ANTOnline.com - Vanguard Cinema DVF7301D SUGAR CREEK (DVD)

Customer Reviews

Reviewed on 2008-02-05

Weird
Even though it's supposed to be a Western, I would rather categorize it as a Cartoon.
Only in Cartoon's people are able to endure soooo much without expressing pain.
The basic story is good, but how the movie was made is just to weird.
Wil

Reviewed on 2007-12-29

Atrocious....even for a low-budget independent movie !!!
It took two tries for me to watch all of this bewildering mess. I gave up about half way through the first viewing, shaking my head in disbelief that such a confusing mess could actually be financed and released.

The script and acting are frequently below the level of a mediocre high school play, and the truly amateurish direction and editing make the flimsy plot unintelligible. The atrocious editing requires special attention: it effectively destroyed any possibility of comprehension. Scenes are terminated prematurely and the viewer then thrust into another, completely unrelated scene that was already underway.

I watch a lot of independent films, because they generally lack the pretentious, glossy, profit-oriented phoniness of hollywood blockbusters...but this wretched mess makes me question the wisdom of this notion.

As testimony to this movie's complete lack of positive attributes, the only flattering critical comment quoted on the DVD label was from a private review posted on the IMDB; no doubt written by someone associated with the movie itself. It is an industry joke that every movie, no matter how awful, seems to be able to locate or paraphrase some positive quotes from an established critic or publication....but not this one.

I rest my case. This is an amateurish, confusing, poorly conceived and executed waste of time and (apparently very little) money. Please, for the sake of your wallet and faith in independent films, avoid it.

Reviewed on 2007-12-27

boring and disconnected, although plot wraps up well enough
There's an interesting idea at the heart of this logy mess. It appears to me a morality tale about redemption, which seems to preach suffering and repentance rather than fighting back and eye-for-an-eye. On that level, it's trite, predictable, and unrewarding. However if I squint past that, I can see a rather intriguing little revenge flick with an overlay of superstition and fear as a means to control people. That theme, alas, is never really utilized or played out, so maybe that's just my own Rorshach reading of the movie.

Aside from that redeeming kernel of an idea, which has kept my editing/plotbuilding brain churning for the last 48 hours, there is little to recommend here. There are two subplots, told through present-day action and through flashback, and they are only very tenuously connected by an act of murder in 1867 that prompts the present-day action in 1889. Merely saying that may be a spoiler, since you don't find it out until about three-quarters through the movie. Before that point, however, every scene seems to be unconnected to what came before. There are too many main characters, the secondary characters exist only to deliver expository speeches to one another (and thank Ghod for that, or the audience would be TOTALLY lost) and the few attempts at making the bad guys more complex only seem digressionary.

I am a costumer that specializes in nineteenth-century garb, so I could see some effort was made to use appropriate costumes. The cut and cloth are generally accurate, but the details are lacking. No one wears hats like they should, the women go around with their hair all loose, and the clothes are way too clean and new-looking. Those things are easy for me to notice, because those are my area of expertise. Also I can excuse them because they were probably borrowed costumes from people who didn't want their gear all torn up on a low-budget project.

What I can't excuse is the terrible, TERRIBLE editing. The director seems never to have heard of an establishing shot. You never know where these people are, what time of day it is, anything. This gets really confusing when the flashbacks come into play--although the director helps us out there by prefacing every flashback with the same tired close-up of the POV character's eyes, either closed or looking away reflectively, mournfully, regretfully.

Yes, it's a low-budget production, and you could blame the lack of setting on that, but there are ways to work around and even employ those limitations, as The Blair Witch Project famously demonstrated (actually the better parts of the action sequences rather reminded me of Blair Witch). What low-budget does not excuse is poor writing. Having a video camera and a cast to film with it does not make you a writer/director if you cannot tell a story. The acting is not too bad, except for the Sheriff, who cannot cuss naturally, and cannot express himself in any tone lower than a bellow. The other characters more or less get the job done. But their dialogue is terribly inane. Characters say things like, "I realized the only way to fight that kind of evil... is with evil of my own," and, "You won't do anything. It's in your nature to [stand by and] do nothing."

I'm tempted to make some remark about the only way to fight this movie is with an evil review, but this flick is too banal to be evil. It's a lot like its protagonist--ineffectual and in denial about it.

Reviewed on 2007-07-26

Awsome movie!
This is an awsome Western thriller that kept me excited with suspense and terror way up untill the shocking climax and stunning conclusion.
I don't usually like westerns, but I love Dances with Wolves and especially this movie! The ghost crusader guy was creepy and menacing!

Reviewed on 2007-05-31

Sugar Creek is a must see!!!
I watched this movie at the Bare Bones Film Festival in Muskogee, OK and I was totally impressed with the movie. The writer/director had great direction and the actors and actresses were amazing! I am pre-ordering my copy so I don't miss out on the chance to add a great movie to my collection. I don't know who did the horse work on this movie but it was as good as I have seen. The stunt men for the movie were great in all it is one of the best movies I have seen all year.

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SUGAR CREEK (DVD)

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