Langdon Alger | Independent Movie Review
REVIEW
So, the first thing I thought of when IMR was asked to review “The Jersey Devil” and was informed slightly about what it was about, was the number three.
With religion I think of the number three, “somewhere in the ancient mystic trinity, you get three” as in the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, right De La Soul? And then in regards to the independent movie world, to me there are three tough acts to tackle; features, comedies and religion.
“The Jersey Devil” (2014), and director Joseph Pepitone, decided to go after all three and make an independent feature comedy about religion and as a result you got three outcomes; the good, the bad and the third… is up to you to decide I guess.
The Jersey Devil started out strong with some solid acting from, Keith Collins, as James Burnett, and even more so, Edvin Ortega, as Richard Cooper. Again, I am usually informed of what the movie is about but besides that, I don’t really do much research on movies before I watch them to review. So, I also was equally pleased to realize this wasn’t going to be a story about the mythical creature of lure, the Jersey Devil, but rather a comedy about hell moving to Jersey.
And honestly, the whole first act (of three) was pretty good. I laughed here and there, some more funny and likable characters were introduced, Lucifer, Judas Iscariot, Tori LaSalle, Father Sandusky (Jack Mulcahy, Stephen Fontana, Penelope Lagos, Michael Billy), there was some skin, that’s always good, and we were on our way.
However, somewhere along the line, the “independence” of the movie started to get in the way and affect the story and the experience.
As in life, it’s all about the little things, and I just think all the things that go with deciding to make a feature instead of a long short started to chip away at the project and the further the movie went along the funny premise and strong acting and characters wasn’t enough to cover all of the technical deficiencies up.
Again, the movie had it’s moments, some funny jokes, good acting… tits, but after awhile being able to finish the movie kind of got in it’s own way and made “The Jersey Devil” not all it could have been.
TECHNICAL CRITIQUE
Looks like they had a decent crew with some competent people who just got the job done, in the true spirit of independent film making.
Nobody is going to win any awards (except the actors apparently), but you could see and hear everything and no complaints with the edit. Pretty sure they did the best they could with whatever the budget they had to work with.
OFFICIAL WEBSITE:
The Jersey Devil | Official Twitter