Legend of the Bog the Latest Travesty of Irish Cinema

When your first film is so good that it premiers within the pages of the Mail on Sunday you know that you're a talent to be reckoned with. Following on from the success of the Riddle Brendan Foley is back with his latest modern classic, Legend of the Bog. To call it inept in every way would be a disservice to truly inept film. It's is hands down the single worst film ever made surpassing the travesty that was Paddy Breathnach's Red Mist.

So lacking in talent is Foley that his next film is being billed by him as a sequel to Michael Collins and the script reviews I have heard about all agree that it is one of the worst scripts around.

Reveiw from Dread Central

A 2,000 year old warrior, his body perfectly preserved in a rural Irish peat bog, comes back to life with a chip on his shoulder after a greedy real estate developer disturbs his corpse. It's all downhill from there and I mean that in regards to the movie itself. Irish eyes are not going to be smiling upon viewing Legend of the Bog; this is one of the year's worst.

When we're shown some actual bog bodies as they appear in real-life they look like blackened corpses covered in moss and muck. The peat bogs allow for their insides to be almost perfectly preserved but their outsides are rather ghastly. But when the ancient dead man in this film resurrects he shows no signs of discoloration or disfiguration at all, looking no worse for 2,000 year old swamp corpse wear. He's just a big bald guy in potato sack clothes who looks like he should be working as a bouncer at a Renaissance fair. We're in Tor Johnson territory, folks. Except Tor Johnson was an odd looking chap with a weird screen presence. This guy is just an average looking big bald dude making dopey faces, grunting and snorting, and stumbling about like a drunkard.

The first half of Legend of the Bog, you'd swear it was meant to be a comedy. The bog man comes across a dilapidated old car, climbs inside of it, beeps the horn and freaks; he then leaps out and begins beating on the remains of this vehicle like a startled caveman. He'll then wander into a convenience store in search of water (resurrected bog bodies require water or begin moving like a mentally challenged robot running low on battery power) trying desperately to bite open plastic water bottles. This is lame humor even by Encino Man standards.

The second half will then take this bumbling oaf and recast him as a Jason-type killer stalking the swamps in search of revenge against those that awoke him. I hesitate to describe it as a slasher movie because it's so ineptly done I don't know what exactly the filmmaker was trying to do. One moment he's a brutish killer, the next he's a sympathetic creature along the lines of Frankenstein's monster. One thing he never is is scary. Nothing about this film comes even remotely close to being scary.

His potential victims consist of three sets of obnoxious characters that each experience contrived vehicular trouble leaving them stranded out in this Irish swamp. They include a pair of young women on the run from authorities, the hateful American developer responsible for moving the bog man's corpse and her driver, and, most conveniently, an anthropologist who specializes in bog bodies and his ex-girlfriend (The Descent's Nora-Jane Noone experiencing her own descent into seriously bad filmdom). About all any of these people do for over half the movie is bicker, insult one another, and argue non-stop. Some of it appears to have been written to be funny. I assure you it is not. I wasn't kidding when I described the American developer as hateful; her constant shrillness is extremely unpleasant to listen to. None of these people are particularly likeable.

All three pairs decide to go slogging straight into the swamp in search of help instead of following the road back to civilization like any sensible person would. The six of them will converge at a cabin in the middle of nowhere that turns out to be the shack belonging to Midnight Meat Train's Vinnie Jones. Jones plays a hunter cleverly named Mr. Hunter. Judging by the pre-title sequence he has experience hunting bog bodies that rise from the dead. None of this is ever explained. Apparently bog bodies rise from the dead around these parts on a regular basis.

Redemption would appear to the theme writer/director Brendan Foley was aiming for. He misses by a mile. After a jokey first half that falls flat, the second half becomes a greater chore to sit through as things now turn serious. Their life or death situation is constantly interrupted by personal asides in which various characters explain in drawn out detail - sometimes with accompanying flashbacks - whatever personal sin they have committed in the past. All of them are seeking some sense of redemption. There is no redeeming Legend of the Bog.

Terrible script. Terrible acting. Terrible monster. Terrible movie.

humanji

I think premiering in the Mail on Sunday was more than this film deserved. I'd have to say that this is possibly the worst film set in Ireland I've ever seen. And I've seen Rawhead Rex! Actually, why the hell is Vinnie Jones in so many of that guys films?

humanji

humanji wrote: »

I think premiering in the Mail on Sunday was more than this film deserved. I'd have to say that this is possibly the worst film set in Ireland I've ever seen. And I've seen Rawhead Rex! Actually, why the hell is Vinnie Jones in so many of that guys films?

This is'nt premiering in the Daily Mail. I'm assuming that they learnt their lesson with the Riddle. Tried to watch Legend of the bog but it took me 4 days to work through all of it. It's such a dreadful piece of trash that I'm ashamed to say that people will look at it and think it's what Irish cinema is like these days.

Rawhead Rex is Godfather part 2 when compared to The Legend of the Bog.

