Terror on the Prairie (2022)

Good as westerns go, but, seriously, way too many missed opportunities to just justifiably shoot them and no explanations or excuses not to.

I suppose that's standard for movies, but I keep hoping for better.

Fmovies: First off, I'm not a western fan. I am a great movie fan,, and some of them happen to be westerns (like Tombstone, McClintock, etc).

I never loved the western genre as a whole though.

This movie takes place in the vast prarie of Montana, where Hattie & Jeb McAllister are trying to build a homestead with their children Will & Bess. Having moved to Montana from St. Louis, Missouri, life is a daily struggle for the McAllister family. Hattie wants the family to move back home, but Jeb is deadset on making their lives work there.

One day, while Jeb traveled to the nearest town for supplies, a group of 4 men ride up on the McAllister homestead, asking for some water from their well. Trying to be hospitable, Hattie offers to feed the men before they set back out on their horses,, but something about these men doesn't seem quite right. Then, while gathering some eggs from their chicken coop, Hattie discovers an alarming sight (a trophy of sorts) hanging off the side of the leaders horse.

Will Hattie be able to protect her children from these men (who obviously want mote than just water and food)?

As I said before,, I am not a western guy. I am a big fan of what the daily wire has done, and is trying to do (really liked Shut In, and loved What is a Woman), so I will happily watch whatever they come out with. This movie is not great by any means,, but it's in no way bad either. Gina Carano (luv her!!!) has come a long way since her mma days, and while I don't see her winning an academy award (who'd want to be associated with them nowadays?) as an actress, she did really great in this. The Captain actor is good as well. The supporting cast is more than adequate. Now,, the pace of the movie, the direction, and the lack of a soundtrack up until the last few minutes really is the primary things I didn't like about this picture. I understand that may be part of the "old western" type of movie that they were going for here,, but for me it just really needed a soundtrack to help build tension, add some relief, etc. IMO, a movie's soundtrack is just as important as what's happening in front of the camera. The music carries so much of the emotion that the audience should be feeling in each scene (of course, that's just my opinion). Overall,, I can't give it more than an even 7 rating. Perfectly worth watching, but not perfect.

From the opening scene, I was surprised at how well-directed this film is. Both dramatic and action-heavy scenes are well-framed and the actions and reactions of the characters are always the focus of the visual storytelling. It makes for an exciting watch!

Additionally, the performances are all quite great. Gina Cyrano probably gives her best performance, and she definitely carries this film with heart and grit.

The writing is much more hit-and-miss. The character introductions are very well-handled and set both the central family and the villains up as tangible people with clear-cut desires, struggles, and goals. Unfortunately, from there, these things are very rarely, if ever, mentioned again.

Instead, we get decisions that are made just to move the story along and give us new situations to watch. Given the villains' goals, what they do over the course of the story doesn't make sense. They seem to be actively trying to make things harder on themselves.

Not to say that the script is bad. The dialogue is often engaging and the pacing is pretty strong. It's just that it feels so contrived and inorganic that it's hard to get as wrapped up in it as the filmmakers wanted me to.

It's a solid western, and there's a shortage of good modern ones. That's about all I wanted.

Terror on the Prairie fmovies. This was a truly terrible movie.

There's a thin plot and almost zero chemistry/connection between the characters.

It also doesn't help that it has Gina Carano that is such a horrible actress that has two facial expressions she can use. Might be 2 stars without her but here we go: 1 star.

I love westerns and wanted to love this one but, like the previous film Shut In, there are just far too many stupid choices and, in this case, bad shots, So many bullets fired, so few targets hit. Frustrating.

I got to say, I thought I had already outgrown and seen everything possible that could be done with this kind of genre of movie, but I was pleasantly surprised.

Terror on the Prairie is definitely not a movie for everyone. More now than a few years back. It's raw, it's simple, it feels real, it even sounds real because of the simple fact that there's barely any soundtrack at all.

If you're someone that judges movies based on the hundreds of millions of dollars in special effects, then this is definitely not a movie for you. This is a movie for those that want to feel the past. That same past that brought us to this point.

The performances were solid and the movie didn't rely on any single character. Mainly because it was aiming to feel and look real, and not some fantasy where some Mary Sue or Gary Stu can just take on everyone singlehandedly. Even the lack of soundtrack serves to put you in that mindset. The silence that accompanies the movie in the slowest scenes, is really to show viewers how were those times. How slow placed life could be when the shores were done, and there was nothing else to do.

The film does pick up the pace after some time, and after that it's a race to the finish line. But that race is correctly paced so the viewer is not overwhelmed, or loses important details.

It's a very good movie, that is showing the viewer a different time that our ancestors went through. And although it could've taken advantage of the obvious north and south division, to land some political message like Hollywood movies try to do in every single movie, it avoided that mistake making it clear that the events were about those people in that land, in that time.

It just isn't an excellent movie, because unfortunately sometimes the slow pace does numb you out a little bit. But considering it isn't a Hollywood movie with hundreds of millions of dollars in budget, it manages to deliver a more interesting overall result than many more recent movies.

I'm actually very satisfied to have seen this movie, and I'll definitely recommend it as a must watch to all those that want to have a taste of the past.

Another aspect that might drive some people away, is the very real raw brutality of it all. Remember that these were the frontier times, when the law was mostly decided by the gun, and what you had was many times things others would take without any hesitation or problems of conscience. So if you're expecting this movie to soften up what was the brutal reality of those times, you're going to find out just how good you have in these current times.

And there lies a lesson I think. Because nowadays too many people have grown so accustomed to fighting for nothing, they have to make up things to fight about. But in those times you didn't had to come up with things to fight about... Life was a daily fight. And people had no time to waste on pointless endeavors.

This movie will definitely go to my collection. And is one of the rare cinematic gems of 2022.