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USA 2009
Director: Andrew Prendergast
Cast: George Stults, Dawn Olivieri, Michael Shamus Wiles, Alex McArthur, Texas Battle, Polly Shannon
Rating: R & Unrated (DVD)
Release Date: 22 February 2009
Running Time: 1 hour 39 minutes
The Movie Review
The four convicts
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I love creature features or monster movies, it delivers certain amount of thrills and entertainment without taking too much of our emotion or brain-capacity. But these days, most of them are rubbish. In IMDb page for Hydra, the rating is so low, that it would hinder some of you from watching this made-for-TV movie. I don't know whether having no expectation at all help my viewing time, but Hydra is definitely not the worst, in fact, it may just be "watchable". Of course, that is if you are indeed a die-hard monster film fans.
 Hydra from the Greek Mythology
Hydra opens with a scene where we see 4 archeologists/colleagues are exploring a cave somewhere in a remote island to find the ancient Greek temple/the lost chamber of Zeus which houses the Sword of Hercules. Dr. Valerie Cammon (Polly Shannon) and her friend are currently entering a cave opening which she stumbles upon a 4th-century Greek pottery shard with Hydra picture on it while her other two friends, Shin and Panos (Diego Villarreal Garcia), are waiting at the base camp. But suddenly a beast/monster which looks like giant snake but has multiple heads called Hydra slithers around and killing them, leaving only Dr. Valerie as the sole survivor.
Two months later, miles and miles from the same Hydra island, a ship, Aegeas, with four rich and powerful men on board is sailing aimlessly merely looking for a empty island. The intention of these men in seeking an island is somehow not summer-holiday-material, because inside the ship is a chamber containing 4 criminals chained to the floor: Ronnie Kaplan (Texas Battle) the drunk driver, Bob Crick (James Wlcek) the serial-rapist, Gwen Russell (Dawn Olivieri) the husband-killer and Tim Nolan (George Stults from American Bandits: Frank and Jesse James (2010)) the mysterious man!
Apparently, a man named Vincent Camden (Alex McArthur), his wife Dixie (Jana Williams) and the boat Captain Sweet (Michael Shamus Wiles) have organized an exclusive hunting season for these rich dudes who pay Vincent $40 million for a felon-hunting game. All four of them are vengeful people who lost their loved ones because of evil actions of some people. And the 4 shackled prisoners on the ship have committed crime similarly. So, once they arrive on the shore of the Hydra Island, the four human-game are given one day start to explore the island and to escape from the vengeful hunters. Nevertheless, either the hunters of the targets will have another thing to concern... Yep, the chompy-happy Hydra. What will happen to them on this so-called paradise island?
 The dudes here serve only as Hydra fodder
In some country you may find Hydra illegally-titled/stamped/labelled as Tremor 5. Hydra is not even close to Tremors original movie. Hydra is packed full of flaws in every corner with only a few upsides. We're dealing with a serious issue of waste here people... Waste of talent, waste of shooting location, waste of story and waste of time! There are plenty room to inject suspense, drama, comedy or sensuality in Hydra, but the filmmakers just opt to play it straight. The story is so linear and is solely about Bad versus Worse and Worse versus Worst, and then the end! For example, from the acting department..., what a total fakey fakey, such wooden and unbelievably awful acting! And yes, unbelievable because even though I don't know all of them and their overall previous appearances, but at least I know Dawn Oliviera and Michael Shamus Wiles were not this bad and Texas Battle's performances in Final Destination 3 (2006) and Wrong Turn 2: Dead End (2007) are full of emotion. In here, every single cast is like acting in their debut role... except for Dwayne Adway (as Mr. Winters the crew) and George Stults (but only in action scenes).
Sigh... people got hunted in a thriller genre is not a new thing and Hydra should have been able to fully use the beautiful shooting location or develop more drama between the characters. I don't know how old are you, but I don't think seasoned horror fans would be remotely moved by the sight of awful CGI Hydra mutilating CGI victims. The only good thing that manages to make Hydra better than most crappy SyFy Channel horror movies is the fast pacing! Even before hitting 5-minute mark, the Hydra monster has already appeared and mutilating its victim (oh the killing scenes are graphic, but anything but scary). Some people call the pacing as "Rushed" but I call it as "saviour" from stifling the yawn.
> Hydra is cool dude, cekidot in: Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief (2010) and a great classic Jason and the Argonauts (1963).
© iwan pranowo of Movielogy.com
Twitter: @movielogy
posted: Friday, 28 October 2011 04:54 pm
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