Cerberus (2005) Reviews

• S10 Reviews: Cerberus (2005)

  suspiria102005-11-14

  S10 Rating: * * 'Cerberus' is a pretty typical SciFi Channel presentation. An interesting premise of the infamous mythical three-headed dog protecting a sword that render the possessor invincibility. The sword was used bu Attila the Hun so that explains his conquering of the little people of his time. As usually a nefarious scheme is hatched by an equally nefarious madman who then sends some mercenaries to grab the little party favor. Of course the lead merc enjoys his taste of power and commences to do his thing while the good guys and girl deal with the dog and now the greedy merc turned madman. Oh the joys of paint-by-numbers made-for-TV cinema. The acting was ho-hum and the direction is plain. The effects were bad as you'd expect but for whatever reason I found it still watchable.

• Watchable- there is a three headed dog.

  Skutter-22006-10-15

  The kind of thing you would expect for a low budget straight to DVD (Or Sci-fi channel) release. Basically the only reason anybody would watch this movie is to see a big three headed dog chomping on people. It doesn't deliver on that front as much one would hope, particularly in the first half which involves some pretty dull action stuff as our bland heroes and cookie cutter villains search for a magic sword (The sword of Mars, which apparently belonged to Attila the Hun if you're that interested). Things liven up a bit in the second half when the dodgy CGI Cerberus shows up and one of the bad guys gets hold the invulnerability granting sword. The plot is pretty dumb as one would expect. The level of intelligence you can expect from this movie is evident from the first scene which involves a robbery of museum in eastern Europe by the bad guys involving guys jumping through skylights with machine guns and grappling to the ground. I somehow doubt the level of security in a place like that is such that it would necessitate such an elaborate armed robbery. I guess the makers just thought it would make a cool action opening- It doesn't. As mentioned this is low budget stuff and the makers don't quite have the flair to get past such limitations and most the action sequences in the movie, particularly the gun battles in the first half are of Walker: Texas Ranger quality. An ancient breastplate which is stolen from the museum is supposed to be essential in leading to the magic sword but later on in the film our heroes manage to do so easily without it. In fact, given the importance placed on the sword in terms of archaeological and mythological magic value this presumably much sought after artifact is found very easily and quickly. The other notably dumb plot aspect of this movie is the subplot involving a North Korean general with some nukes. I have no idea why this subplot was added, other than perhaps to try and increase the stakes but it adds nothing to movie and really seems out of place. You won't have to look very far to find lots of other bits of stupidity in this film but hey it's got a big 3 headed killer dog. The characters and the actors playing them are a boring lot. The script seems like it was written by a twelve year old, complete with lame comedic banter between our hapless heroes which is so feeble and unfunny that nobody would even bother to laugh at the jokes at the end of a Scooby-do episode. There is not a lot of personality to spare between our leads. The male lead of course has a clichéd 'history' with the lead baddie who he used to serve with in the military. The female lead is the standard could pass for a supermodel scientist/archaeologist who is perfectly groomed and made up, even after hours of crawling around in dusty tunnels and who despite her supposed intelligence acts pretty stupidly. The cheesiness it delivered upon though. There are some fun scenes of the oh so fake CGI doggy tearing people up and some of the stuff with the sword wielding and now invulnerable baddie going on a rampage (All a bit Highlander really)is fun. They even manage to include such clichés as copulating teens getting killed by the beastie in one completely unnecessary scene and, I swear to god, a scene with a mob of European villagers with burning torches and at least one pitchfork. There was potential for a better movie here with the somewhat interesting mythology and the cool monster but this was a strictly paint by numbers, heartless product. Oh yeah, how the hell is Cerberus meant to return the sword back to Attila's tomb after it has killed anyone who took it?

• I agree

  agtwine2007-02-10

  I found the dialogue, particularly Emmanuelle Vaugier's, very hard to follow. The whole movie was pathetic. I forced myself to watch it all, believing that it would improve. All the actors in this movie are very experienced (based on their filmographies), so you'd expect they would be able to make something out of a very trite and superficial script. The special(?) effects were hardly believable - When people lost limbs, it reminded me of the Bridge scene between King Arthur and the Knight from Monty Python and The Holy Grail. Not even the eye candy made up for it.

• A surprisingly good action / adventure / horror / fantasy film

  boyinflares2006-06-26

  Emmanuelle Vaugier, Sebastian Spence and Brent Florenece star in this surprisingly good film which blends action, adventure, horror and fantasy competently. The premise is simple, Vaugier's Dr. Samantha Gaines is a leading historian and is forced into helping a villainous collector find the sword of Attila the Hun which would grant him even more power. Gaines is forced to help the villain as he has kidnapped her brother, Zach, played by Brent Florence. Gaines is helped by Jake Adams (the handsome Sebastian Spence) and his fellow adventurers, who also delve out most of the comic relief in the film. Naturally, the heroes - and the villains - eventually come across the legendary Cerebus, the three headed dog that guards Attila the Hun's tomb. From then on in, the heroes have to deal with stopping the villain and staying alive as Cerebus is hot on their tracks. The acting is decent from the leads, the scenery is okay, however the Cerebus CGI could have been better. All in all though, a fun 90 minute adventure.

• The Sword and the Dog From Hell

  claudio_carvalho2007-06-28

  In Bucharest, Romania, the priceless breastplate of Attila, the Hun is robbed from the National Museum of Antiquities by a gang leaded by the despicable Marcus Cutter (Greg Evidan), and the curator Radu (Gelu Nitu) is killed by one of the thieves. Meanwhile, in New York City, the former assistant of Professor Radu, Dr. Samantha Gaines (Emmanuelle Vaugier), is waiting for the valuable piece for an exhibition. The agent Jake Adams (Sebastian Spence) visits Samantha in the museum to tell about the heist and the death of her friend, and she tells about the legend that the breastplate would have the inscription of the location of the Sword of Mars, which is guarded by Cerberus and made Attila invincible. When Samantha's brother and addicted gambler Jack (Brent Florence) is kidnapped, she believes his debt of US$ 2,000.00 could be the reason, and travels to Romania invited by the evil kidnapper Kul Jae Sung (Garret T. Sato), getting involved in a supernatural adventure with Jake. "Cerberus" is a reasonable and entertaining adventure, unfortunately "sold" to the viewers as a horror genre by the distributor. I bought this DVD expecting to see a trash movie, and actually it is an action movie with a supernatural dog and sword. The screenplay is flawed and predictable, and also too serious while it should have jokes and humor with the unbelievable situations, but this film is not so bad and does not deserve the IMDb User Rating of 3.9. I only believe that it does not reach the target audience with the scary monster and tagline inducing to horror genre on cover of the DVD. My vote is five. Title (Brazil): "Cerberus - O Guardião do Inferno" ("Cerberus - The Guardian of Hell")