Sleeping Beauty (2014)

Self-important, over-dramatic, uninspired.

Clever and entertaining enough to recommend even to members of the 1%

Although I seem to have had higher expectations than I thought, the movie is super entertaining.

Story: It's very simple but honestly that is fine.

Apart from the terrible acting from an okay cast and some dodgy directing, this isn't too bad a story. As a film though, it's only average.Though the cast has B-Movie king Casper Van Dien (who directed this flick), Catherine Oxenberg, and Michael York listed, their worth in this film is minimal. The real bad thing is their lack of spirit is tangible. Poor York is the narrator and appears to have literally phoned his part in. There's no emotion or feeling in his voice; something which is a basic requirement in a narrator. Even though, Van Dein and Oxenberg, as Sleeping Beauties regal parents, are asleep for the majority of the movie they actually appear to be sleepwalking in their "awake" scenes.Even Olivia D'Abo who has a meatier role as the evil witch, Queen Tambria, ofttimes appears to be a somnambulist. The best actors in this little play are the Kings whipping boy, Barrow (Finn Jones) and the Prince Jayson (Edward Lewis French) along with his heavy Gruner (Gil Kolirin), and his soldiers.What this film really appears to be is an exercise in how many Van Dien's you can get on the screen in one film... that would be all of them. Most families would have a picnic... the Van Diens make a movie.The one thing that did surprise me was the location. For one, it actually worked. It even reminded me a little of the Hammer House Of Horror sets of far-off European principalities - it even came with a graveyard and earth clawing walking dead. Even the inside locations were decent. It was a delight to see proper stone walls. I would love to live in that mansion come castle.That said, there were a lot of gaping holes in the story that Dien should have ironed out when filming. For example, there's one scene where Prince Jayson sends Barrow up the castle walls to secure a rope through the only open window. Instead of getting him to check the place out while he's up there, he orders him to come straight down and they will camp in the courtyard, for the night. Then later the next day, they're being chased by dead warriors and climb the rope to escape only to find it leads to a balcony, with no entrance into the castle... hhhmmm, if only somebody had looked around before then they wouldn't be in this predicament. I cannot believe they were so stupid back then. This is bad writing and directing.There are some nice beasties in the film, though you can see when the budget started to run low. The lake monster is pretty good, as is the one which scales the outside of the building the first night they're there. However, near the climax of the film, the same monster is looking pretty funny and quite unrealistic as it prowls the dungeons.On the whole, this film could have been a hell of a lot better had the "Quality" cast put the effort into their portrayals of their characters... the story had been tightened and all the holes filled... and ropey special effects thrown onto the cutting room floor. You shouldn't rely on CGI if the budget won't carry it, find another way round to entertain the audience.If there's very little on the telly and it's miserable outside then you could give this a try. It'll waste an hour and a half.

I think my title says it all. No sense giving too much away. Asylum manages to capitalize on the zombie craze from Abraham Lincoln to Sleeping Beauty. After all, its all about the green. No sense wasting money on James Earl Jones, for an announcer when Michael York needs the work. Having Casper Van Dien and his family direct and star in the film was some more Asylum genius as no one has mastered the faux-Elizabeathan accent like them. Sleeping Beauty was named "Dawn." Again, how clever is that, especially when Casper Van Dien is made up to look like Tony Orlando.Then there is the almost Monty-Pythonesque language:Prince: "What is that?" Aide "The undead my liege." Prince "Run!"Asylum has really outdone themselves with this mockbuster.

Every now and and then I'll get a movie about which I know very little. After all, it can be an exciting way to discover those unknown hidden gems. This movie is not one of those gems. Sometimes a movie is so bad that I feel compelled to review it in a desperate attempt to save others the money I've wasted. This is *that* movie.It is shallow, disjointed, two dimensional and lacking any real discernible acting or directorial talent. The characters lack substance, or anything approaching a realistic thought or emotion. The story pays bare lip service to the original, which in itself would be fine, if the replacement contained any actual story line or drama. The moral of the story/film is not something from which you'd want your son or daughter learning. But then it doesn't really have a moral. Or a story.This seems strange given it is almost singlehandedly a creation of the Van Dien clan. The title role being blandly and subserviently played by daughter Grace who doesn't demonstrate any character which could place her as a female role model and develop her career (her entire existence can be encapsulated as too stupid to not touch spindle knowing what it represents, needs prince to wake her, instantly becomes his, and has his baby), while daddy Casper writes/directs and plays her dad and step mum Catherine Oxenberg plays mum. Two other kiddies have small roles too. The movie may have benefited from open auditions to get talented actors rather than just family members, but then it is possible that the writing was so bad that no-one with any actual ability wanted any of the roles.The budget is clearly low as the special effects are quite ordinary by 2014 standards, although if the story and acting were up to par, the effects probably wouldn't have mattered much. It is clearly not a kid-safe version with some unnecessary and graphic violence, which adds nothing to the movie, except perhaps confusion about who the target audience is.In a time when classic fairy tales are regularly being cleverly reinvented on our screens with strong female leads and complex characters, this movie completely misses the opportunity. Disappointing is probably the best that can be said of this production. It probably doesn't help that it is one of three movies in the same year re-telling the same fairy tale. While I haven't seen the other 2014 Sleeping Beauty, I cannot envisage it being as bad as this one, and Maleficent is a clear choice here instead.

I was keenly interested to see what I expected to be a modern retelling of an old fairy tale, enhanced with fine acting and superb special effects. The story was interesting, and the characters and settings were well presented and costuming was pretty good, and the quality of the filming was acceptable. Unfortunately, my expectations regarding acting and effects were far from met. Even the inclusion of zombies failed to lift this movie from it's lack of brilliance or vitality. The acting was poor all around, and the obvious attempt to embed some credibility by having the narration done by Michael York proved too little. Special effects would have been spectacular 40 years ago, but obviously by modern standards they fell dreadfully short of the mark. Amazed that I saw it through, I would not recommend this movie as a must see - more as a must avoid.