Hmmm let's see now...



Wicker Man:

Guy goes to remote location looking for missing girl, encounters uncooperative locals, finds out about barbaric ritual cult stuff, then becomes a victim of it.


The Shrine:

Journalists go to remote location looking of missing backpacker, encounter uncooperative locals, find out about barbaric ritual cult stuff, then become victims of it.


Oh well, at least people got some employment out of the production...

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Actually from what I've read about The Shrine HP Lovecraft or his peers seem to have had more of an influence.

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I thought that H.P. Lovecraft might have inspired it.

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influence.. of Wicker Man...at most.

quite a different film and quite suprising.

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Did you see it at Fantasia tonight?

-Kelly-
www.Aaron-Ashmore.com

The opposite of war isn't peace. It's creation.

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yes

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How was it? I really wish I could have gone but Montreal was just too far to travel.

-Kelly-
www.Aaron-Ashmore.com

The opposite of war isn't peace. It's creation.

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it was quite funny...but not the movie, the whole situation surrounding the movie.

I went to see Centurion on Saturday night, it was my 5ft (out of 6) movie at Fantasia. My next one was supposed to be "little big soldier"

I went alone and i found a very good place next to a guy that was quite easy going and quite cool. Arriving 1h before the movie is not enough to get 2 good seats in a row, but when you're alone...it's not so bad.

So i ended up next to this guy who arrived just the day before and really wanted to see Centurion as he was a fan of the director. Then he started to ask me about the other movies I saw. After 30 minutes of talking, we ended up talking about the trailer of "The shrine" which I liked but as I explained him, I was a little disappointed that this trailer ended up giving a part of the punch (human sacrifices) and he ended up admitting he thinks that it would be more "powerful" if it would stop earlier. I told him that I don't think i will go see it as I feel that pretty much everything interesting is already in the trailer. And way too often, good trailers announce bad movies as everything worth it is already shown. He kept going by telling me that he saw 2 posters at the entrance of this movie, and he wondered if I saw them. I did and he asked me what i was thinking about it. Then i started to wonder, why so much questions around this movie. The guy ended up telling me that he was Jon Knautz the director of the movie. Then I started to ask him questions about the movies, about the productions, the distribution etc.

We kept going after Centurion and he asked me if he could expect me at his premiere. I had not much choice but to say yes. I went today and early to have a good place. He saw me in the line up, quite happy about it, he came to chat a little more. Thats how i ended up seeing "the Shrine"

The movie itself is quite surprising. The role playing is good enough, Cindy Sampson (CS) had a strong start taking most of the place and Aaron Ashmore (AA) seems to be hesitating at the beginning of the movie. But as soon as we reach the middle of the movie AA takes his place and is playing a strong role.

The movie starts in America and moves in Poland. As they reach this little village where most of the action takes place, there is no subtitles at all and it gives a creepy style to the movie as you have really no idea what's going on. As the story line goes on, you can start to really expect what's coming next, but it is done on purpose, just to surprise you even more (i wont give you the spoiler). Overall it is really an impressive movie. I wasn't expecting anything good and in fact I enjoyed my evening much more then expected (thanks to Jon for this).

After the movie and the Q&A (with Jon and Aaron Ashmore etc.), I went outside to chat with some guys I've met in the line up. While i was talking with them, Jon came to ask for my impressions, we had a little chat to finish this great evening.

Overall, a great movie, A great director and a great guy.

I give this movie a note close to 7, which is a good note on IMDB. the second best movie I've seen in Fantasia this year so far (1st being A Serbian Film)






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Oh for f's sake it's the exact same story.
All they did was change the location.

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See: Cannibal Holocaust

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Similar premise for sure, but different movie.

Have you seen it or is this a judgement based on the synopsis?

By your standards half the westerns ever made were crap
Hmm let's see now...

Stranger rides into town and saves town from bad guys,

Half of Clint Eastwoods career down the drain.

Hmmm let's see now...
Boy meets girl, boy falls in love with girl, boy and girl fight, boy and girl make up.

We could've stopped writing stories after Shakespear and moved on to the ant stage in your world.

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Similar premise for sure, but different movie.

Have you seen it or is this a judgement based on the synopsis?

By your standards half the westerns ever made were crap
Hmm let's see now...

Stranger rides into town and saves town from bad guys,

Half of Clint Eastwoods career down the drain.

Hmmm let's see now...
Boy meets girl, boy falls in love with girl, boy and girl fight, boy and girl make up.

We could've stopped writing stories after Shakespear and moved on to the ant stage in your world.
-anthony-601

Exactly.

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Very nice Anthony. Great point! I got quite a laugh out of that too

I see Stupid People...

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even if it is the same movie it can't be any worse. Or can it? Guess I'll need to find out.

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Closer to The Ruins. Really have to stretch to say it's that much like The Wicker Man. Maybe if you don't watch to the end.
Not all movies that involve an outsider in Tokyo are just like Godzilla either.

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Yea it reminded me of the ruins but this movie sucked

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I wish i could have given this movie a MINUS 10..it was sooooo bad! Much worse than wicker man & The ruins.

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The Ruins was pretty good. What are you talking about?!



