Acensbart Excellent but underrated film

Console best movie i've ever seen.

Zandra The movie turns out to be a little better than the average. Starting from a romantic formula often seen in the cinema, it ends in the most predictable (and somewhat bland) way.

Geraldine The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

Coventry I have fond memories of watching the original "Reeker" back in 2005. It was at the Belgian Festival of Fantastic Films and practically the entire theater went wild with enjoyment. Surely the premise was derivative and the wholesome was overall forgettable, but at least it was a totally unpretentious new horror film with neat gore effects, fresh acting performances and a really cool killer character (a smelly grim reaper like serial killer). Nothing more, nothing less. The release of sequel within a couple of years was inevitable, but let it be understood that it wasn't unwelcome at all. In a fair period of three years, writer/director Dave Payne came up with a follow-up that is at least equally entertaining, exciting and fast-paced as the first. Obviously the surprise element has vanished – although even the original wasn't *that* surprising – but Payne inventively compensates this through adding a background to the killer, even more black humor and barbaric gross-out effects. The main difference with "Reeker" is that the characters become conscious of the situation they're in relatively quick and actually attempt to make it out of there. Whether some of them succeed or not is what keeps the film reasonably suspenseful. "No Man's Land" opens bizarrely, in the year 1978, with the arrest and execution of a serial killer known as the Death Valley Drifter. He doesn't even bother to resist because the voices in his sick head keep telling him that his work on earth is done and a much bigger errand awaits him. Jumping forward to present time in the same desert, where a retiring Sheriff and his estranged deputy son literally bump into a couple of fugitive casino robbers. Subsequent to some gunfire and a car explosion, the posse find themselves isolated and abandoned in the desert, with a heavily stinking and vigorous "shape" chasing them. In this type of films, when you already know from beforehand what the major twist will be, it's still a lot of fun to pay close attention and fit all pieces of the puzzle together yourself. The script of "Rise of the Reeker" leaves plentiful of clues for alert viewers, but offers even more exhilaration and bloodshed for undemanding horror fanatics. Good performances, particularly from Michael Robert Brandon and the beautiful Valerie Cruz, surefooted direction and a marvelously depressing setting as well. Overall a much recommended film to fans of the genre.

Paul Andrews No Man's Land: The Rise of Reeker is set on a lonely strip of desert road in the middle of nowhere at a dusty diner & motel, on the day of his retirement Sheriff McAllister (Robert Pine) is about to hand the reins over to his son Deputy Harris McAllister (Michael Muhney) & are discussing things in the diner when a situation breaks out. There casino robbers on the run from the law arrive, one looking for his (very hot) ex-friend Maya (Mircea Monroe) who is a waitress at the diner. All hell breaks loose, a shoot-out between cops & robbers ensues & they all end up stranded there, cut off from the outside world by an invisible barrier & terrorised by a smelly ghostly killer but that's just the start of their nightmare...Like the original Reeker (2005) this was written, produced & directed by Dave Payne who also composed the musical score on both films & is basically more or less a straight remake as opposed to a sequel & I think it's telling that the number 2 doesn't actually appear in the title anywhere. I think that those who have not seen the original Reeker will enjoy No Man's Land: The Rise of Reeker more than those who have since all the twist's & turns are exactly the same in both films especially the ending. Those who have seen the original Reeker will know exactly how this will end which obviously takes a lot away from the film, the original wasn't even anything that different anyway since the twist had already been done before & in a much better capacity in the excellent Dead End (2003) a couple of years previously so there's definitely a strong sense of déjà vu here with No Man's Land: The Rise of Reeker (God I hate that title). Forgetting about the original & the not very original twist ending on which the whole film hangs No Man's Land: The Rise of Reeker taken on it's own merits is fairly enjoyable with a nice pace, some good action, a plot that entertains, some humorous moments & dialogue, some spunky character's that are quite likable & one blonde bird who is drop dead gorgeous (call me weird but even when she is heard talking about someone taking a stinky sh*t in a grease pan she still came across as hot to me), some nice gore effects & one or two nice sequences that add up a better than average horror film & as I have said those not familiar with the original & therefore not expecting or know about the twist ending will find an enjoyable little twist filled horror film that delivers on several counts. Unfortunately those who have seen or know about the original can't help but know exactly where the film is going within the first fifteen minutes which is not good. So there you have it really, whether you like No Man's Land: Rise Reeker & how effective it's twist's & turns are will depend if you can guess or already know about it's ending & that's basically what it boils down to in a nutshell. Also one has to say that writer & director Payne has tried to expand on some of the ideas & themes of his original almost as if he was trying to explain away some of the ambiguities & mystery of the original, for instance he gives the Reeker more of a specific purpose, he gives it & his potential victims more boundaries & rules in which they function & operate & he even gives the Reeker an origin, birth & back-story which I am not sure was needed but Reeker is beginning to smell (pun intended) of a cheap endless sequel driven franchise based around some sort of monster or gimmick & I think Payne sets the roots for a possible series up here.It's quite interesting to note that although film is a very visual & audio based medium how many times the makers base scenes around bad smells which is something by it's very nature the media of film just cannot accurately convey in any way whatsoever. There's some decent gore on show here like decapitated heads & severed body limbs including a sawn off hand in a sneeky nod to the infamous sawn off foot sequence in Saw (2005), a drill through someones head, a pole stuck through someones body, someones chest is sliced open & some cool CGI computer effects to render half a guy's head & face missing while he is still moving around. The demonic Reeker itself is alright but it's scenes are always filmed with an annoying blurriness & wobbly straight line effect which lessened the impact & distorted the image too much for me.With a supposed budget of about $2,000,000 this was shot in California, Los Angeles for the interiors & Lancaster for the exteriors. It has a pretty slick look to it & feels more polished than the original, the special effects are good & it certainly looks better than most recent low budget horror fare. The cast are alright but no-one I have heard of or seen before although I will just say again that Mircea Monroe is hot in this.No Man's Land: The Rise of Reeker is a better than average horror flick with good gore, good CGI effects, some humour & horror & at only just over 80 odd minutes it's fast paced with some good twist's & turns. The only problem is anyone familiar with the original will have already seen & therefore know about those twist's or turns which on the one hand is one of the films biggest plus points but by a bizarre sort of logic at the same time are one of it's biggest minus points as well.

