Movie Review: Marked

Posted by Natasha Bennett Saturday, January 1, 2011

Well...dangit, I was hoping to have one more bad movie on this box set to review, but then Asylum Studios decides to croak out something good for once.  Don’t get me wrong-this is not a particularly ‘good’ movie, one that I would recommend watching in theatres. A good movie for Asylum Studios means an average one in the real world...or a good movie that has been ripped off exceptionally well.  Even stranger, Marked was produced by the same company which also produced Passed the Door of Darkness, and even has some of the same actors. You would think the dialogue is atrocious and I should hate this movie...but I don’t.





The plot is thus-a young woman named Diella survives a rapist attack and her assailant is killed. Years later, Diella is a paranormal investigator who joined the field because she always feels the ghost of her attacker nearby. As it turns out, he somehow marked her and is trying to possess her body, creating an act of ‘pure evil unleashed’ in the process.

As I said, this is an average movie. There are some minor plotholes, and some characters who just badly need to die before they even made it to the concept stage.  How this movie works, however, is the relationship the two main characters, Diella and her brother Mitch. Mitch doesn’t believe in the paranormal, but he feels guilty because he wasn’t around to help Diella during her attack years ago. She, on the other hand, believes her brother is a chronic alcoholic and tends to disregard his help, even when it’s perfectly logical.



However, this movie has a few flaws, primarily subplots that go nowhere. Somehow an evil cult sprang out of this movie. Why? Because they think it would be cool to see Diella possessed I guess. There’s another subplot with one of the investigators becoming a cynic, and it doesn’t pay off in any way. Plus the movie has a weird fascination of inserting grainy effects during spooky scenes, which look overall jarring. The ending, however, is pretty interesting. 

FINAL GRADE: 2 out of 5. Average, but it’s more than what I usually expect from Asylum Studios.

And that concludes my four movie package. I will never have to review another movie from Asylum Studios again. Whew, what a nightmare! Hm...what’s this unopened box near the Christmas tree? Another present? That’s so swe-AAAAHHHHHHH!

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3 comments
  1. Chris H Said,

    An evil cult? That reminds me of Hellraiser 7 (there are 7 Hellraiser movies? Holy crap): Deader, a movie that might have been decent if it hadn't been cannibalized into a Hellraiser movie by the studio. Naturally that film has jack shit to do with the Hellraiser series other than Pinhead popping up for his usual 1 minute cameo.
    And if your lucky, that present under the tree might be The Asylum's Sherlock Holmes. Not only is it their first genuinely good, entertaining movie, it's also bizarrely awesome and absurd.

    Posted on January 1, 2011 at 9:47 PM

     
  2. Chris H Said,

    And they've struck gold again with their just-been-released Mega Shark vs Crocosaurus, a movie that improves on everything it's predecessor failed at.

    Posted on January 2, 2011 at 7:29 PM

     
  3. Chris H Said,

    And they've struck gold again with their just-been-released Mega Shark vs Crocosaurus, a movie that improves on everything it's predecessor (being a mostly boring film) failed at.

    Posted on January 2, 2011 at 7:31 PM