PlatinumRead Just so...so bad

Curapedi I cannot think of one single thing that I would change about this film. The acting is incomparable, the directing deft, and the writing poignantly brilliant.

Janis One of the most extraordinary films you will see this year. Take that as you want.

Billy Ollie Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

Michael Ledo Dr. Victor Reed (Jeremy Childs) of Parkland Hospital has created Elizabeth, a genetically spliced clone. He has problems at work with the government, the public, and he has problems at home with the help and Ethan (Isaac Disney). The film gives you enough clues to let you know what is going on without telling you.It is an interesting topic, but poorly scripted. The baby was born with ominous music, I expected it to jump out with fangs eating the hospital staff. It asks questions on cloning, but poorly addresses them. It takes a swipe at being a horror story but doesn't achieve it.Guide: 1 F-bomb . No sex or nudity.

Nigel P This is a relentlessly grim and humourless film – understandably, given the subject matter. Another modern day take on Frankenstein (loosely speaking, most horror stories are), this deals with engineered babies and cloning, and the reaction of modern day media and 'normal' people.Elisabeth is the 'first' of these experiments, and public reaction is exacerbated when one of Doctor Victor's (Jeremy Childs) staff leaks a picture of her to the press: a normal looking child, she nevertheless has an electronic implement injected into her forehead. What follows are various viewpoints presented both for and against Victor's experimentation – for some, it presents hope that certain diseases will be combatted as a result; for others, it represents a violation of their perception of the will of God ('Humans not clones/There's evil among us' they chanted like a mantra).But Elizabeth is not the first experiment. The rampant and deformed Ethan has that dubious honour. Locked in his room, barely shown to the audience, he has behavioural disorders and continues to grow less manageable. One day, Ethan brutally kills the nanny Mary (Shelean Newman).Exhausted, Ethan approaches Victor, having killed Elisabeth in another rage, who embraces him fatherly before giving him a fatal injection. The crowd of protesters outside his home falls silent as Victor shows them Elisabeth's corpse, asking 'Is this who you were afraid of?' Incensed, one protester shoots the doctor, killing him.The subject matter of cloning isn't quite interesting enough to justify its screen time. The characters' reactions to the various developments, Victor's moral dilemma and his belief he is doing positive, progressive work against a whirlwind of protestation and alienation is very well conveyed. But it isn't until Ethan's escape and subsequent blurred violence that things become truly creepy. In the end, when the experiments have presumably come to a shuddering end, will the protesters be happy, or will they simply move on to the next Big Issue and be equally compelled to bring that to an end too?

Metra Ton The indie feeling, the old-school acting, the moral conflict - really gives the movie some depth. Unfortunately, the movie hardly fits the description. When I read it, I expected anything, but this. Cheap slasher, perhaps, or something demonic or some mutation.The idea of cloning is well-established, but it's so diluted by everything going on that it sort of disappears by the time the movie climaxes.Here you have a baby, a science marvel, extremely valuable. But... there you allow second-hand people next to her. There you start getting attached or treating her like a baby. At first, the focus was on her, and that's what the movie was about. From her weird eyes to that needle to whatever else.Then the story of the caretakers, moving the baby to the house... classic cliché of such movies: when a scientist does something on his own - it ends badly.But this secret... The way it was presented at first, it was disturbing. It was suggesting. Hinting at possibilities. But of all the possibilities, I assumed it would be genetic, it would be relevant to the subject.But no... Of all the possibilities, of all the indie flair, even stained with his irritating family, the movie just had to end as a monster slasher. And not just monster slasher, but incredibly stupid at that.A brilliant doctor, who gives enough pity to keep his "secret" alive, but doesn't ever once check up on it? Caretakers, who, against all sense, just don't quit or press the matter? And... with tons of security at the gates - the only resolution ever is to go alone armed with a freaking syringe? The movie starts by actually thrilling you. You feel like it's something unique, it has potential. To discuss the idea of cloning, the reactions, the consequences, even unreal ones.But the bottom line is that cloning is only a background, moral is about as much as religion in The Mist, and the center plot is a monster slasher hidden as a "payback for past sins" of the doctor.It's not a bad movie, it can deliver unease and more... thoughtfulness than modern "indie horrors", but unfortunately it just doesn't end well. Perhaps the movie deserves more, but if there's one thing I, personally, can't stand - is when all the buildup is ruined in the end. Few movies can accomplish that, and this is one of them.

Lowbacca1977 Closer to God is a modern revamp of Frankenstein, and it somewhat straddles the genres of science-fiction and horror, or at least tries to. While there's a large attempt of things that seem scientific, I really feel like that area was so underdeveloped that I just didn't find that at all convincing, even for suspending disbelief for the purposes of a film. It's what comes of a film trying to make some pretty broad claims about science without really exploring or addressing them. The horror film aspect of it has its moments, and while I think it did a very good job of building up tension, it really seemed to fall apart when it came time to cash in on that by being a bit blunt about it, after doing a fairly good job of building up the unease and mystery.There certainly are some other interesting questions that are at least mentioned about what represents humanity and how cloning factors in, and it acknowledges a lot of issues with the ethics, philosophy, and spirituality of cloning, but it doesn't really explore or discuss those issues much. It opens the door to them, and I do give it some credit for not pushing a particular answer to those questions, but I feel like more could have been fleshed out with them.An overall slow pacing, I think it could've been made up for with stronger points, both conceptually and thematically, instead it fizzles out a bit at the end.