Pulse 2: Afterlife (2008) Reviews

• Absolute Junk!!!

  wyattej20002008-10-24

  Do not see this movie. There, I warned you. It is an absolute pile of garbage. I'm not even talking about the plot, story, screen writing or the acting, I am talking about the way the film was shot. The entire thing is shot in a sound studio next to a blue screen. The first minute of this film look creepy and promising. What follows is an absolute disaster. The actors are not even interacting with one another. It is glaringly obvious that one actor was shot doing his or her part in front of a blue screen, then another, then another, then it was all layered together. None of the actors are even looking at one another because they are not there. This movie sucked, and it looked like hell. What a waste of time and money.

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• If you like the first one, stay away. If you didn't stay away.

  Southboundnorthstar2008-10-04

  I am a huge fan of horror films and I loved the first one, but this was perhaps the most disappointing and distracting film I have ever seen. At no point was this film cogent, constantly hopping from theme to theme and direction to direction. None of the characters ever acted like people facing the end of the world instead staggering through what I can only describe as a directionless ambling incoherent miasma. I wish I could say anything was redeemable but I can't, at no level did it even manage to entertain. If you liked the first film this one will do nothing but upset you as they fail to match the emotional tone or thematic value of the first film. They also consistently violate the rules set forth by the first film as well as their own rules they make up in this one making me wonder if there was anyone at any time paying attention to the consistency of the film. As a fan of good horror I have to rate this as unseeable.

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• What Did I Just Watch?

  Matttttttttttt2008-10-03

  Wow, there are so many bad things to say about this one that I don't know where to begin. Let's start with the obvious: the excessive use of green screen. I'm not lying to you when I tell you that about 90% of the scenes take place in front of a green screen. The use of it in Pulse 2 is just absolutely unnecessary. Do we really need a green screen background when a woman is walking down the street or someone else is walking down the steps? Even just sitting down in a cabin...you guessed it, green screen. It completely detracts from the film because it uses up all of your focus and it's done horribly. When you're watching a film and the background looks like an old video game and DOESN'T MOVE, it's a little ridiculous. The budget on this film must have been a couple thousand dollars since they definitely didn't use any money on the sets or effects. Now, on to the story...also pretty bad. Not only does this film come as a sequel to a horrible remake (Who asked for Pulse 2 by the way?), but it doesn't really fit in with that film too much. In a nutshell, we're given a story of a woman searching for her child who is now with her husband and these computer creatures are chasing them and yadda, yadda, yadda. You begin to realize quite quickly that the story makes little sense and most of the acting is rather awful. There are very few redeeming qualities in Pulse 2. Even when you find something about the film that you might enjoy, it's completely ruined by the constant green-screening of EVERYTHING. Let me say that I'm being generous even with a 3/10. Don't even give this one a rental unless you're desperate to see just how bad it is. And Pulse 3 is on the way soon...God help us all.

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• Craptastic.

  DigitalRevenantX72011-04-11

  PLOT OUTLINE: The world has been invaded by ghosts who enter this realm through computers & cell phones. Michelle Kramer, a single mother who lost custody of her daughter Justine to her unfaithful husband, goes out on the streets looking for her, only to find that the child is actually with her father. Michelle, who is unaware that she is actually dead, tries to get her daughter back while her ex-husband does his best to save the child from her. PULSE was one of a spate of horror films made in Japan during the boom of the late-90s / early 00s. This particular film was the work of Kiyoshi Kurosawa, a filmmaker who was not unlike David Lynch, with his work being almost universally hard to follow due to having murky impenetrable plots. That said, Pulse was the greatest success that Kurosawa ever had, probably due to the strong atmosphere that he had invested in the film. The execs at Hollywood made the decision to conduct a remake. This remake was strictly a mediocre affair, the only good thing it did was having explained all the plot dead-ends that the original failed to do. While it was a rather dull remake, the film only just made its money back, prompting the execs at Dimension Studios to greenlight not one but TWO sequels, of which Pulse 2: Afterlife and Invasion was the first. The man responsible for making the film was Joel Soisson, a director who is known in the industry as a 'hatchet man'; his career consisting of stepping in to finish other people's films & making cheap sequels to genre films. With Pulse 2, Soisson figured that the few fans the remake had would be already familiar with the concept, so he decided not to invest any energy in re-establishing the concept, instead hitting the ground running. The first thing you'd notice about this film is the fact that the film suffers from a very poorly written script. You'd think that having spent close to twenty years in the B-movie gutter would make Soisson a good filmmaker. He does have good experience. But the fact is, Soisson is quite a bad director & even worse writer. The script he delivers for Pulse 2 is written according to cliché & has some absurd characterisations. The female characters here are so badly drawn that the viewer is left groaning. Georgina Rylance, who plays the mother, delivers her shrill characterisation with a completely flat performance that becomes the source of unintentional laughter. The 'surprise' revelation that she is actually a ghost is telegraphed miles in advance & only serves to make the viewer groan in disbelief. As for the rest of the cast, only the male actors manage to give good performances, most notably Jamie Bamber, who plays the father. Bamber is the only actor who gives us reason to feel sympathy for him. Acting & script aside, what really sinks the film is the rampant overuse of digital effects. Most of the background shots & sets consist of still images digitally inserted into the film, the actors doing their thing in front of a green screen. This unimaginative use of CGI is pointless to say the least & reeks of lazy filmmaking. The sets are not the only victims of digitalis imageris insertis – the ghosts themselves look like they were taken from a video game! Another flaw with Soisson's approach is the way he mounts the shocks. The set-pieces – Rylance's uncle covering himself with dead cat entrails; a fat man stripped down to his underwear jumping off a bridge; a gas station attendant pouring petrol all over himself; a man having sex with a partially-disintegrated Boti Bliss – are not only lousy, they veer into bad taste.

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• If you thought PULSE was bad...

  Pigs_rock_122008-12-30

  If you thought PULSE was bad, OOOH just you wait! They made a sequel! If you did happen to see these both, you may at least recognize some of the actors in the first one, however this movie only was supplied with some of the worst. If acting was a draw- back, then understanding what they where talking about was another story. It also used the pleasantly Awful blue screen, where the backdrop... well looked as fake as it was.... While it was vivid and layered with parts atop of another, the actors looked washed-out and out of proportion. Even though I didn't LIKE the first movie, this one just sets another bar! To add, the plot is TERRIBLE, and questionable. And what's up with the father calling his daughter 'squirt'? It was obnoxious and corny, and given the circumstances I wouldn't appreciate it... And the naked girl.... obviously just wanted that thrown in there to widen their target market, and make us laugh even harder they added a fat man jumping off a bridge. Seriously, don't waste your money or your time on this movie like I unfortunately did.

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