Pulse 2: Afterlife DVD: Review By Shelley

THE CAST: I have heard that Jamie Bamber did a great job I the show Battlestar Galactica as Captain Lee ‘Apollo’ Adama and honestly he is the best thing about this film. I also recognized Boti Bliss from her role as Maxine on CSI: Miami. I would love to say she did a fantastic job, but she was basically the token naked girl and did not demonstrate much talent at all. The daughter, Karley Scott Collins, is a beautiful little girl but did not receive much coaching at all because she is emotionless throughout the film. The other two main actors were Georgina Rylance and Todd Giebenhain, neither was impressive.

DIRECTION, CINEMATOGRAPHY AND SPECIAL EFFECTS: Special Effects were appropriate, but the cinematography pretty much ruined the film. With the entire thing being filmed in front of a blue screen, the photography becomes so distracting at points it is difficult to concentrate on the film. It is almost as if you are watching someone playing a video game.

Joel Soisson has directed such films as The Prophecy: Forsaken and Maniac Cop 3: Badge of Silence, needless to say, he has yet to impress with his directorial abilities. Personally I think he should stick to producing movies instead of directing them. He also directed Pulse 3 which I have yet to witness, but I am very apprehensive about picking that one up.

THE GOOD: Pulse 2 is watchable, has a good overall concept and has a couple respectable parts, but I after viewing you have to wonder how they received financing for a third film.

THE BAD: Pulse 2 was shot in its entirety in front of a blue (or green) screen. This becomes obvious after the first ten minutes and to be frank, was utterly distracting. I do not know exactly why this was done this way, but it gave the film a cheap appearance.

This film has a couple redeeming qualities, but not many. It is full of ‘eye rolling’ moments and scenes with absolutely nothing going on. Very little character development causes to viewers to care less about what happens to any of them.

THE STORY (may contain spoilers): Cities are a virtual wasteland because of all the electronics. Very few people have survived the contagion and ghosts are everywhere searching for additional souls to consume. Some of the ‘ghosts’ are in denial and believe they are still among the living. This is the case for Michelle and she is desperately searching for her daughter. Her former husband is also searching for their daughter. Who will find her first? Will Michelle realize she will kill her daughter should she touch her?

EXTRAS: Standard DVD

Deleted scenes

Feature commentary by the filmmakers

First look at Pulse 3

REPLAY VALUE:

BOTTOM LINE: I thought it was strange that the DVD I have is titled Pulse 2 but every DVD cover I see has the title Pulse 2: Afterlife. After doing some research it seems Pulse 2 is the ‘short title’ and the long title is actually Pulse: Afterlife and Invasion. I guess it makes no difference since it is the same film regardless, but I thought it was strange.

I know the first film in this series of three did not receive glowing reviews which was why I was surprised they made two sequels. This seems to be a growing trend, take a movie that is not so great and make a couple direct-to-DVD sequels. My main question is where is all this money coming from and can they honestly recoup production costs?

It is hard for me to recommend this film but if you are like me and enjoyed the first one, you probably would want to watch this one at least once for curiosity sake. However if you miss this one, you are not missing much.

Thanks for reading.