A different way of telling a story

I wanted to like it more than I actually did... But much of the humor totally escaped me and I walked out only mildly impressed.

It’s fine. It's literally the definition of a fine movie. You’ve seen it before, you know every beat and outcome before the characters even do. Only question is how much escapism you’re looking for.

The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

No, this one won't win any awards, but its not too bad either. Anyone who watches this kind of film from time to time has seen much, MUCH worse movies, acting and general film making... The plot is a near identical rip from the 1996 TV miniseries 'The Beast' staring CSI's William Petersen and Charles Martin Smith. If you like that, you'll like this... only less.

They say that there are only a certain number of plots. This movie draws on the play An Enemy of The People for its "outsider spoiling the local economy" plot device. It is also a rehash of Jaws, where interfering with the local fishing takes the place of "driving away the tourists." An Indian-Paleface interracial hatred subplot is tacked on to satisfy Canadian content requirements, and the movie echos the theme of innumerable Westerns. Derivative to a fault. Added non-attraction: hackneyed theme of brave scientist "sticking to his guns" in the face of disbelief and antagonism on the part of both his superiors and the locals.

And this one seems to know just when to attack so that nobody knows it's out there. Just like all its relatives seem to.A lot of influence from Jaws (a nice way to say they ripped off some plot devices from it), but there is a well developed story here. The plot centers not to so much on the creature itself, but the lives (and of course some deaths) of those who have encountered it. Witnesses to its existence are treated like an outcast nut cases, while fishing revenues drop mysteriously and steadily, and mutilated bodies wash up on beaches all over. A few characters are given more dimension than to be just screaming victims, but there is a tad too much talking. It's done to give exposition on the characters and the creature they're up against, but there were probably some better ways to do this.The movie lets the monster remain an unseen foe until near the end, which succeeds at making it more threatening. The monster appears hokey when you do finally see it, although the acting of the people in a life-or-death struggle with the creature is convincing enough to offset this.Overall, decent enough for rainy Saturday afternoon entertainment.

Having said that, it was nice to see a movie that recognised its own limitations and didn't pad out every scene with awful CGI.Don't get me wrong....there is awful CGI at the end, but it brought a warm fuzzy glow to my heart to see them attempting to use more traditional methods to display the monster, or rather, its tentacles.Of course, seeing someone wrap themselves up in a rubber tentacle is never going to be realistic, bringing back memories of old Tarzan movie "crocodile moments", but at least it was different.Because of the lack of effects budget, there was actually some story to this flick. Not terribly involved, but enough that it could comfortably thumb its nose at SciFi Channel movies like Pterodactyl and the like. In fact the monster, as in the B-Movies of yore, makes relatively few appearances until the climax.It is rather predictable and somewhat chortle-inducing. But at least it has the grace to not pretend to be anything other than what it is....a modern B-Movie.SUMMARY: Rubber tentacles notwithstanding, this isn't the worst movie I've ever seen.