A teenager becomes a victim of his first serious feeling. Falling in love with a non-communicative classmate, he makes a grand attempt to get acquainted through the network, thereby violating privacy. The result is house arrest with a ban on Internet access and a bracelet on his leg.
Chamber mysticism is very boring throughout most of the plot: another schoolboy with loyal friends, pursued by another ghost in a confined space.
The salt of what is happening is in the final.
There are two assumptions during the review: 1. The case will end with a standard loss of the hero in a confrontation with a ghost. The usual ending of a horror movie. 2. It will end with the realization that true love was always there, and that what he took for love was a mistake of immaturity. A kind of drama about growing up with the loss of love or, conversely, reunion with it after joint trials.
The creators were unexpectedly original, as the final cancels the banal youth horror and melodrama with mysticism.
"Unrested" turns into a drama about the failure of the use of black magic in relationships. It should be borne in mind that a person is individual and therefore, the result achieved by magical means can be very different from the expected. This is only the first conclusion.
We can also say that the hero becomes a victim of the peculiarities of his own psyche. And he makes, unwittingly, victims of all the other characters. Even the supervisor, who, after the latest find, should become even more entrenched in the skeptical worldview.
“Unquiet” is the second full-length directorial project of Paul Solet from the genre of mystical thriller / horror film. The first project of the director, “Grace”, did not find success not in finance, not in the assessment of critics, which said only one thing – for Solet this fake can be not only the first, but also the last. As the years passed, there were no changes in Paul’s career, only the very debut directorial project, which every year said that he would not find a new project. However, fate gave a second chance in the form of a new project called "Unquiet", and even forced the screenwriter - debutante to the project. It would seem to make a film and walk boldly, but even on the second attempt, Paul Solet steps on the same rake, making a new disappointment, and the big question mark over his career has rapidly increased.
The court sentenced Daniel Williams to house arrest. No, he didn't shoplift, beat his neighbors to death. He just sat at the computer a lot and hacked whatever he wanted. The sentence is all summer. All summer without a computer, and even attached this detector, so there is nothing left to stay at home, watching TV and bored. However, it is not so simple, Daniel enters Skype and immediately sees a call from a classmate. After a little reflection, the hero still answers the video call and what he sees is simply shocking - Mona (the name of a classmate) takes a gun and shoots himself right in front of Daniel. After what happens, strange things begin to happen in the house of a young hacker.
Once again, director Paul Solet did not take his work seriously. If at the beginning the film can attract something, then the whole middle, literally the whole, just sags, leaving the viewer to be bored and suffer from anguish, after which there are cheerful last 20 minutes. Everything, in the film there is nothing alluring, interesting, not a bad and cheerful beginning and the ending that makes you wake up. Solet did not cope with his work and wait for a new project this time he will have a very, very long time. The script by Mike Le is not bad, interesting, but reminds nothing more than Paranoia. D.J. Caruso, taken in mystical brackets. However, the writer does not hide this, and even inserted a similar scene in the beginning of the film. In everything else, the script does not cause any problems, everything is clearly spelled out, the heroes (of which there are not so many here). The ending of the film was disappointing, destroying all the canons of the thriller or mysticism, because the very last scene itself looks too stupid and frivolous. Simply put, the script is good, but the director’s poor work spoils the film. The only thing that the director and screenwriter could not find is the atmosphere of fear and the mysticism surrounding the characters, and if it is, it does not feel at all. Operator Zoran Popovich does not work poorly, but this is due not so much to the camera work itself, but to the huge choice of contrast and color choice - there are dark tones, and soft green (computer screens), and blue (pool). Everything in the film balances between dark and light, and this play of light is almost the only thing I liked about this film. The composer of the film was Austin Wintory, working with the director for the second project in a row. Wintory’s music is sometimes able to plunge the viewer into a deep sleep because of the monotony, but in some moments, pleasant compositions run through, and at the end of the film it seems that the composer woke up and adapted his soundtrack to what is happening, emphasizing the unexpectedness of the moment.
The creators of the picture did not think much about the cast, taking anyone into the picture (it is no coincidence that only 6 people appear in the script). Not badly coped with his work Keir Gilchrist, who played in the film the main role. For his role, he works especially hard and did not have to be himself, say what happened and so on. Stella Maiv and Maestro Harrell come to the aid of the actor, so that the main character would not be bored. Basically, the trinity plays right, does not try to do something impossible, scream at the whole house with his mouth, but just be himself, and such a step is quite appropriate. Grace Phipps showed herself well in the role of a dead classmate Mona, she does not bring such unreal fear, but she also managed to show herself from the mystical side. The unexpected news was the participation of such an actor as Peter Stormare. I will not be surprised if many people say about this actor that he has long since slipped and it is not surprising that he is so much stuck in such films, but although his role here is not so big, he plays very well, without any mistakes, cleanly and simply entering the image of his character.