<Generation "me" is an EPIC FAILURE>

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Ridiculous styo2! I've seen planty worse movies than any of the three and I'm so tired of this group mentality of hating Wicker Man. I've seen Wicker Man twice and can't imagine what people see that they hate so much. Sure Nicholas Cage is a limited actor, but he's still somewhat entertaining. I think you guys just all follow it, because it's trendy to hate Wicker Man. The Ruins was pretty good too and The Shrine wasn't bad.

I see Stupid People...

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It is NOT you idiot(drywall!) In The Shrine, what you call "barbaric ritual cult stuff" is actually Christians destroying evil. And even if it was as you say it still wouldn't be a mirror image of Wicker Man. It's like three 25ish year olds and they're not lured there by some devious plan.

My signature has you in mind.

I see Stupid People...

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It's nothing like The Wicker man.

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ABSOLUTELY nothing like The Wicker Man. Not even the scenery was like The Wicker Man (which took place on an island off the coast of Washington, I believe). They did both contain what could be called a cult-like group, but one was all women, trying to preserve their all woman cult by getting impregnated by men on the outside, and one was a group of polish people trying to protect outsiders from evil. Not even close to the same at ALL. Which makes me wonder if the topic creator has ever even seen The Wicker Man o_O It seems doubtful.

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The Wicker Man (original or the remake) is no where near comparison to this movie. I do agree it's closer to the type of reactions made by the villagers in The Ruins or In The Mouth of Madness thrown in (meaning Hobb's End residents reactions)but the movie is average, but the end scene with the short explaination was lacking.

"God's not supposed to be a hack horror writer." - In The Mouth Of Madness

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It made me think of an HP Lovecraft version of The Ruins.


"You and me are goin' on a car-ride to hell... and you're riding shotgun! "

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They did both contain what could be called a cult-like group

The locals in The Shrine were more like security guards than cult members.

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Nothing alike. You're dumb. Shut up.

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WARNING SPOILER AHEAD!

Jeez you people are so... Don't you really get it? It's the same as the wicher man not for the plot, the all women thing or the fact that the villagers in the shrine were actually good, while the ones in the wicker man are not. It's the same as that big pile of trash with nick because it has the same ultra dumb sequence of ultra dumb plot holes put there just to try to put together 90 minutes of film!

I go to poland (and let's ignore the fact the writers thought that polish live like 60 years ago...) and there is this village where nobody wants me. People with big knives drive me out of it.
But I go back, cause, you know, people with big knives don't see my car in the wood.
Oh look there, the mist. Well, why not jumpin into it? why not ignoring anything at least a bit smart (you know, come back with help, get a damn rope so I don't get lost...).
Oh look there, the girl wants to show us something. Uhm, let's go and, of course, never watch her while we scrap bodies with our bare hands.
Oh too bad, while we weren't watching the girl closed us in...
Oh look, I'm trying to open the door, don't help, stay 20 meters away just to make the running more difficult.
Oh wait, they're chasing us, but we have to stop because the main character that put us into this deadly situation scream "we don't know where are we going!" DAMN STUPID B***, WE'RE RUNNING FROM 5 GUYS WITH BIG KNIVES!!!!
Look, we were so lucky to run away from the bad guys. Dear lord, we even managed to close them in the vault. Do we run? Of course not, we stay there to look the blond guy in the eyes for 20 seconds. Yeah. Of course. Yeah...
Ehy, I have a gun, give us your truck. Of course, I'll lose 20 minutes tieing you up just to ask you your truck. Really? wasn't this bullcrap long enough?
Ehy, we're in 6 priests and we all go berserk against Satan. We can't do him anything, but when we're just 2 then it's ultra easy to beat the devil...

Do I have to go on?
It's the same exact thing of seeing Cage wandering in an island in which nobody is explaining anything, you already know that the character will be screwed, but the character himself doesn't do what every normal person in the world would do (get out of there!!!) but simply go down the path to death all by himself.

The shrine is a bad, bad film. The idea was good (the mist, the statue, the fact the devil uses humans curiosity to enter our world, a group of priests devoted to guard the place) but the entire "I want to be a journalist so I'll walk into every possible danger in the world" thing is just bad. bad bad bad. Also, it was poorly directed, slow, it had a lot of holes in which you didn't feel any suspence but in which you simply thought how stupid were the characters, there were almost no visual effects.

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This movie had nothing particularly in common with The Wicker man, just because the lead actor(s) come to a remote place to investigate a disappearence, it doesn't make The Shrine 'influenced' by it in any way.

Many movies have things in common; even similar plots at times, if this move is influenced by Wicker man than 70% of all movies are influenced by each other.

Note that there is a subtle difference between similar & same plots.

I was always fascinated with the enemies of heaven -Crowley

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Elrogos, your assessment was spot on. I agree with every. slingle. word.

And not just about The Shrine. You are right about The Wicker Man too.

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Cheers for the spoiler warning you *beep*

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It's not really like The Wicker Man. There's basically nothing supernatural going on in Wicker Man except in the mind of the society. All we know at the start of The Shrine is that there's some kind of barbaric ritual that they perform, but it doesn't unfold in a way that is anything like Wicker Man.

Someday you will name me, then gently place those burning holy roses in my hair.

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with the mention of the bees.....maybe it takes place in the same universe. so she died cuz she got possessed but had she gone for the bee story, she'd have something to share with Nicolas Cage. :P


"oh my god no....not the beeeeees!!!!"

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drywall, did you even watch the movie or are you just a Wicker Man basher? The 2 movies are polar opposites.

I see Stupid People...

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