lastliberal This film first appeared to be a straightforward cops and robbers movie. Three guys rob a casino and manage to land at the same gas station/cafe as a father (Robert Pine) and son (Michael Muhney), one a retiring sheriff, and the other the new man in town, were eating.Then things got weird, as one man gets his head practically torn of, but was still able to walk and talk, another man, who was burning a car, is also walking around, and, I kid you not, some legs without a body were running. Are we in the Twilight Zone or something? But, just when things couldn't get any stranger, we come to the ending where there appears to be a logical explanation to everything we saw. So what were we watching for the last hour? A soul-catcher reborn or someones imagination run amok. It was an interesting film with just the right amount of gore, a lot of laughs, and enough to keep you interested. Well, not totally. Mircea Monroe and Valerie Cruz were nice eye candy, but they could have made it more interesting.

Rabh17 The other reviewers have pointed to this being a 'kind of/sort of' prequel to "Reeker", which I did not see. The other reviewers also said that if you saw "Reeker" then "No Man's Land" will be kind of a letdown.Without having seen the 'Main Event', I think I agree. But if this is your First view, then by all means, it will be entertaining.Without giving away any plot-- a assemblage of characters, including the obligatory 'Fleeing criminals' are holed up at an isolated desert gas station/motel to find they are trapped and being stalked by something Hideous. Starts as a simple, time-worn horror/slasher premise, which can prove to be limp and boring except for either creative laughs or extra buckets of splatter. You know-- a "Jason" in the Desert sort of thing.Except-- this movie takes a vague left turn. It isn't about the Splatter-- though there is a bit of that. It's about some strange, unexplained supernatural rules: Rules that must be adhered to. . .or enforced.Think about it that way as you watch and begin to scratch your head-- then when the end comes, it will all try to snap together. Yeah-- with gaps and loose pieces, but still. That's why I gave it a 7. That plus the notion of a 'Reeker' as a supernatural creature seemed more corny than scary at first glance-- so you think it will be cornball fun and yucks might be disappointed when it doesn't deliver. Instead, I came away from this movie thinking of an episode out of Neil Gaiman's Sandman universe. So to me, this movie was more Supernatural Thriller than Horror. Not the BEST-- but nicely entertaining. Give it a try.