THE COLONY

I enjoy David Leslie Johnson’s work.  I found his scripts ORPHAN and RED RIDING HOOD inventive with good visual moments.  The only problem I have is he tends to fill pages with blocks and blocks of descriptions.  Hey, when I’ve got to read eight scripts over the weekend and provide coverage, dense pages like these fill me with horror.

I liked THE COLONY.  The whole thing about how ants become smarter as their colony grows bigger draws parallels with all the social networking going on today. 

However, how visually scary can ants or bees or wasps really be?  Yes, it works when they attack en masse but how many times can you go to that well in a film?  It’s just the same note being played.  Same thing with the giant ant-hills, beehives and wasp nests.  The first couple of times, the visual works.  After that, it gets old fast.

If we compare this to PIRANHA 3D, the writing here is far superior.  The fish in PIRANHA 3D however are bigger with eyes and sharp teeth which helps.  The insects here are regular sized so there’s not much of a fear factor at play.

THE COLONY’s conflicts between family members needs to be strengthened.  Plus, the message of “working together to overcome all obstacles” needs to be hit much harder.

A good read.  What we want is a great read however.