The Survivor (1981)

Director: David Hemmings

Starring: Robert Powell, Jenny Agutter, Joseph Cotten

When an airline pilot survives a crash that kills all 300 passengers, he works with a psychic and a priest to find the culprit behind the incident and pacify the souls of the victims.

‘The Survivor’ is not to be confused with 1984’s ‘Sole Survivor’, which is also about a plane crash leaving only one survivor.

I’ll start by saying ‘The Survivor’ had the potential to be so much better, but no thanks to the director’s vision of the film and choppy editing, I found the film difficult to follow at times. There literally were moments in the film where I had no idea what the hell was going on. To add to this, many scenes were so dark that one could hardly follow the action.

After a confusing start of various images edited together, a plane crashes, killing everyone on board except pilot David Keller (Robert Powerll). Not being able to remember anything since taking off, David is trying to find out what happened.

Clairvoyant Hobbs (Jenny Agutter) – a rather strange character in her own right – seems to have some sort of connection with the victims, and contacts David. She feels she was somehow involved with the accident. I didn’t fully understand this character, nor their quest for answers. At times the film seemed to have a supernatural edge, but when the reveal came it had nothing to do with supernatural powers. Speaking of which, I can’t say I agree with the twist ending.

‘The Survivor’ has a confusing premise and I won’t be surprised if I forget this in an instant.

Surprisingly, the film won an award for Best Screenplay. It also received award nominations for Best Lead Actress, Best Achievement in Sound, Best Achievement in Production Design, and Best Achievement in Cinematography. I think I must have missed something here…

‘The Survivor’ might be classified as a horror, but there’s no horror here. Thriller at best.

Would I watch it again? No.

Prey (2024)

Director: Mukunda Michael Dewil

Starring: Ryan Phillippe, Emile Hirsch, Mohamed Hakeemshady, Emile Hirsch

A young couple is compelled to leave their Christian missionary station in the Kalahari Desert after being threatened with death by an extremist militant gang. After crashing their aircraft they must battle man and beast for their lives.

Oh, no, not ANOTHER lion movie called ‘Prey’! We had ‘Prey’ in 2007, ‘Prooi’ in 2016 (Prooi being dutch for Prey), and now again! Then there was the 2022 ‘Predator’ prequel also called ‘Prey’. All too confusing…

The film’s alternate title is ‘Kalahari’, and now it sounds all too much like 1965’s ‘Sands of the Kalahari’, which is about a small plane flying to Johannesburg crashing in the Kalahari. Only, in that movie there are baboons and no lions. ‘Prey’ sees a private plane (flying to Johannesburg) carrying a handful of passengers crash landing in the Kalahari, and the survivors are being hunted by lions – blah-blah-blah.

‘Prey’ (aka Kalahari) is as B as a B-movie gets. Very little was explained about why the handful of passengers had to make use of the private plane and the characters were bland and one-dimensional. As a result I didn’t root for any of them. In short, I simply didn’t care about any of the characters. What the hell is Ryan Phillippe doing in a film like this?? Someone get the man a new agent!!

If you were hoping to see lion attacks here, forget it; there are none. There are lions, yes, and there are attacks, yes, but nothing is shown on screen!! The attacks are pretty much left to the viewer’s imagination. Now, this is as cheap as it gets. I mean, honestly, this film is from the bottom of the cheap barrel!! The plain wreck looked like a cardboard cut-out!!!! I’m not joking, it literally looked like a thing that was made out of cardboard with windows being painted on it!! Give me a moment while I compose myself and try to stop laughing…!!!!

Why on earth did Green Light Pictures greenlit this?? It’s a horrible script, and even worse in its execution. Every attempt at adding emotional depth – or horror for that matter – failed miserably. This is as forgettable as they come. If you’re into lion movies, ‘The Ghost and the Darkness’ is still the king of them all! 2022’s ‘Beast’ starring Idris Elba was by no means a good lion movie, but it was far superior to ‘Prey’. In fact, compared to ‘Prey’, ‘Beast’ is a masterpiece in film making!!! The best thing about ‘Prey’ is its poster!! Pffff!!!!

Would I watch it again? Not even to make fun of, no…