab you then there's always Stephen McHattie's mesmerizing tour de force of a performance - you probably won't see a better one all year.

This movie blew me away, it's not your typical run of the mill zombie movie, it's something different and bought something different to the table. This is one of the best horror movies of the past decade!
It show's you don't have to have milliuons of dollars/pounds to make a great horror movie.

I suggest you get this movie when it comes out... just AWESOME!!
I want to say something about the plot but i don't want to spoil it for you guys, just watch it and sppreciate it for what it is.