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A Brilliant Conflict

Ok... Let's be honest. It cannot be the best movie but is quite enjoyable. The movie has the potential to develop a great plot for future movies

Worth seeing just to witness how winsome it is.

After seeing the title, you could say it's a neat homage to Tobe Hooper's horror classic "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre". In some regards it's virtually that film, but set on a whaling vessel where the crew (a family; mother and her two sons) practice their trade on unexpected victims. Hey even Gunnar Hansen makes an appearance, but finds himself in the opposite chain of events. A group of international tourists on a whale watching trip in Iceland, find themselves in trouble when their captain is killed in a freak accident. But lucky for them there is a passing former whaling vessel where they are force to take refuge, but to their surprise it's no safe haven as once they step aboard the ship they become the helpless prey. The oddball plot might be thin, but the choice of location was fitting and it did offer a surprise or so. However its bitter, mean-spirited tone that really did surprise me, as it doesn't hide its intentions. Especially since after it kicks into gear, it never lets up setting up its bewildering situation. On the other side of that, I did find the majority of the characters (mainly the victims) quite insufferable and disconnected. Very typical, if dislikeable bunch, with the exception of two characters (played with gusto by Terence Anderson and Pihla Viitala). This means there's a healthy body count and numerous over-the- top slaughter sequences. Blood runs freely. It can get really cartoon- like in its graphic depiction, which does disrupt the suspense and raise a chuckle. But still the script does have that dark humorous edge, which never lets it become too serious. Director Julius Kemp's handling is streamlined, being well-shot and confidently paced. Nothing out the ordinary, but a amusing, rustic splatter horror slasher.

Iceland's equivalent of Texas Chain Saw Massacre's Sawyer clan, a family of ex-whalers with a hatred of foreign tourists, 'rescue' a boatload of people from a disastrous whale-watching trip and subject them to a night of horror.Given the silliness of its title, a playful riff on Tobe Hooper's classic 70s shocker, Reykjavik Whale Watching Massacre is clearly not intended to be taken very seriously—there's a delightfully dark streak of humour and a delicious sense of irony running through the entire film (such as the girl who unwisely goes off with a total stranger at the start of the film staying perfectly safe, whilst her more sensible friend winds up facing danger). Keep this in mind when watching, and the chances are that you'll have lots of fun with this film, Iceland's first splatter movie.Plotwise, the film is undeniably a bit random, with the action lurching all over the place like a ship in a storm, but even though certain aspects of the story are a little hard to fathom out (the ending still has me baffled), the sheer verve and insanity of the piece, combined with lots of well executed violence and some commendable performances from an international cast (Pihla Viitala's Annette makes for a likable heroine; and Gunnar Hansen is surprisingly good as Icelandic sea-dog Captain Pétur), should provide most fans of gory craziness with a solid hour and a half of bonkers entertainment.

A load of tourists go on whale watching sea trip. There's an accident the captain is injured and they call for help. Help comes in the unlikely form of a family of backsea fisherman or fishbillies as the DVD blurb refers to them. I say unlikely because they don't help.This has to be one of the best European slasher films I've seen. It has some good gore done with practical effects and a couple of inventive kills but the thing that raises this above other movies like cold prey (which was good) and trackman (which was bad) is the characterisation. Yes, some of the characters may be a little one dimensional but at least they have some character. You have the down trodden Japanese PA who finally has enough. The three middle aged women on the hunt for young men and the French tourist who says just about every French cliché you can imagine. from oohlala to sacre bleur.Also this movie has some laughs. Some of the dialogue is funny in a very surreal way mainly from the hunchback fishbilly. I enjoyed it a lot more than I expected to and i'm sure on further viewing I'll see more things in it to make me laugh and squirm.

Around twenty minutes into this movie I started to wonder if "Reykjavik Whale Watching Massacre" was meant to be a dark comedy. After all, how could this be a serious horror movie when it included scenes such as a traumatised woman singing Björk's "It's Oh So Quiet" over the loudspeakers of a ship whilst a tragedy occurs on the deck? Or the moment in the movie where the scene suddenly changes to a group of people discussing their love for whales? But if it's a comedy, where are all of the scenes designed to make you laugh - or at least smile? It's almost as though the scriptwriter was as confused about the movie they were making as I was about the movie I was watching.Obviously "Reykjavik Whale Watching Massacre" is a homage to the far superior "Texas Chainsaw Massacre" - the original Leatherface (Gunner Hansen) even shows up here. However, everything that "Texas" did right, "Reykjavik" does wrong and then some. The victims here are some of the most one-dimensional stereotypes you could ever assemble from the loud, drunk Frenchman to the Japanese tourists with their camera gear, and none of them are particularly sympathetic or appealing. The only exception is a young black American man (portrayed by an actor in serious need of accent training) whose sexuality prompts one of the most unrealistic dialogue exchanges i've heard (and that's before you take into account the fact that this exchange takes place whilst the two characters are running for their lives from insane whalers). I'm not even sure who was supposed to be the main character in this movie which shows how problematic the story was.This already unsteady boat is further sunk by gaping holes in logic which will leave you scratching your head in disbelief. For example, early in the movie we're introduced to a character whose presence seems to indicate that our victims have been lured into a trap. However, their fate actually has nothing to do with him but rather an unfortunate (and highly unlikely) accident. This is indicative of the poorly written script in which strangers suddenly and inexplicably relate their life stories to one another merely for the purpose of giving the audience some back-story, or act out of character to set up a specific plot point (see the crazy sequence of events which begins with the line "Your father was a real kamikaze!" for evidence of this).There is only one death scene that is of any interest and the villains aren't terribly memorable. Whilst it's exciting to see a slasher movie emerge from somewhere other than America, I can't recommend "Reykjavik Whale Watching Massacre" due to its many, many flaws. You would be advised not to waste your time and to instead watch a movie like 2006's "Severance" which manages to be both funny and frightening - two things which "Reykjavik Whale Watching Massacre" completely fails to be.