SYNOPSIS:
Jamie Bamber (Battlestar Gallactica) stars in this terrifying sequel that picks up where the original Pulse left off. The dead have found a way back to our world - through cell phones and WiFi - and the human survivors have taken to remote areas to escape. When a young girl goes missing, her father must return to the city to battle her mother's vengeful ghost, along with a host of other horrifying ghouls. Intense, suspenseful, and terrifying, Pulse 2 will frighten you straight through to its shocking ending.
MOVIE REVIEW:
There’s actually a market for direct to home video sequels of modest box office hits, a market that’s the reason why movies such as this and its successor, Pulse 3 (2008) get made. In that market, Joel Soisson is quite a name to be reckoned with, the guy having written and/or directed three sequels to The Prophecy (1995), two to Wes Craven’s Dracula (2000) and one to Hollow Man (2000).
Soisson writes and directs this sequel to the US-remake Pulse (2006) of the Japanese horror hit, Kairo. The movie picks up right where its predecessor left off, so for those unfamiliar with what’s happened so far, here’s a recap.
The dead have apparently found a way back into our world through our cellphones, laptops and other electronic devices, causing users to commit suicide and join them in their unending thirst for more souls. Oh, and there’s also something else about red being the only frequency that these ghosts cannot move through, hence its use as some sort of protection.
You’ll do well to remember this if you’re indeed keen on checking this out, since Pulse 2 actually doesn’t provide you any hint or explanation behind what’s going on. Yes, it’ll help you understand why in its opening scene, a guy covers himself head-to-toe in red before stepping out of the house. But never mind about him- the rest of the movie revolves around a woman Michelle and her ex-husband Stephen (Jamie Bamber) looking for their daughter Justine, except that Michelle is in one dimension, Stephen and Justine on another.
Soisson tells the movie from two different perspectives, the living and the dead, and I won’t spoil the surprise for you whose is which, because the film offers very few pleasures, and this is one of them. Indeed, there isn’t much to enjoy here, simply because there’s in fact nothing much happening, except of course that those among the living are trying to escape from those among the dead.
But throughout the whole movie, you only get to see about five of those ghosts, flickering like television images moving through the city. Low-budget though this may be, it doesn’t excuse the horrific lack of any suspense or buildup towards its climax. Heck, how much does it take to clone a few more of those ghosts to roam around the streets?
What really takes the cake is the obsessive use of green screen throughout the movie- more than three-quarters in fact- and boy does it show! There are more than a couple of scenes where the characters look like they are walking past some wallpaper behind them- that’s how fake the backgrounds look.
Soisson has in the past churned out more than watchable stuff but Pulse 2 is sadly not one of them. This is bottom of the barrel bad, a movie whose title is really a misnomer- since it really is dead on arrival. And as well, you’re probably best advised to stay away from Soisson’s Pulse 3 (2008) too and hope that that’s the end of it.
SPECIAL FEATURES :
This Code 3 DVD contains no extra features.
AUDIO/VISUAL:
Images are sharp enough especially during the movie’s many dimly lit scenes. The movie could do better than the disc’s Dolby 2.0 audio especially during the scare scenes that clearly would have benefited from some surround effects.
MOVIE RATING:
 
DVD
RATING :
Review
by Gabriel Chong
Posted on 10 June 2009
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