Smartorhypo Highly Overrated But Still Good

Matylda Swan It is a whirlwind of delight --- attractive actors, stunning couture, spectacular sets and outrageous parties.

Fatma Suarez The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

Juana what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.

Leofwine_draca THE UNGODLY is another film in the recent trend for found-footage style serial killer films, a la THE LAST HORROR MOVIE and others. The granddaddy of all these is the seminal '80s film HENRY: PORTRAIT OF A SERIAL KILLER, with its unremitting bleakness and harsh realism that enhanced the grisly sights the film had to offer.I'll admit that THE UNGODLY is a little better than the usual barrel-scraping stuff that fills the genre these days (including the horrendous Spanish film, H6: DIARY OF A SERIAL KILLER, and the Uwe Boll-made SEED). The production values are pretty good, and the director elicits two solid central performances: Mark Borkowski has the relatively straightforward role of the killer, while Wes Bentley (AMERICAN BEAUTY) shines as the film-making student who finds himself drawn into an incredibly dark world.Thankfully, THE UNGODLY is better plotted than other serial killer movies I've seen, and it retains your interest throughout. It's also thankfully not as gruesome as others I've mentioned, although the material is still more than disturbing. I can't say I enjoy watching films like this, but I can appreciate what the director and writer were trying to achieve.

Raul Faust "The Ungodly" has an original story, involving a serial killer and a filmmaker that films everything he does, in order to make a daring documentary. Things don't happen as planned-- of course-, and filmmaker seems himself in a big trouble once the killer involves his mother. One thing I have to ask-- is it that easy to get away with murder in the USA? I mean, he kills lots of people and simply walks away, with no police after him or anything like that. I really don't know what went wrong with this picture, but I found the first half hour very boring and uninteresting. Maybe because the plot is too simple; maybe because we're tired of movie with people filming everything, or maybe because it just plains bad. Nothing bad-- or good- to say about acting, directing and development. It's just an ordinary movie, but didn't entertain nor pleased me. Just pass it.

Maine_Druid Okay...I watched this film last night on Showtime; something else was scheduled, but when this movie appeared instead, I didn't change the channel.I will not fault "The Ungodly" on either the plot or the acting, although the title cannot have been what the filmmakers originally intended. The film is very novelistic, and I would not be surprised if it had been a novel originally. The unreality of much of what occurs, as well as the conduct/misconduct of the characters is, I believe, due to the fact that it is intended as more of a morality play than as a drama.Didn't anyone notice all the parallelism between the central characters? Such as the impaired relationship with the mother, the addiction (note especially the scene in the hospital elevator), not to mention the fact that in the end one character essentially becomes the other.And didn't anyone notice that this is a film about a filmmaker? Movie-within-movie suggests strongly taking another step back, to watch ourselves as audience members. Don't we, to some degree, share in the filmmaker's fascination with his subject? And doesn't that implicate us in acts of evil? And, speaking of watching in fascination, didn't anyone notice the theme of sight and blindness? The rape victim is commanded to keep her eyes on her violator so that evil will be fully witnessed. The serial killer craved more than anything else for his own abuse as a child to be witnessed, which is a major component of psychological healing. He needed the voyeuristic camera as an addict needs his/her drug: compulsively, unwillingly, fatalistically.Of all the ways the killer's mother could have been killed herself at the end, the weapon of choice (the pillow) was the only one that cut off sight at the same time it cut off breath.All of the action leads up to this climax, both dramatically and psychologically. There is a sense in which the whole thing is a particularly complex dream that has been brought to analysis. If one thinks of all the characters as being aspects of the same individual, it becomes much more coherent.I don't have either the time or the inclination to do a full critique of this film, but I am tossing these tidbits into the mix for the contemplation of others. I believe "The Ungodly" is a better movie than most commentators, because of its multiple strands of meaning and its...er...satisfying conclusion, in which the eyes are at last wide open, as if having finally awakened from a nightmare.

Vomitron_G Now which movie-lover doesn't love the following: You walk into a theater having absolutely no expectations whatsoever concerning the film you're about to watch. Then you walk out, approximately 90 minutes later, deeply impressed about what you've just seen on the big screen. Shamefully, I have to admit that my case was even a bit worse (and therefore the experience was even a bit better): I already had some expectations walking into that theater, and they weren't very optimistic. I assumed a film with a premise like THE UNGODLY could be either very good or it would just suck big-time. Nothing in-between. Just to be on the safe side, I was betting on the latter. Never was I so foolishly wrong. THE UNGODLY can easily be considered as one of the best movies about a serial killer to come out over the last 20 years (or even longer, if you take in consideration excellent movies like DERANGED and HENRY: A PORTRAIT OF A SERIAL KILLER).Actor Wes Bentley (the teenager with the cam-corder in American BEAUTY) is allowed to play with a bigger camera this time. He portrays Mickey Gravitski, a struggling filmmaker with no job and a severe alcohol & drug addiction. One night, he coincidentally succeeds in recording a murder committed by a notorious serial killer. However, it turns out that it wasn't all that of a coincidence that Mickey was at the right place at the right time the night of the murder. Mickey gets in touch with serial killer James Lemac and uses his footage to blackmail him. He wants Lemac to be the subject of his documentary.Being from Belgium myself (and after having read the synopsis) I couldn't help but thinking about our own Belgian little movie (our national cinematographic pride & joy, if you will) with the same subject matter released in 1992: C'EST ARRIVÉ PRÈS DE CHEZ VOUS (AKA MAN BITES DOG). And that was also the reason for my distrust: A movie with the same shaky documentary-style camera, without the outrageous black humor but with lame semi-philosophical twaddle instead? Wrong! Director Thomas Dunn indeed keeps the camera close to the actors' skin and the cinematography is often dark, gritty and depressing. But it always feels like a real film. The two most stellar elements of THE UNGODLY are the two leading actors and the plot. I don't know if Wes Bentley also might have any hidden comedian talents, but he sure can put down very believable, serious characters with rough edges. The young man simply looks tormented throughout the whole movie. But the most positive surprise definitely was newcomer writer/actor Mark Borkowski. He's not even a very young guy anymore, so where has he been all of his life? The way he shuffles around on screen, his (figuratively) scarred character-face, his sudden violent outbursts and especially his Brooklyn accent made me think a lot about Harvey Keitel. And I'm even convinced our dear Harvey couldn't have portrayed James Lemac in a better fashion.And then I also mentioned the plot, right? Well, instead of just registering Lemac's deeds & commentary and following him with a camera (much like the aforementioned MAN BITES DOG and HENRY did), THE UNGODLY manages to tell an intriguing story that even takes a few curves into the unexpected. The psychological cat & mouse power-plays between Mickey and James (who's blackmailing who actually?) are finger-licking good. And then there's the ultimate cliché that every killer somehow has to be traumatized by a tyrannical mother during his child-years. Well this movie actually does something with that concept. I was grinning and shocked at the same time when that subplot unfolded on the screen.It all adds up to THE UNGODLY being one of the most pleasant theatrical surprises I've encountered in a long time. I'll try to temper my enthusiasm and keep myself from rating it a 10/10 yet. But to me THE UNGODLY already earned its place in my personal "Serial Killer Hall Of Fame". And now please let the godless keep on killing... It produces great cinema!