Total:
“Unquiet” is another directorial mistake of Paul Solet, where he again failed to give the film an image, and even more so to revive the atmosphere and interest in it. Instead, even though the scenario is not bad, the picture looks very sluggish, it is difficult to watch from boredom. The advantages of this tape are not many - a couple of not bad scenes, the play of light from the operator, as well as actors. Everything else in the film looks very bad and I will not recommend such a creation to anyone, only if there is a huge desire or desire to waste 81 minutes of my life.
Thank you for listening!
You will feel the same as I do - boredom, despondency, falling asleep.
"You're going to feel the same way I do!" the suicidal girl said over Skype to the suspected catch in every rustle and every light bulb the boy lit before going to heaven. I wonder what Paul Solet felt during the filming of another horror movie, which is not a horror movie at all, unlike his previous “Grace”, at least something resembling horror? It seems that he was just playing with the camera again, then adjusting it, then focusing it. And nothing more.
"Unrested" (in normal translation - "Dark Summer" or something like that) is a very sleepy work of the director. Half of the session can definitely be squandered, since at least some action begins only in the middle of it. Basically, hallucinogenic shots, performed with love, but without effort and desire to go beyond the banal framework, prevail here. The main character now and then walks around the house, depicting unimaginable seriousness, stumbles upon some of his own visions, now and then proving him (as well as the viewer). And the boy has a friend and a girlfriend to dilute with something viscous, meaningless plot, which too late reveals its original idea (the only decent plus, although it should still be noted good camera plans).
However, even its disclosure no longer saves the film, as if deliberately shot “as usual”, without a constructive approach, but with the initiative to exasperate the audience’s patience. An incomprehensible twist under a mystical thriller is a clear failure for Paul Solet.
3 out of 10
Paul Solet, the filmmaker is not the most famous for a wide audience, however, in the genre of horror, he noted a rather remarkable picture of Grace. Although it did not become an event in its genre and received not the most flattering reviews from both critics and viewers, devoted admirers of tense stories appreciated his efforts, highlighting a couple of successful directorial finds that distinguish Grace from many other faceless brethren in the category B. After taking a pause from the creation of a full-length film, Solet plunged into the television industry with his head, to later return to full-fledged cinema with the film called “The Unquiet”, also known under the original name “Dark Summer”. However, if “Grace” for all its shortcomings became a relatively revered film, then “The Restless” was waiting for a much sadder fate. Promising on paper mystical thriller almost razed to the ground due to the fact that its creators for the most part made plagiarism on the events of Paranoia D.J. Caruso, who just a few years ago became an unexpected box office hit and gave the world Shia LaBeouf as an actor capable of playing leading roles in remarkable films. The main difference between Solet’s tape and Caruso’s work is that in “The Unquiet” a lean is made towards paranormal activity raging around the main character and his family. Otherwise, Paul Solet, led by the script works of Mike Le, is no different, repeating the material passed, recreating famous scenes, slightly reworking them in a new manner. An interesting fact that makes you still pay attention to the “Unquiet” is the participation of Peter Stormare. The famous character actor of the second plan is often starred in films worthy of attention. He successfully combines work in expensive Hollywood blockbusters and does not neglect strong independent projects. Thus, his interest in cooperation with Paul Solet could not pass by the connoisseurs of horror, to which I consider myself. However, if the film speculates solely on the glory of its predecessor, nothing good will come of it a priori. It does not matter which celebrities are involved in the cast. Going along the path of frank borrowing of successful ideas, while not bringing anything original to the history, it is quite natural to count on the failure that happened with “The Unrested”.
