The acting is subpar, and the characters were not interesting and, oftentimes, more laughable than anything. Speaking of laughing, the only characters that were interesting in any way were surprisingly the two adopted brothers – the “comic relief.” Not to give them too much praise ‘cause a lot of the jokes were terrible. Played by Jimmy O. Yang and Not-Will Arnett—I mean, Ryan Hansen—, these two at least bring some fun to this film.

Oddly enough, Michael Peña is this film, and he plays Mr. Roarke. After knowing him from so many bad comedy roles like CHiPs and Ant-man, it’s really difficult to see him play this mysterious straight-man and take him seriously. I’m sure I may feel different if I hadn’t known who he was, but it seemed like a weird casting choice.

The only other actor I knew in this was Portia Doubleday who just plays another one of the non-interesting guests. I was pretty disappointed because I like her on Mr. Robot, and I know she can do better than this. Not that she was terrible but her character was poorly written, so she wasn’t able to shine in the role.

Then there’s Really Annoying Blonde Chick, who’s actually more of the main character in this film. But I really hated what they did with her in the “twist” at the end. Then there’s Boring Brunette Chick and Boring Hot Military Guy. That’s it. Moving on.

The dialogue in this film is terrible. Most of the time I was thinking, “Yeah, cuz that’s how people talk.” I know dialogue can often-times be a stylistic thing in Film (some Rod Serling scripts come to mind), but usually there should be a good balance between clever/dramatic dialogue and realistic dialogue. Most of the time, this film tries to use clever dialogue and pull it off as natural and realistic, but it does not work. Also, I know I’ve mentioned it, but very few of the more comedic lines are funny at all. They’re mostly cringeworthy.

Special effects are used sparingly in this film, but they still don’t look great. The CGI was very cheap. Even the make-up isn’t very good. There’s this ghost-like character that’s supposed to look like he’s been in a horrible fire accident, but it just looks like badly-applied Halloween make-up.

I wasn’t a fan of how the film looked, either. I hated how often the camera moved during scenes of dialogue. It wasn’t there to add any dramatic effect. It just wouldn’t stop moving. I also couldn’t get over the fact that a lot of the scenes looked like a commercial for back pain medicine because of the bright colors and lighting.

The music was pretty trope-y and manipulative, but that’s kind of the norm when it comes to horror schlock. It at least implements some sort of tribal themes in the score to give it that island/jungle/mysterious feel to it, so it’s not completely lazy.

Also, I should mention, this film isn’t scary at all. In fact, I would label it more like an adventure/thriller-type film that tries to be a horror movie. Even with its dumb jump scares, it hardly tries.

Overall, I would not recommend this film. Unless you were a fan of the original show, I don’t know anyone who would find this interesting. If it is the case you are a fan of the show, I’d love to know how you felt about this adaptation!

Clifford Close

Writer and Movie Reviewer