Shallow Ground

Description

Jack Shepard didn't think his nightmares could possibly get any worse. But when a mysterious boy appears, dressed only in a coating of fresh blood, Jack is forced down a path of dark secrets and unthinkable horrors. The small town of Shallow Valley is about to become a gruesome battleground where the living will now pay for the pain the dead have suffered.

Customer Reviews:

1.5 STARS: Started out like it might be good, but very poorly developed........2007-03-03

Like many others, I caught "Shallow Ground" on the Sci-fi channel. At first, I was thinking I may have stumbled on to something, but the movie failed to develop on its early success. The plot for "Shallow Ground" is confusing to say the least. Evidently, the creators of this flick thought that this confusion would help keep the viewer interested. It does to a certain extent, but by the time the ending rolls around, the viewer or audience becomes irritated and disappointed with the plot development and the ending itself. Frankly, the killer's identity in the end undercuts the early success of the movie...I mean a grandmother for Pete's sake!!!??? That is just soooooo scary!! NOT!!!

Also, the boy coming back from the grave and all of the blood really did not do much for me at all. At first, it kept me interested, but ultimately, all the blood was just window dressing for this flick. "Shallow Ground" tries to be cute with its confusing plot, but ultimately fails to deliver the goods. The acting in this movie is below average to average at best in "Shallow Ground". If you are interested in confusing plots and strange plot twists, you may want to check this out. However, in the opinion of this reviewer, "Shallow Ground" represents an unconvincing attempt at style over substance. The mystery that is "Shallow Ground" keeps one's interest for a little while, but as the movie unfolds and begins to reveal itself to the viewer, the audience gets a feeling of emptiness or a cheated feeling if you will...at least, this is the feeling I came away with after watching this rubbish.

If you want style over substance, check out Dario Argento's "Suspiria" which is the classic style over substance horror movie which actually produces some scares unlike this dressed up trash called "Shallow Ground". "Shallow Ground" might be worth a rent to some, but is definitely not worth owning.

5 for overall strangeness.......2006-11-11

Great film, totally suspenceful and i bet you will have to wtach it several times to figure out whats going on. I also love the ending, i don't know what the ending was about exactally but it was really cool.

Very scarey!!!!.......2006-10-07

I really liked this movie. I bought this movie very blindly at a second hand book shop. I didn't watch it for sometime after I bought it. I really loved the movie. It is scarey, suspensful and very well done. I watched the commentary after the movie and was very suprised that it was a very low budget movie. When I was watching it, I thougth it was a movie that I missed in the theaters. I recommend this movie very highly!!!

Totally disappointed!!!.......2006-09-07

Poor plot, speechlessly confusing storyline, none scary or gory, the longer I watched, the more "?" I got, wondering why other viewers could give more than 1 star???
The ending scene is meaningless and made me laugh, the wicked killer-mom came back from the dead and killed the blood-coated boy, who was supposed the dead too? God, what was the message supposed to deliver?
I love horror movie, but this one...sorry to say that it is really a waste of my money to have bought this DVD.

Fantastic microbudget flick........2006-06-29

Shallow Ground (Sheldon Wilson, 2004)

It sometimes pains me to pick up straight-to-DVD horror releases. Not because they suck-- though, assuredly, most of them do-- but because I inevitably compare something like Shallow Ground (or the more recent Deadbirds) to (a) the complete unwatchable trash that shows up as "Sci-Fi Channel Original Movies" and (b) the complete only-slightly-more-watchable crap that's coming out in theaters under the horror banner. I can't begin to tell you how much more Shallow Ground deserved to be on a big screen than did the recent Hills Have Eyes or Dark Water remakes or, Jehosephat help us, Haute Tension. Yeah, it's got its problems, but when you put it up against any of the three other films mentioned, or scores of others, it's Oscar material.

The plot: a small town, made into a boomtown by an influx of temporary workers building a dam, is deflating again after the dam is finished. Sherriff Jack Sheppard (Skeleton Man's Timothy Murphy), his deputies Stuart (character actor Stan Kirsch) and Laura (Lindsey Stoddart, whose biggest role until now has been a minor part in The Ring), and town paramedic Darby Owens (Scab's Natalie Avital) are all getting ready to go their separate ways when a stranger wanders into town, naked and covered in blood. Suddenly, there's a reason to hang around town, especially when Jack starts to suspect that to silent man killed Amy Underhill (Tara Killian, of American Pie Presents Band Camp), whose murder still haunts him. The truth, however, is a whole lot weirder...

The script could have used a good rewrite or two for the purpose of patching up holes and doing a bit more character development. This, however, is true of a lot of microbudget movies, and we can't really give points off for it here any more than we did for El Mariachi. Besides, lack of character development is pretty much a staple in horror films, no? I can't help but think, though, this one's got enough stubs from which real characters could grow to make a rewrite (and a remake, preferably with the same connections) worthwhile, in the same way El Mariachi grew into Desperado. But if you look past the script's shortcomings and a relatively silly final scene, this is a fantastic little shocker-- well thought out, with enough plot twists to keep you looking like you're trying to follow Wimbledon, some decent acting (coupled with some scream queen action, but again, in a horror flick that's kind of forgivable), and a good deal of convention-flaunting.

I liked this movie a whole bunch, and I hope it ends up getting the attention it deserves. It's the kind of fresh, new horror film that Hollywood needs to understand is what's going to hook a new generation. Cranking out crappy remakes of good films is going to do nothing more than inspire contempt and desensitization. *** ½

Average customer rating:

Shallow Ground/Vampires: Out for Blood
Starring: Universal 2pak
Manufacturer: Universal Studios
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

General | Horror | Genres | DVD | Video

General | Science Fiction & Fantasy | Genres | DVD | Video

DVDs Under $14.99 | Today's Deals in DVD | Special Features | DVD | Video

( S ) | Titles | Features | DVD | Video