By Forris Day Jr.
This is something you don’t often see in an indie film. An epic story. A story of Gods, good and evil, battling for humanity over the ages. In “Nightscape: Dark Reign of Thanatos” the God Zelos has created the Earth. He wants to hand the reigns over to his two sons, Aevum and Thanatos, but, like many small businesses that get turned over to the kids in the real world, they proceed to screw up right from the get go. They begin to battle one another, Aevum for good and Thanatos for evil. Thanatos wins and begins his evil reign of terror, but there are Guardians who keep a close eye on Thanatos’ doings and they constantly seek out his dark minions and kill them. Is Aevum truly dead? Does his spirit live on in others? Watch Nightscape and find out.
This film is amazingly a micro-budget film that looks big budget. With sweeping landscape shots and wonderful aerial cinematography of jagged coastline and ancient castles high on the cliffs you forget that this is indeed a student film. As a matter of fact you may not even believe it is a student film right from the beginning with its high concept wardrobe and elegantly designed props, including an array of swords and axes that are any weapons collectors dream. Sure you can kind of see the battle axe that the evil warlord is using is kind of rubbery but you can forgive that fact because it’s just so damn cool looking! Lots of slow motion in here too. I ‘d have to say that was overused a bit, tending to slow the story down, but again, no big deal. Also adding to the big budget feel was the use of a horse. There is a chase scene where two of our heroes are running and hiding from a lone horseman and I’ll tell you what, that horse was daunting. It was no Mr. Ed.
There is a nice little DVD extra at the end where Co-creator Dom Lenoir talks about some behind the scenes stuff, so that is well worth watching after you see the flick. He tells of his and co-creator Tim Osgood’s struggles and successes in producing Nightscape, and how they were shooting for the big budget look and how they succeeded. If you like the Lord of the Rings movies and all that is Hobbit you are in for a surprise with this tale. Rich scenery, top notch acting and a really good story. I highly recommend it.
Rating: 5.5/10 – “Big budget look on a microbudget film”
Buy it here:
http://www.reality-entertainment.com/films/titles/nightscape-dark-reign-of-thanatos