R-Point (Road to Halloween)

'Tartan Asia Extreme' movies interest me because of the graphic nature of their horror. I love horror and especially love violent, torn limb from limb horror. I also love psychological horror which made R-Point a good choice to review.

R-Point is a 'Tartan Asia Extreme' movie set during the Vietnam war. A South Korean base receives transmissions from a platoon of soldiers who have been missing (presumed dead) for 6 months. They decide to send a squad of 9 men led by a decorated officer to try and rescue the soldiers from the R-Point.

The location that they go to is sacred because 100 years earlier Chinese killed Vietnamese and threw their bodies into the lake, building a temple onto of them. In the soldiers hunt for the missing men, they begin to see strange things.

The area where the lake used to be is marked by a gravestone which reads "NO Return; He who sheds others' blood can not return." and this being set in the Vietnam war I couldn't help thinking “Let he without sin cast the first stone”

The first half of the movie is spent setting up the situation and characters however no character was remarkably different from any other which made it difficult to become attached to any of them. In one scene, a few American soldiers show up and the lead American soldier reads his lines as if reading them off of cue cards.

The movie is subtitled which may put some people off but it is, in my opinion, a better option than dubbing over the actors, the dialogue is delivered perfectly conveying the characters' outright fear.

R-Point is a mixed bag but well worth a watch.

Rating 3 out of 5

See it if you liked:
Apocalypse Now
Saw
Other 'Tartan Asia Extreme' Movies

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Review by Kevin Brown