Intersect

Any time a writer tries to tackle time travel it's a sticky situation.. and this movie actually does a pretty good job of handling time/dimensional travel... so it's with great disappointment that the entire rest of the storyline and execution are so bad. I mean, really bad. An endless string of non-sequitur events, bad CGI "aliens", and an unexplainable ending. They could have focused SO much more on the development of the time machine, the alien influence, the aftermath, instead of things like school bullies, love interests, and dinner outings.

Ah well, better luck next time

Yeah, this 2020 movie titled "Intersect" was a swing and a miss, especially for a Lovecraftian movie. Well, I am getting ahead of myself here.

I was lured in by the movie's rather interesting cover/poster, and the fact that this was allegedly a Lovecraftian movie. And yes, the cover/poster definitely also sold the movie as being Lovecraftian, and the fact that the synopsis included the Miskatonic University just cemented that fact. So of course I found myself sitting down to watch writer and director Gus Holwerda's 2020 movie "Intersect".

This 2020 movie was slow paced, incredibly slow paced. And it just prolonged the agony and boredom that there was so very little of any interest taking place throughout the almost 2 hours that the movie ran for. I stuck with it though, given its supposedly Lovecraftian roots. But that was just a stretch. Sure, there were some cosmic influences, but it just never really reached a level where I personally would deem this worthy of being labeled Lovecraftian.

The storyline told in "Intersect" was boring. Let's just be bluntly honest. Yeah, it most certainly was boring. Sure, the movie's script and plot did have some interesting aspects to it, but writer and director Gus Holwerda just never really brought them to a noteworthy fruition.

While the movie was dreadfully slow, uneventful and just downright boring, then it should be said the the casted actors and actresses put on good performances, and they made the ordeal bearable to sit through. But entertainment-wise then "Intersect" was just a shallow experience.

The special effects in "Intersect" were for the most part actually adequate. I liked the portal effects. However, the Watchers - or Lurkers - creatures in the movie were just atrocious to look at. They moved like something taken straight out of a 1990s computer game and also looked that way. It was just an eyesore to look at.

I am a big fan of Lovecraft's works and Lovecraftian work in general, "Intersect", however, doesn't really tickle me in the right places. Nor would I deem it worthy to be branded as being actually Lovecraftian. Sure, it may be Lovecraftian inspired, but that is about it.

My rating of "Intersect" lands on a mere three out of ten stars. I had hopes for the movie when I sat down to watch it, but those hopes vanished like morning dew before the rising sun pretty early on in the movie. In fact, the last 8 minutes of the movie is essentially what you need to watch to get the concept of the movie. Not worth the time or effort really.

This film has a lot of interesting themes, which will and clearly is, lost on most viewers. I don't watch modern TV shows, so I have not seen "Stranger Things", I think those who have are misjudging this film. This is indeed a Lovecraftian film, go read up on Lovecraft, but like most Lovecraftian films, it is a mixed bag. I get the feeling, when you are dealing with the bizarre themes of Lovecraft, it must be hard to make things work well, it can be done, but I can only think of a few examples, such as "In the Mouth of Madness", one of the most Lovecraftian films not based on a specific Lovecraft story, and that movie is also incredibly confusing and in the end you may ask, "Did any of this even matter"? I bring this up, because I get the exact same feeling while watching "Intersect".

Intersect has a lot of confusing time jumps and narrative jumps, convoluted is an understatement. At the same time, it does mostly gel together by the end. I found myself very frustrated in the first half, I had no idea what was going on, it was extremely confusing. The bad thing about it being sequentially in reverse is that it is very hard to get what is going on until late in the movie. I am not going to say they shouldn't have done this though, I think it was a good choice, and while clearly the confusion is irritating, I know this was by design. It actually makes sense why they chose to do it this way by the end if you pay attention.

People complaining about the color correction are confused, it is obvious they used a washed out look on purpose. People are really grasping at straws here. Also the comment about "Dubbing shouldn't be used in 2020".... Uhhhhh, dubbing over dialog is EXTREMELY common in all movies for various reasons... Yikes! Is the acting that bad? Nope! Yes, the actor who plays Nate is a tad over the top, he did annoy me, but he really wasn't awful, and everyone else was just fine other than Ryan's mom, she was also slightly over the top. Most the complaints here are really scraping the bottom of the barrel. I get the complaints about the convoluted and confusing narrative, that is a valid complaint, was really confused myself, but I get it now. Be patient, I don't think it is "up to the viewer to decide" what is going on as some else said, but rather, the answers are all there, but it requires patience to find them.

This is not a movie for everyone as it will be a VERY frustrating experience for most people. For those who have a little bit of patience and like science fiction and ideally Lovecraft, you will find much to enjoy. It just isn't an easy watch.

I came back to save myself from this. Wait, do I mean you? Or is it "us"? I'll... we'll... figure it out later, I think.

Anyway we have a message for us concerning this movie.

Don't.

Just... don't.

And please remember: this is your attempt to get back the time you wasted on this,

Trust yourself.

You regretted watching it.

The only redeemable feature of this movie is it causes us to create a time machine. However, it turned out to be a one-time-use-only temporal device that left us stranded in the past and the only hope for returning us to our correct timeline is to keep us from watching this movie. I mean, seriously. The movie stinks so bad we got so focused about erasing it from ever happening that we didn't even check the winning lottery numbers for anytime after seeing this stinker. We so wish you had thought to do that.

OK, new plan. Watch this movie but in the time you take to do some proper R&D after being thoroughly motivated to erase having ever seen it please remember to collect the winning lottery numbers.

OK.

We didn't save this draft to our phone before posting it so we had to do it from memory.

So yeah, I think that's everything.

OH! Wait... If you ever see a green van on a Friday night out with your friends, stay away! The only thing you will get from it is a terrible case of the crabs which turns out to be infinitely more fun than this movie is.

Meh. It was alright. So, in this Covid world in which we live, the vacuum created by the constantly delayed big budget stuff is going to be filled either by mediocre titles that probably would've under performed in a crowded summer theater (Mulan, Bill & Ted 3, Greyhound) or the arthouse/small/tiny budget festival treats that somehow find a footing with critics and audiences alike (Vast of Night comes to mind). But we have run out of those. Intersect is a perfectly decent SyFy movie of the month. It is inoffensive in its attempts at mediocrity. If it means anything - I didn't pause it when i went to get another beer or release said beers back into the wild. If you like sci-fi, and specifically Lovecraft inspired tales, this is a perfectly reasonable 80 minute movie. Except that they made it 40 mins longer than it needed to be (2 hours??!!). If you are desperate for something and its your genre, have at it. 5/10