So, the plot of the film introduces us to high school graduate Daniel (Kil Gilchrist), who was put under house arrest by the court. Officer Stokes (Stormare) wears a control bracelet over the hero’s leg and Daniel is now banned from leaving the area nearby for more than five seconds. The crime committed by the young man does not seem so terrible, but it nevertheless involves punishment: Daniel, who has the skills of a talented programmer, hacked the accounts on various social networks of his pretty introverted classmate Mona Wilson (Grace Phipps) in the hope of finding out her interests in order to subsequently win her heart. However, his machinations were noticed, which led to house arrest. Since the hero has no father, and his mother works abroad, he remains at the mercy of himself, the guy wanders through the corridors and rooms of the house for days, periodically diluting the despondency in the company of loyal friends - Abby (Stella Maev) and Kevin (Maestro Harrell). The depressing monotony suddenly changed to a sense of constant fear when Mona contacted Daniel through the network to commit suicide in front of his eyes, warning that he would soon feel the same as her. The discouraged guy did not expect his passion to come after him after his death and pursue him for some mysterious purposes. Every day the otherworldly activity of Mona increases, and the means against her presence simply does not exist. Daniel and his friends find themselves hostage to the situation, gradually realizing that a direct confrontation with the ghost cannot be avoided.
When the creators of a horror film position their creation as a tense detective horror, then you expect it to be the same. “Unquiet” despite the secondary nature of the plot, which the main characters do not hesitate to talk about, mentioning the same “Paranoia” with Shia La Beauf, had every chance to become a remarkable tape that would keep its viewer in suspense and gradually shocked some scripted revelations. In fact, most of the timekeeping in the frame did not happen anything significant. To be fair, Paranoia also suffered from a slow narrative, but in that film the protagonist at least had a constant dialogue with a cute neighbor. But in "The Restless" Daniel most of the screen time has to have with himself. He has no one to share his fears with. Instead of some interesting activities, he now and then takes a bath, swims in a personal pool and sleeps. You could blame his amorphousness on the lack of Internet, but this is not an option, since the friends of the hero provided him with secure access to the network, which for some reason he was in no hurry to use. The director decided to save the most dynamic action until the final. It seems that he asked forgiveness from the audience for painful minutes of inaction, saturating the end with a mass of story revelations. And in some ways, he succeeds, as a lot of "Unquiet" gets from head to toe. Only thanks to the intriguing ending, the film at least a little, but still looks like a quagmire of all-consuming despondency.
The sharply negative moments associated with the film can be safely attributed to the camera work of Zoran Popovich. His creative techniques included long walks of the camera on computer cords, which was supposed to symbolize something important, although in fact it served only to stretch the timekeeping to an acceptable amount, so that “The Undead” got a chance to roll in theaters as a full-length movie. Also, by the will of the director, Zoran Popovich now and then concentrated the focus on the back of the head and neck of the main character, blurring the rest of the background. Probably, according to the idea, such a move was supposed to show us that Daniel was waiting for a certain danger that could jump out of nowhere, simultaneously scaring an unprepared viewer, but such findings only slowed down the pace of the narrative, continuing to drag out time without affecting anything. There is not much to say about actors. Most of the guys played mediocrely. In particular, this applies to the protagonist and his girlfriend, who during the filming seemed to be sitting under some psychotropic substances that take away their strength, which adversely affected not only the game of young people, but also their always tired appearance.
In the end, I want to say that “The Undead” for the most part stomped in one place, focusing on the inaction of the main character. There is not a single truly frightening episode in the film, the tension never jumps to heights. In the final, of course, the narrative is gaining momentum, but this is not enough to compensate for the creative inconsistency of the creators.
A teenager named Daniela was put under house arrest for terrorizing his classmate Mona and hacking into her accounts. But one day Mona herself communicates with Daniel via Skype. Before his eyes, she commits suicide and manages to inform him that he will feel everything that she felt. From this moment, inexplicable things begin to happen in the house of a teenager.
Honestly, the story itself we learn only from the synopsis. And why the teenager was put under house arrest, what he did, in the film all this is silent. And it turns out that there is no script basis and the whole concept of the film came up with a couple of minutes before the start of shooting. And the plot of this film is simply incredibly similar to the tape Death-bearing " or "Tamara", as you like. Like Tamara, Daniel is to blame for Mona’s death, and she turns out to be a witch who allegedly wants revenge on her abuser. But it's all just incredibly unskillful. There is no oppressive atmosphere that would lead us into the events of the film.
The young inexperienced director Paul Solet wants us to show either a thriller with notes of mysticism, or a weak detective with an unexpected denouement, from which the viewer gasps and will applaud standing. All this remained inexplicable to me. The film does not have a straight line of plot and then everything happens abruptly. And all the mystical aspects on which the film should rely occur in just a few seconds.
