The Devil Beneath

Somedays after i come home from work and i just want to relax infront of the TV, i know just the thing that might get me feeling chilled out. I turn on the reality TV series known as Aussie Gold Hunters where we follow different people out in the Australian wildlife looking for gold nuggets. To see these hard workers trying to dig out nuggets in the massive hot Australian heat wave, shows that there still are old school hard workers out there. They get dirty, they sweat and they might even harm themselves but they just keep on working. I hope a younger generation who can be lazy these days watch a show like this and see what working can look like. Everything is not meant to be easy and comfortable. I have to mention that i really appreciate the Australian Whishy known as Bakery Hill that i tried at a Whisky and Beer Festival in Stockholm. It was very tasteful, easy to drink with some nice beer sausages and i might actually buy myself a bottle and try it again. Speaking of Australia there are a numbers of great horror films that has been released from this beautuful country. You have the classics slasher like the 2005 horror film known as Wolf Creek, and then you have one of my personal favourite Australian horror films known as Rogue from 2007. But let´s not talk about these films but mention a film that wasn´t released than many years ago, and let us go back to the year of 2019. This was the year when the Australian horror film The Furries. Directed by Tony D´Aquino, this film tells the story of a woman named Kayla ( Airlie Dodds ) who wakes up inside a box out in the wilderness, having no idea why she is there or who put her there. She finds out that she is chosen to be in a game, where a group of masked people are supposed to kill her out in the wilderness. To survive she must be able to do things she never would have imagined herself doing. The Furies is a fun slasher horror film that reminded me of the 2020 film The Hunt in many ways, except that The Furies is perhaps filled with more gore than The Hunt. If you want to see a great Australian slasher film i suggest you pick of The Furies on DVD or Blu Ray, unless you can see it on Shudder. It is not often these days i come across horror releases from Australia so i was pleasantly surprised to see that a film called The Devil Beneath have come out this year. I noticed that this film is directed by Luke Sparke, who directed the Australian sci fi films Occupation and Occupation: Rainfall, both worth checking out ) and was curious to see what he have done with a horror film. Is this a future classic in Australian horror, or is Devil Beneath not as fun as we were hoping it would be?

Nick ( Dan Ewing ) travel to see his brother Tristan ( Tim Pocock ) who lives at their grandfather´s farm. Tristan show him a letter from their grandfather where he explain that he wants farm´s land to be returned to the local Aboriginals. During Nick´s visit he finds out that Tristan have invited some friends out to the farm to have a good time. What might start off in a positive way, is about to turn into a nightmare.

Devil Beneath starts off pretty interesting and then lands somwhere out in the Australian wilderness from an episode of the classic Australian TV series Neighbors. We get relationship dicsussions and issues between friends, and i get it they wanted to build up some kind of character development. And honestly i don´t feel that interested in all of that, even though i know it might have been needed to make the plot work. But once this film finally starts taking off into the monster theme, this is where The Devil Beneath gets me hooked up. You could probably say that this film reminded me of monster movies of the 80´s such as Watchers with Corey Haim. The difference was of course that in Watchers it was a mutated monster from a classified research laboratory, while inThe Devil Beneath we have a monster that is known from local Aboriginals. The fact that this monster have been known about for a very long time in history makes the story surrounding this beast interesting. So what about the acting and the characters in this film? The acting isn´t top class from all the characters, and i can accept that in an independent film. As long as there are some kind of character that i feel works. Of the characters we find in The Devil Beneath i do enjoy actor Dan Ewing ( who can be seen in both of the sci fi films Occupation ) as the character Nick. The thing i like about the character Nick is that he seems to be the most confident character in this house, especially once all the guests arrives and all the drama begins. I also enjoy the chemistry between Nick and his brother Tristan played by actor Tim Pocock ( who you might recognize from X-Men Origins: Wolverine ). The monster effects may not be the best i have ever seen but i still enjoy the design, and especially the scenes where the monster attacks all the hunters. The final battle is really fun old school monster ingredients inside some kind of underground cave. Director Luke Sparke must have been inspired by old school monster films while he worked on this film, because you can really feel the passion for this genre in some battle scenes. The Devil Beneath will most likely be enjoyed by people who loved action monster movies of the 80´s, and if you happen to be one of these people i think you might appreciate what this film had to offer. I had a good time with The Devil Beneath and i have a feeling you will as well.

Rating: DDD