Monster Island (2025)

"Monster Island" as a concept showed promise.Regrettably, no one seemed to have any idea, what to do with this 1950's style, retro monster story.

This film literally wanders around aimlessly, for the majority of its run time. What it should have done, is quickly establish a survivalist tale, where the underdog protagonists, take risks and set traps, to defeat the vicious humanoid amphibian creatures, stalking them.

In summary, strong casting choices, plus a great retro concept, that could have worked so well, had the script had a clear purpose and direction. As its stands, a mediocre watch.

55/100

A WWII Japanese prisoner ship is destroyed and 2 prisoners, a Japanese spy and British soldier, are stranded on an island with a gruesome creature. This was pretty good when it focused on the confrontation with the creature; its looks and actions were extremely savage and the kills were gory, graphic and quite violent. The characters were likable and I enjoyed their relationship going from enemies to comrades in their fight for survival. However, there isn't a lot of story here with long instances of padding and silence to stretch it out. Worth a watch though. -- DrNostromo.com

Lovely monster, good enough story
The story is basic, and works really well. There is a reason why basic things work, and we don't need to elaborate that much further on it.

The monster - it is just lovely. It gets the right sort of exposure to make it seem menacing and deadly, you get it revealed in a good way and it looks great on camera. I have always been one for good monsters, and this tickled my fancy!