Patient X (2009) Movie Review
Written By: RY
Edited By: Grave Reviews Staff
Film Information
Director: Yam Laranas
Producer: Yam Laranas, Richard Gutierrez, et. al.
Screenwriter: Yam Laranas and Aloy Adlawan
Date Released: October 28, 2009
Cast:
Richard Gutierrez as Dr. Lukas Esguerra
Cristine Reyes as Guada
TJ Trinidad as Alfred
Miriam Quiambao as Nurse Betty
Nanding Josef as Dr. Jack
Elvis Gutierrez as Marcus
Rating = 1/5 Graves
***May contain spoilers***
Synopsis
When Lukas was young, he witnessed a group of aswang (vampire-like creatures who randomly attack people at night) kill his whole family. He was with Guada, a woman who was with their family. After 20 years, local police named Alfred was able to capture one of the aswang after killing his whole family. He then contacts Lukas, who is now a doctor. Lukas was then forced to go back to his old town to face the aswang. When he got there, he was surprised that the aswang is Guada. The hospital locked her in the basement. This made the aswang angry, especially Guada’s husband, Marcus. So he called his gang to attack the hospital.
Gore Factor
Patient X (2009) is all about the creature called aswang. These creatures target humans and eat them to survive. With this, the movie does show a lot of gore. There was one scene when Guada is eating the flesh of a human being while Lukas tries to ask her how to kill the aswang. There are also other scenes when the victims lay on the floor with blood in their body and the hospital walls are covered with blood.
The movie also used a green liquid that comes out from Guada’s mouth. She also has burns on her face and messy hair, giving her a horrifying aura. Meanwhile, the aswang, like Marcus, have red eyes with blood coming out of their mouths.
The Grave Review
Patient X (2009) features the work of director Yam Laranas’ take on the Aswang folklore (an Aswang is a vampire-like creature of Philippine folklore). The movie does also quickly becomes this survival horror about a group of people stuck inside a rural hospital that is being attacked by a group of aswang.
The monster design on the aswang looked awkwardly-placed and bordering to ridiculous. It was as if they just came off a Halloween Party with faces too white and outlandish. Although the make-up was intricate, but there were moments that they looked goofy. It was also a bit inconsistent that at an earlier scene the aswang could talk to each other normally, and the next scene, they appear growling and snarling.
To top it all, the performance of all the characters was subpar. It is unfortunate that Guttierez who plays the lead role in this movie performed so bad. No matter how many times he’s had movie and TV appearances, it seems to never have any progressive effect on his acting. His performance looks like it is only equivalent to some high school actor in a classroom play. In some scenes he looks like he’s too conscious of how he looks, and in most of the scenes.
The setting helped in terms of giving jump scares. Adding simple jump scares, like when Lukas is staring at his old house and suddenly someone appeared on the gate, will make you jump from your seat. All throughout the movie, the scenes were taken inside the hospital during the night, making it quiet and dark so one will not be able to determine if an aswang will suddenly appear.
Because of the foregoing reasons, Grave Reviews gives Patient X (2009) one grave out of five graves.
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