FeistyUpper
If you don't like this, we can't be friends.
Ariella Broughton
It is neither dumb nor smart enough to be fun, and spends way too much time with its boring human characters.
Allison Davies
The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.
Logan
By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.
benjaminweber
Daemonium is a strange film. It sets out to do something ambitious: tell a story about good versus evil in a strange world slightly different to our own in an inventive way. Does it succeed? Sort of.The story-telling here is non-linear, and jumps around. This can be brilliant if done well. In this case, it sort of works, however the pieces of the story don't quite fit together at the end, which denies the audience the moment of revelation when everything fits together. At the same time, there clearly is a set timeline there, which leaves the audience frustrated by the plot rather than with a sense of wonder at the bizarreness of it all, as with Un Chien Andalou.Some of the visuals are great. There's one scene where a character has a vision of what has happened in the past, and the way it's shot actually manages to emulate the visual feel of TV programs from the past, such as Star Trek. The visual theme also feels consistent throughout the film.Most of the film is okay. The acting is all either good or okay, with none standing out as particularly bad. Some of the fight scenes are entertaining and exciting. However, towards the end the quality of these scenes begins to drop significantly. The big final fight scene in particular is a big let-down, looking more comical than dramatic.The camera-work needs improving. There is an overuse of Dutch angles, particularly in the opening scene, some of the editing is too choppy, and shakey camera shots happen far too often. So overall, I'm not sure about this one. It has some interesting ideas and has the guts to try them, but it's let down in several places by bad camera-work, or plot inconsistencies. So I give it a 6/10, because there were a lot of good and inventive ideas about both the story and execution. However, not all of these paid off, and other elements, such as the final battle, weren't given the attention they needed.
lucasdluengo
Just wanted to write a review because I completely disagree with half of the reviews here. Most people complain that this movie is incomprehensible. But the plot is pretty straightforward. I have to assume that the problem is in the subtitles or the dubbing. I'm from Argentina and had no problem understanding why the same actress does several roles and why some characters change through the movie. Beyond that, the plot is very original (unless you've seen too much anime), the acting is decent and the FX are pretty good.
Darkdaxter
First off I must say I really enjoyed this movie and the inventive the props and costumes, as well as all the classic horror/thriller homages, and nerdy cultural references (I mean the whole magician seen looked like they took people from Comic Con, and many people in this movie make stuff for conventions like it).Razor starts out as a humble soldier hired into an elite gang of mercenaries (The Wolf Pack) protecting/serving a prestigious government official in a post-apocalyptic Spain. This government official seeks to trade the new Satanic Messiah's corpse to a powerful Archdemon in exchange for power. He breaks the rules for negotiating with demons, showing disrespect and angering him, resulting in his own death and almost the entire wolf pack, save Cortes 'The Wolf' himself (saved by Fulconi's magic, essentially playing possum) and Razor, who naively makes the deal instead. The Archdemon gives Razor demonic power by marring his flesh (similar to the Messiah), but in the process this warps his mind and personality. Razor begins calling himself Razorback and begins a bloody coup, taking almost complete control of Spain, leaving his pregnant wife, Lisa, at home. Mimicking his own ritual, Razorback has cursed his best soldiers (which is why they also have white eyes). The official's wife and a rebel squadron kidnap Lisa with the plan of forcing Razorback's hand.After month's of torture (and a miscarriage), it becomes clear that Razorback no longer cares for her, so their best assassin Arteeka trains Lisa with the promise of revenge against her ex-husband. She becomes Shabira (a sexy bondage ninja), and while trying to infiltrate Razorback's training compound assists in killing Ursula (his second-in- command). Upon seeing the box's marking on a rebel, Razorback becomes curious and eventually discovers the truth: That the Messiah's corpse will eventually be reborn in Hell, giving the Archdemon immense power, and allowing him to freely crossover and rule the world. The time he has left is represented by the dual helix blood hourglass. Furious, Razorback hunts down every magician he can find and orders them to slow or reverse the process. Unfortunately, they only speed it up (he is pained at each incremental drain of life force), so he executes them all.He then changes tactics, building up arms, and seeking to summon the demon again before he reaches full power, and to kill him first. Thus he targets Falconi and puts up a random. Cortes' goons find Falconi in the slums, and he narrowly escapes capture, teleporting himself and Rebecca to the middle of nowhere. It is here he describes how she came to be. She is actually the Archangel Azazel, who came down to conquer Earth. When the Messiah made the original pact with the devil, he gave their magic to humans and used it to imprison her, as she was too powerful to kill at the time (decimating her legion afterwards). Razorback freed her, cut off her wings, surgically wiped her mind, and created three autonomous clones of her (claiming she was one as well).Falconi tries to contact the rebels and stop Razorback's plan but ends up getting turned over instead, and the entire rebel faction is wiped out. Razorback summons the Archdemon, only to have his demonic powers taken away and the demon-hybrid soldiers revolt. Most of his forces die as well (including Kato), leaving Rebecca to fight the demon. Her powers gradually awaken, leading the demon to go Super Saiyan and a fight straight out of your favorite fighting game. Rebecca regains her memories and is about to kill everyone else, when her schoolgirl clone stops her. This reminds Azazel of her kindred angels (and Rebecca's kindred droids), but is a trap to kill her before she finishes regrowing her wings and regaining her power.I don't know why people had such a hard time following this, quite honestly. I only rate it a 9 because it was a bit melodramatic, and there wasn't enough magic. Regardless how you feel about the movie, I think we can all agree that Caro Angus is one of the sexiest beings on the planet.
lemon_magic
I actually wanted to give this movie a 7.5, and not an 8, but the IMDb system doesn't let you do that, so I rounded up, because for all its many problems, this movie won me over. You'll notice that the other reviewers complained about the lack of coherence in the story line. I get that, and I agree with them. This is, in some ways, an awful movie. But it's awful in interesting ways...it's the movie that the first "Underworld" COULD have been. The deal-breaker for most people is going to be that you are dropped into the middle of a situation with very little backstory or exposition or character set up, and you never really get anything more than the barest sketches of anything resembling that as the movie progresses. And characters the movie has been following die abruptly and the movie then switches to OTHER characters who pull out new abilities and fighting moves and backstories from nowhere, with very little justification or setup. So the end result is like watching a series of "Metal Hurlant" episodes, or (as one earlier reviewer cleverly noticed) extended versions of the old animated "Aeon Flux" cartoons.You never know quite what's going on, or why people are doing what they do, and the fact that one actress plays several different roles (with the barest throwaway description of "synthetic combat robots" or some such silliness) only adds to the confusion. However, if you can put up with that, you can groove on some wildly inventive character designs, costumes, makeup, and fight scenes. And for all the lack of actual character development in the screenplay, the actors pump huge amounts of energy into filling out their cardboard roles. "Falcinelli", who seems to be sort of the "hero" in this, is especially good. All you ever learn about him is that he's a low level street wizard who mostly uses a Tarot deck to work his magic and is something of a scoundrel who enjoys cigars...but man, he is fun to watch in action. So: should you watch this? I can't tell what kind of mood you will be in when you start watching, so I can't tell whether it will pull you in or annoy the hell out of you. But you might like it.