The film is ultra budget, so the cast is represented by only 5 actors, but which ones. The main character was performed by the actor Kair Gilchrist. In principle, this role is for him. Because he can play troubled teenagers. But it's okay if it's a comedy, but the horrors and the emotions have to be different. And Gilchrist walks around with one gloomy expression throughout the film. The charismatic inspector was performed by the unsurpassed Peter Stormare. There's also spirituality and something fun about his game. And his last sentence in the film, in general, caused an incredible laugh. In the last sentence, he directly described all the creators in the singular.
In the end, I want to say that the chances of meeting a worthy horror movie are decreasing over the years. Ideas become less and young directors go into a drama that will make them 100% famous. And few people want to shoot horror. So I came across this fresh horror film, which was supposed to surprise, but unfortunately failed. I wish director Paul Soletou success in his future career and choose worthy projects, because this film is not a very worthy start.
After watching this film, I really don’t want to say anything about it, since the tape left no impressions after myself, but I will still say a few words about this work.
In general, the film turned out too weak, banal and not thought out by the authors. You can immediately see that the director Paul Solet did not think much about the films and began to sculpt everything that comes to mind. That’s how it turned out all this porridge, which to turn the viewer becomes quite difficult ... Sometimes, even in some episodes, there was a feeling that you were not looking at horrors at all, but a parody of them. All these incomprehensible scenes with unnecessary sighs did not leave my stormy imagination alone. And during the episode of the protagonist in bed, I just couldn't stop laughing in the theater. Even the musical accompaniment does not save the film, although in fact it is not bad there. I was waiting for something so exciting the whole film, and in the end one debauchery and wasted money. In my opinion, if the creators had thought of coming up with a prehistory of this film, that the viewer could understand from the very beginning, what is what, then the tape would have turned out much better! I just have to figure out what happened before these events. And the main reason why the court sentenced Daniel Williams to house arrest? Not clear.
The actors are little-known, so do not expect anything so supernatural from them. But still note the American actress Stella Maiv. Her acting was not particularly impressive, but her figure is charming.
The only thing that surprised me was the ending of the film. And to be more precise, I liked the picture itself, and not semantic logic, which simply does not exist!
I will make a conclusion like this, if you still think of watching this “masterpiece” of cinema, I advise you to stock up on a couple of bottles of beer, since it is simply impossible to look at a sober head.
2 out of 10
Daniel (Kair Gilchrist) is sentenced to house arrest for stalking Mona (Grace Phipps) on social media. The guy thinks he's in love, the girl thinks he's too intrusive. When the sentence goes into effect, Mona calls Daniel on Skype and shoots a bullet in his head. Soon, the teenager begins to think that the spirit of suicide wants revenge on him.
Every director who turns to horror dreams of becoming a pioneer, writing a new word in the history of the genre or, at least, being remembered by the public. Paul Solet began his career as a vampire. "Grace", which received rave reviews, but still was well received by critics. After such a debut, the second film is very important - as a rule, it makes it clear what the future awaits the director. Six years later, Solet returns with a new job, and then the opinion is unequivocal: “Unquiet” – absolutely passable and unassuming product.
Should we even call it a horror? With a huge stretch. Frightening moments (or, at least, those that are supposed to scare) are few here, and those are ugly banal. A sudden change of frame and the image of a dead girl? Wow! An insect under the skin? Wow, that's new! An unknown force presses the heroes against the wall and forces them to bleed themselves? How do you fall asleep after that?
Timekeeping of one hour and twenty minutes, in theory, can not allow “the restless” to be delayed, but somehow Solet managed to include in the film a few scenes, the absence of which would not change absolutely nothing. Footage of Gilchrist swimming in the pool, for example, looks inappropriately inserted into the tape video, especially since they are accompanied by a track of the Elysian Fields gang. Instead of whipping up the suspense, the director is absolutely irrational workspace - claims to a torn rhythm in which the film is more than enough sustained, since the alternation of meditative plans and random jerks of the camera does not seem a successful stylistic technique.
Perhaps “The Unquiet” has an original and unpredictable plot? Or did the actors do well? Unfortunately, on both points you have to put a fat minus. The plot twist, which is not too readable, of course, is present, but does not save the situation - it does not produce the proper effect, it is just a way to put an end to the story. Young artists diligently portray fright, but they, in fact, have nothing to play - everything is too sloppy. Charismatic Peter Stormare, appearing for a few minutes, beats the youth one right, and this can hardly be considered the trump card of the film.
The film's original title - "Dark Summer" - is easy to project into how it will affect its director's career. Mr. Paul Solet, if you continue in the spirit that the future is definitely dark.
3 out of 10