If you can’t afford Alec Baldwin, just hire his brother Daniel. In doing so, you essentially get the same face and voice but with none of that pesky acting talent or comedic timing. To be fair, even that wouldn’t have done much to redeem Born of Earth, a film about dormant demons resurfacing in greater numbers that could threaten all of human existence on Earth. The premise could work in the hands of a more talented writer and if visualized by a more competent director, unfortunately the respective writing-directing duo of Joseph Thompson and Tommy Brunswick result in a melodramatic film with sloppy camera work that makes the film as painful to watch as it is to follow. To make matters worse, the film’s monsters, the one place where horror films have a chance to be original and make up for disappointments in other areas, resemble rip-offs of creatures from the television series Dead Like Me and are portrayed by people hopping about in bodysuits and masks in a sum of effort that just completely fails on every level.
Years after Danny Kessler’s wife is murdered and his children abducted by a group of shadowy creatures, he still lives haunted by the memories of what he saw that fateful eve. Having been bitten by one of them he’s knows they’re real, and he takes comfort in that because it helps him assert he’s not crazy. Unfortunately, no matter what kind of forensic evidence you have, if you go around telling people that demons are emerging from the ground after millennia of slumber and that they’re responsible for a string of missing persons reports, you’re going to get a lot of strange looks. Unless those people know it’s true. Returning to the town where his life was ruined, Danny finds an ally in the form of a scientist whose studies cross into the paranormal and an enemy in the mayor and sheriff who’d rather the truth about the demons never come to light.
So much went wrong in the creation of Born of Earth, from the writing, acting and creature work to the editing in post-production. Almost every sense of comedic timing is lost upon delivery when the actors butcher the lines, and if one of them happens to get it wrong, editing spoils the effect by lingering awkwardly on one cut. When the mistakes aren’t on the technical side, it comes from execution, like the people in the dark suits playing the demons who look exactly like people in dark suits playing the demons. Not once is makeup or acting for the creatures scary and consequently Born of Earth, with its hokey dialogue and poor monster effects, turns from a would-be horror into an unfortunate comedy.
DVD Bonus Features
Nothing but the film’s trailer.
"Born of Earth" is on sale September 13, 2011 and is rated R. Horror. Directed by Tommy Brunswick. Written by Joseph Thompson. Starring Brad Dourif, Daniel Baldwin.
