What Still Remains (2018) is a post apocalyptic movie directed by Josh Mendoza and starring Lulu Antariksa as Anna and Colin O’Donoghue as Peter. After her mom dies and her brother disappears, Anna encounters Peter and joins him on a track to get to his village where more survivors huddle together and help each other survive. My What Still Remains (2018) movie review is below
Being 19 years old and not knowing the world before the apocalypse (happened 25 years ago), Anna is resourceful but also naive on the better life being found in some far off community. She becomes reluctant to leave but agrees knowing she is all alone in a house surrounded by a small fence that couldn’t keep out a determined child, much less an adult. Made no sense knowing she can take care of herself and has the means of defending herself in the time of need.
Peter, a preacher in his village, is a handsome young man who knows exactly what to say to a vulnerable Anna. He tells her that he has his best interest at heart and she believes him. Who wouldn’t trust a Bible following man that aligns with Anna’s beliefs? After all, even if we claim to like being lonely, a lot of us yearn to belong somewhere.
For about half of the movie, nothing happens. We see Anna gathering her things and surviving as well as Peter trying to get her trust. They walk around and only one “action scene happen (blink and you’ll miss it). Even when we see the village, nothing happened. It is just bunch of Bible thumping religious nuts who distrust strangers and act all creepy for no reason. The movie itself is so boring that it considers talking to be entertaining. If it built character or revealed anything big, that would be fine. Instead it’s more of saying “if you desert us and steer away from the true path, you will be punished”. It gets boring and a bit annoying too.
With about 18 minutes left in the movie, something finally happens. Let’s just say it was not worth the wait. The reason it was not worth the wait is because nothing surprising happens. It is all cliche stuff we have seen in other movies. This movie has nothing to distinguish itself from other movies. It is very forgettable, even though the main actress and Peter had a solid performance considering what they were given to work with.
Based on other reviews, it seems like this movie was infested by fake reviews to push it to the top. This happened on both iMDB and Rotten Tomatoes. This is not the first time these sites were accused of being “bought” to elevate the quality of the movie. Many reviewers for this movie have only one review on their profiles and it is this movie being praised as 10/10 masterpiece. Maybe some people loved it but even those who enjoyed it found a lot of flaws in story, character motivations, and the overall progression of the film.
This is a simple post apocalyptic story and the people left behind to fend for themselves in order to survive. It doesn’t try to be anything big but it also doesn’t come off as original in any way. It is well acted and the cinematography is not bad. With a runtime of only 90 min, nothing happened in the first half and the second half left a lot to be desired. I am a firm believer that if you do a post apocalyptic world, do something crazy and run with it. It is a world of no rules and no boundaries so almost nothing is out of scope. If you are restrained by budget, don’t do a post apocalyptic world story that shows us nothing interesting. Unless you want to show us the stuff we have seen numerous times and are sick of seeing. Just my two cents.
Thanks for reading my What Still Remains (2018) movie review 🙂
