Back in the late 1970’s, ol’ Ben (Matt Whelan) inherits some property down Oregon way. So before you can say “Shitty idea”, Ben packs the fam and heads off to that newly acquired property.
Naturally, the house the family is set to move in looks creepy as all hell, and despite the beautiful view, the place would be avoided by anyone with half a brain cell in real life… and that’s not even factoring in the bizarre water feature, the eponymous tank, sure to detract even more value from the dread domicile.
From there we get some Horror Tropes 101 as we get a blast of bumps in the night, dark family secrets, a legacy of missing persons, and mysterious creatures.
Will Ben and his brood survive their wicked windfall, or will the secrets of the house be their demise?!
Lets get the elephant in the room out of the way first; writer/director Scott Walker walks some familiar ground with The Tank, but dammit tropes are tropes for a reason; the tried and true stuff works aces cats n’ creeps, and if shit ain’t broke there’s no need wasting time trying to fix it. Rather, it’s what you do with the tropes and how you present them that can make a terror tale shine.
It’s there that The Tank succeeds… let’s break that down a bit…
For starters, the creature featured here is a thing of wonder; created by WETA (The Lord of the Rings series, The Host, and many, many more) a practically realized, ever-evolving monster that effectively threatening (despite the relatively small body count present in the narrative), and is worth the price of admission alone.
Also tops is the Neo-Gothic locale; suitably dusty, shadow-laden affair replete with it’s own cave system… it’s suitably creepy and adds exponentially to the film’s atmosphere.
Finally, the small cast assembled here are pretty damn solid and their reduced numbers offer a sense of intimacy as things around them swirl into madness.
Less top-shelf are the bonus materials present here with two glimpses behind the scenes and the film’s trailer, but the quality of the main event more than makes up for the lack of special features.
All in all, The Tank manages to be a compelling creature-feature with a strong Gothic flare, and the film’s dilapidated locale and what lies within make this one a wicked, if familiar, winner in my beastly book!
