A small group of college students discover that an urban myth has become reality and that a demon that is Appladus is about to raise hell upon the world. Together with a former mythology professor, the group must find a way to stop the demon before the army of hell will roam the earth and enslave humanity.
It's easy to bash on most indie movies, or to give them a knuckle sandwich or two in the gut, but what is never really easy when it comes to independent cinema is to see past the way the film's visually look, the amaturish acting that most of them feature and simply that they lack the proper budget to create certain effects and such. While The Wicked One tries, and nonetheless tries hard, on some aspects it doesn't work due to a low-budget. But the budget issue aside, the film manages to get its story through, that also shows some potential. It might be a little rough around the edges and needs to be polished up a bit, but given a higher budget, some neat effects, proper make-up and proper actors - I don't see any reason why this wouldn't work. While the story does not deal with stuff that personally makes me excited, there are tons of worse movies with a higer budget out there for sure.
Since I don't watch indie films that often anymore, when starting to watch one I would say that it takes at least 20 minutes or so just to get used to the way things look. When I began to watch The Wicked One, it pretty much looked like your standard type of indie flick, some of the lines felt a bit forced and the first action element, (that set the whole plot in motion), was a bit of a turn-off, although I believe that once again this was a budget issue and with a higher budget, it might've been all right. The problem, and that's a problem that keeps popping up all the way through the film, is that the script for this flick most definitely requires cash to be put into the film for it to work properly. The movie deals with demons that needs good make-up, and the film obviously needs some special effects here and there as well. But since this is a low-budget film, those things are nowhere to be found and even though you try to picture what things would've looked like with a good budget, it's sometimes very hard to get past the fact that they do not actually look that way, as presented on screen.
 
After about 30 minutes or so, I felt that the dialogue had gotten a whole lot better, it would still benefit from some re-writes during certain scenes, but overall it got ok enough for one to be able to get into the film. Also, the story got better and so did the action elements that provided some well-needed gore - something that felt needed, but that the film lacked early on. The very action from then on the film throughout had its ups and downs, but I think that the film-makers handled all that very well - again, it was just a matter of budget.
Acting-wise, I would have to say that three actors impressed me and managed to deliver performances that were belivable enough. One of them were Jared Haas who had the lead (or at least one of the leads depending on how you see it). He played the role of Jackson, a character that came to feel more and more natural as the movie kept on rollin'. The other one was Doc Ogden, the older man who had some wide knowledge of demons. Now, I'm not really sure how good his performance was, but one thing is for sure and that is that the man got into his character to a 110 percent and seemed to really believe every word that came out of his mouth (even though he was talking about something as unrealistic as demons). I applaud that, because for most of the time talking about such things on film feels stupid, the actors knows that and it sometimes shines through, but not here so that was actually quite cool. The third actor, or that is actress, that did good was Jess Shultz who played a character named Ariel, because for the fact that just like with Haas, her performance felt natural enough.
What's said above does not mean that the others did an all negative job portraying their characters, it was just that most their performances felt a bit wooden here and there and were just not convincing enough, but that doesn't mean that it was all bad either. Another character that I did like was Mitch Nyman who played an a-hole jock named Johnny, simply because he added some comedy to the film. While you can't take away the fact that The Wicked One is an indie film that truly looks like an indie film, it has a script that has potential and I think the film would've worked quite well with a higher budget. While it was entertaining and just long enough, on the horror front it would've needed some polishing up to be able to deliver more horrific scenes. Some were good and worked totally ok, but a lot of them were just too obvious. I don't know what the film-makers intentions was when talking about scares, but on an action and entertainment scale, they did pretty well.
Demons are not my thing, because for the fact that it's just too hard to releate to (or should I say impossible). And since I find it hard to releate to, I also find it even more hard to be able to get scared by it. But that is just a matter of taste and I think that the film-makers here have come up with a story that actually works quite well, but that also requires a higher budget for it to work all the way. Still, I believe that some blood, sweat and tears were put into this film and they should be given credit for making it work as well as it did. And who knows, maybe the future will hold something for them.
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ALTERNATIVE TITLE:
MOVIE YEAR: 2006
DIRECTOR: Aaron Commareri, Jared Haas
WRITING CREDITS: Aaron Commareri, Jared Haas
GENRE: Horror
CAST: Chad Littlefield, Jared Haas, Doc Ogden
COUNTRY: USA
RUNTIME: 80 min
RATING: 4/10
Wicked One, The Website/IMDB Click here
Wicked One, The Trailer Click here
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