Tomohawk

I had forgotten about Rawhead Rex, I think a generation of Irish film crew still has disturbing flahbacks to this apocalypse now of a film. Or maybe that should be Hearts of Darkness!

Amalgam

humanji wrote: »

I'd have to say that this is possibly the worst film set in Ireland I've ever seen.

What about that film with the midget travellers doing a conga around St Stephens Green singing, ' You don't have to be Irish to be Irish..'

That film was bad, RTE show it every so often.

Amalgam

Amalgam wrote: »

What about that film with the midget travellers doing a conga around St Stephens Green singing, ' You don't have to be Irish to be Irish..'

That film was bad, RTE show it every so often.

Still better than Legend of the Bog.

Amalgam

Deleted User wrote: »

Still better than Legend of the Bog.

I found it, now I can make space for other stuff in my head..

That clip there is a million times more entertaining than anything Legend of the Bog, in fact it's superior to anything that Foley ahs ever written.

Edit: Jebus that was directed by the great Ralph Nelson who made Soldier Blue and Duel at Diablo.

BlitzKrieg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FBQwkewA5lk

I think I actually know one of the girls in it.

I was going to post the trailer but felt inflicting it upon anyone here would be a sin.

niallon

Always wondered what voiceover guy would sound like saying bog, funny stuff!

On another note, Nora Jane, what areyou at girl?

starn

Ive just watched it, and to be fair. As bad and all as it is. Its still a million times better then Shrooms. But shame on you Jason Barry

omerin

BlitzKrieg wrote: »

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FBQwkewA5lk

I think I actually know one of the girls in it.

jeasus thats terrible, not even bog standard

Nolanger

Rawhead Rex, Boy Eats Girl, Deat Meat, Isolation, Dead Bodies, Shrooms, and now this?
Makes me embarrassed to be Irish .

Nolanger

Nolanger wrote: »

Rawhead Rex, Boy Eats Girl, Deat Meat, Isolation, Dead Bodies, Shrooms, and now this?
Makes me embarrassed to be Irish .

I think Isolation gets a lot of unnecessary grief. It really isn't that bad when compared to films like Shrooms and Legend of the Bog.

Nolanger

Have Isolation on DVD and it's crap - though a bit more intelligent than the others.
These sh*t films are being made by people with no genuine interest in horror. It's just a job for them - read a magazine interview with the director of Dead Bodies - these people are too 'normal' to make interesting horror movies .

Euro_Kraut

Nolanger wrote: »

Makes me embarrassed to be Irish .

Well if you don't have to be Irish to be Irish... then surely if you are Irish, then you don't have to be Irish.:)

Nolanger

Nolanger wrote: »

Have Isolation on DVD and it's crap - though a bit more intelligent than the others.
These sh*t films are being made by people with no genuine interest in horror. It's just a job for them - read a magazine interview with the director of Dead Bodies - these people are too 'normal' to make interesting horror movies .

|I think the first hour of Isolation is really well done. It creates a great sense of dread but the dialogue and direction really let it down. here's my review of it.

Nolanger

Do you not think that these fools have given Ireland a bad reputation for horror films? We're a bit of a joke now in the horror genre because of these hacks.

Nolanger

Nolanger wrote: »

Do you not think that these fools have given Ireland a bad reputation for horror films? We're a bit of a joke now in the horror genre because of these hacks.

I don't think it's fair to say that we look like hacks in the genre because of these films. We always have. I agreet hat we have yet to produce a truely great horror film which is a shame given that there are so many great locations and Irish stories that would work really well.

pinksoir

Has anyone seen Dorothy Mills?
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1034306/

It's erm... amazing...

pinksoir

pinksoir wrote: »

Has anyone seen Dorothy Mills?
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1034306/

It's erm... amazing...

I think the only word to describe the film is woeful.

pinksoir

Oh yeah, that's the word I was looking for. Woeful and tedious.

starn

Tell me Darko, is Rodger Corman still pumping out horror flicks from Galway ?

starn

starn wrote: »

Tell me Darko, is Rodger Corman still pumping out horror flicks from Galway ?

Nope, he stopped doing them nearly a deacade ago. Have to say that there's a certain charm to watching a Bloodfist film in which various Galway landmarks are used as terrorist headquarters.

starn

Deleted User wrote: »

Nope, he stopped doing them nearly a deacade ago.

Oh thats a pity. Has a new production company moved in and taken over the studios. I was pretty sure there was still a thriving film industry there.

Have to say that there's a certain charm to watching a Bloodfist film in which various Galway landmarks are used as terrorist headquarters.

Agreed.

But I honestly I didnt think Legend of the Bog was all that bad. But had I actually paid money to see it. It might be a different story.

But compared with Shrooms or the historic Irish money Six Semesters it actually holds up resonably well.

George White

The one with the travellers singing 'you don't have to be Irish to be Irish'
Flight of the Doves by Ralph Nelson! The worst actor in that apart from the girl is well he's not conventionally good, but Ron Moody, he's hammy, he's a big slab of ham for christmas dinner! And yet he gets away with it!