NateWatchesCoolMovies If you ever find yourself in conversation with Tom Hardy at some cocktail party (one can dream), Minotaur is the film you bring up to both flabbergast and embarrass him, if only for your own amusement. It's one of those low budget sword & sorcery schlock-fests that the SyFy channel used to broadcast at two in the morning on sleepy Saturday nights, to serve as background noise for whatever hedonistic shenanigans are going on in the living room. It's Tom's first ever starring role, and therefore should never be forgotten, like those old camcorder tapes of kids learning to ride sans training wheels for the first time. The story borrows from the legend, adding its own lurid, t&a soaked flair that only SyFy can get just right. Tom plays the son of a Viking chieftain (a brief Rutger Hauer), who goes looking for his true love, one among a few of the village's youngsters who get kidnapped every year by a freaky pseudo African tribe of weirdos who sacrifice youths to the mythical Minotaur, residing in rocky catacombs beneath their city's surface. Led by supreme weirdo Deucalion (Candyman's Tony Todd, hamming up every scene), who fervently wants to impregnate his own hot sister (chill, dude), and oversees this theatrical occult ritual with obscene relish. This is one of those creature features where you barely see the beast for the first two thirds of the film, save for a quick snaggle of fur or fang rushing by in the shadows, and suspiciously looking like a bearskin rug cello taped to antlers and a hobby horse. Hardy does get an eventual confrontation with the Minotaur late in the game and deep in the maze, providing a few schlocky moments that are worth the ride, but it's silly stuff most of the time, scraping the bottom of a barrel that does lower than the maze of the bull. Totally tagging Tom in thee blog post though in hopes that he sees this and it brightens his day just a bit.

Scott LeBrun In an ancient time and place ("Minotaur" was filmed on location in Luxembourg, both interiors and exteriors), people that tended towards "hedonism and greed" needed a god that was somehow more tangible, one of flesh. So they contrived one by impregnating their Queen, who gives birth to this thing. Naturally, things get way out of control, and soon a regular requirement of sacrifices of the young comes about to keep the beast in check. One young man, Theo (Tom Hardy of "Layer Cake", "RocknRolla", "Bronson", and "Inception", etc.) is led to believe that a lost love of his, a past sacrifice to this thing, is still alive so he agrees to take on the challenge of determining if the Minotaur is really so much of a "god" and can actually be killed. Normally, when we watch stuff like this, we expect a lot of silliness and a lot of cheese and know not to take it terribly seriously. "Minotaur", however, which is inspired by Greek mythology, does go out of its way, for a while, to keep these elements at bay and deliver a somber, moody, foreboding kind of tale - and it works pretty well. Granted, before too long, the mostly inane characters cease to maintain any sort of interest and it becomes tedious watching these people get picked off. The actors who come off the best are Tony Todd (not surprisingly), who's magnetic as usual even if there's a definite feel of Candyman to his performance, and the absolutely luscious Michelle Van Der Water as the sister to Todd's character (one fun kinky touch is that Todd loves her more than as just a sibling, which doesn't exactly sit well with her), who's tired of the senseless deaths and tries to defy him. The actors playing the would be victims don't have enough to work with to register very strongly, but there is the attraction of seeing some veterans in the form of Rutger Hauer (whose disappearance from the story is rather disappointing) and the legendary, sultry Ingrid Pitt, who's actually unrecognizable, buried under heavy makeup, as the cave dwelling Leper. The creature gets a reveal sooner than this viewer would have liked, but it's reasonably impressive - big, bad, and ugly, and done with both digital and practical effects. There's some nastiness for gore hounds, although a lack of real detail (there's too much stuff taking place off screen, for one thing) will likely leave them less than satisfied. Not exactly that good, but not all that bad either; it may amuse the genre fan who doesn't demand too much from what they watch. Six out of 10.

bluemagus I've got a bit of history with the SciFi original movies, I used to watch them all the time whenever there was absolutely nothing on TV, and nine times out of ten that was the case. But I saw previews for this movie and said to myself "that looks interesting, I think I'll watch it." I think the SciFi channel(now re-titled SyFy and they're constantly ridiculed for it)has a lot of problems with their original movies. Whenever they have to create an original idea, well you get stuff like Dark Relic, Riverworld, Ice Spiders etc. But then there are movies like The Wraiths of Roanoke, which is pretty damn good if you ask me, Abominable, which I regard as one of the best Bigfoot movies ever even if the Monster looks goofy. Minotaur if you ask me is one of the HIGHLY superior original movies. It does move a little too fast in the beginning and it's not really all that intriguing but when you have Tony Todd play a villain things always get more interesting. The characters in this movie are all likable to some extent, well okay maybe not the screamer girl but to her credit she does have a Lesbian scene for what it's worth. The story in this movie is a retelling of Thesius but done in the way a Monster movie is. That's kinda genius, sure I can talk all day about how the Minotaur from Greek Mythology doesn't look a thing like the one in the movie, in fact the movie Minotaur is more like a big ass bull with a skull face than anything, and he's supposed to be half man/half bull. But I can forgive that because the special effects the use for him are surprisingly top notch.I don't know why it has such a low score on IMDb, I'm guessing it's more critics whining about what they think it should be or something, when you get to the bare bones of this movie(if you watch it that joke is actually kinda funny) is this. It's a monster movie version of Thesius, you really can't do any better than what we have here.

Scarecrow-88 A monstrous product of a queen and bullgod by a people who desired amorous things, is fed the children of a nearby village(8 youths)every so often. This massive bull, named the Minotaur, with a diseased skeletal look, was caged within a cavernous labyrinthine pit underneath the palace which is now ruled by King Deucalion(Tony Todd, chewing the scenery as the lecherous villain)and his sister Queen Raphaella. Sheepherder Theo(Tom Hardy)is being groomed by his father Cyrnan(Rutger Hauer in a glorified cameo)to become leader of their little village which is often raided by Deucalion of the youth. A wart-infested leper informs Theo that his beloved Ffion(Donata Janietz), who was one of those chosen as meat for the Minotaur, is still alive and that he was destined to be the very man to kill the god. Their village worships the Minotaur as a deity, but Theo believes, thanks to this driven spirit and a strong love for his Ffion, he can kill the beast and will sneak among the chosen to face the music. Among those from the village chosen are loud-mouth Vena(Fiona Maclaine), gruff & tough Tyro(Lex Shrapnel)who holds a grudge against Theo for "taking his girl Ffion away from him", mute Morna(Maimie McCoy), Morna's love and Theo's close friend Danu(Jonathan Readwin), Tyro's love interest Didi(Lucy Brown)and quiet Ziko(James Bradshaw)who keeps to himself mostly. These are the ones who will be sent into the beast's lair maze to try and survive. Theo will have to somehow guide them through the most difficult situation. In an interesting turn of events, Raphaella hopes that Theo will succeed and opposes her brother Deucalion who wishes for her to bare him a child. She, herself, will enter the monster's lair willing to face whatever obstacles come upon her as a sign of resistance towards Deucalion and what he stands for. Meanwhile, Deucalion will plead with his sister to return even promising the bullgod statue sacrifices of the entire village and infants born for it.Okay little mythical monster movie set centuries ago..small scale and mostly takes place within the Minotaur's den. A slight bit of graphic violence showing the Minotaur goring victims, but most of the deaths in the film happen off screen. Nothing truly memorable about it, really. May work best for monster movie fans with a Saturday afternoon to spare.