Gallowwalkers

  I'm a pretty big fan of mister Snipes, but that's not to say all his movies are great. I like a handful of them, and then love Blade II. Gallowwalkers is just a misstep. No doubt about that. Critics aren't too harsh on it (meaning those with a blog who've reviewed it...) and audiences have been pretty cruel. I don't think it's godawful, nor do I think it's good. It'll appeal to some people, but it's a mess. For sure. It's about a man named Aman, who is hunting a band of undead guys. Why? Because they raped his girlfriend, who later died in childbirth. Aman is special because he has... guns... or died once. Or something. His mother was a satan worshiper? Or something. You'll find alot is unclear in this movie. Whether you want to blame the script or the editing, it's up to you. They're both haphazard and it's totally fair game to assign blame wherever one would see fit.

  The first act of the movie is the worst in terms of editing. Events are shown out of order, flashbacks, more flashbacks, current stuff... you have to work your ass off to figure it out. I commend anyone who made it to the second act without going: "Huh...?" Villains are shown, and no reason is ever given as to how they came back from the dead. Even the main villain doesn't know why. He's on a quest for answers. Doesn't get any. Neither do we. But this is lazy and makes no sense. We're given the sense early on that there is a much larger picture in play here, but there really isn't. A group of thugs raped a girl, got killed by her boyfriend a year or so later, they came back to life and want to kill him now. Oh and the main villain wants to bring his son back to life, the one villain who didn't get killed by Aman. The villain is dying to know why he didn't return to life, I'm not sure if anyone ever tells him. It's quite clear why though. Which only makes everything else that much more confusing.

  Aman has super strength apparently. He can decapitate these fuckers just by pulling on their hair. It looks as convincing as a Mortal Kombat fatality and might be cool if he did anything else with his power. But for a man who can decapitate people with his bare hands, he prefers to shoot them instead. At one point he recruits some young guy to help him kill these bad guys. We have no idea why he picked this guy at all. If there was a reason, someone probably mumbled it, or the editor cut it out. NO CLUE. So, Aman goes back home to his adoptive mother, new guy in tow. And apparently Aman has a death trap maze of zombies underground there where he randomly drops the guy and lets him fend for himself in the most half-assed "training" bullshit ever. The editing around ALL of this is simply atrocious.

  So Aman offers the guy a bunch of silver to help defend his place against the bad guys, who're hunting for him or something now... or looking for a woman. I don't really know. It was a chore to sit through. If you haven't quite gotten an idea of the amount of bullshit in the movie by now, you clearly haven't been reading. I shall pay the movie it's due diligence though. I gotta say, the special effects aren't bad. The majority of them are practical effects surprisingly. Which was refreshing. Several people get their heads blown off, and it's all done with good ol' fashioned effects. Lovely. Really. I enjoyed that. Sadly, despite the decapitations and shootouts, this movie is too damn slow to be a bloodbath. The makeup effects are also really cool and top shelf. There's a skinless man in the movie for a bit. He looks fantastic. Sadly he's not shown for long. Then, amongst the gang of undead dudes, they wear the skin and faces of other people. One of them, had the bright idea to wear some lizard skins and iguana tails. It looked really cool and unique.

  That's the extent of good in Gallowwalkers. It wasn't exactly boring, and things came relatively into focus by the second act, but there's too much going on and none of it is done that well. If the whole movie was played out in a linear fashion, it might've been better. It's a mediocre western, barely a horror movie, and it just... isn't worth it in my opinion. Just go watch Blade II again. Much better flick. More entertaining by far.
Snipes is sleepwalking through this role. A role he could play blindfolded and shackled. Not much to say there. It's nice to see him in a movie again, but he can do and should do better.