Reptileenbu Did you people see the same film I saw?

ShangLuda Admirable film.

FrogGlace In other words,this film is a surreal ride.

Delight Yes, absolutely, there is fun to be had, as well as many, many things to go boom, all amid an atmospheric urban jungle.

amesmonde A demonic seducing serial killer is on the lose in South Africa and a troubled cop sets about to separate fact from fiction to catch the killer. Director Richard Stanley delivers a more refined, satisfying and rounded film than Hardware. Dust Devil (Final Cut) benefits from its predominantly South African location shoot, the interesting sweeping landscapes contain the dreamlike lasting atmosphere. Simon Boswell 's eerie haunting score coupled with Stanley's visuals presents an exceptional experience. There's dark dusty rooms, windswept desert roads, canyons and dream sequences. A nod should go-to Steven Chivers great cinematography. The scope of the screenplay is wider and more psychological than as physical, it's less commercial and more art-house similar to Mulholland drive. There's' an interesting ambiguity to the characters and story created by Stanley. There is a fine supporting cast. This is probably Chelsea Field's best role and her South African accent is quite good, however, oddly she can be stilted at times. Oddly both Field's and Robert Burke's line delivery doesn't always flow whether this is due to the actors chemistry or script it's hard to tell. Burke's exchanges aside he gives an excellent, mesmerising, creepy and imposing performance as the Dust Devil. Notable is Zakes Mokae (who sadly passed away in 2009), he is on fine form as investigator Ben Mukurob. Mokae also provides an interesting voice- over narration that adds to the films layers.Although the pace maybe a little slow there's still exploding heads, body parts and the serial killer element to possibly appease. Despite the supernatural, rituals, witchcraft and mystic elements for the most part Dust Devil is fixed in reality reminiscent of Angel Heart and David Lynch's works.It's a wonderfully shot, slow burning film containing symbolic themes - relationships, suicide and self destruction to name a few. If this appeals, Dust Devil will deliver for you.

Coventry "Dust Devil is one of the only 90's horror classics!" "The special edition DVD from Subversive Cinema is finally a release worthy of this film". "If you haven't seen Dust Devil yet, you're in for a brilliant and refreshing horror surprise". Okay, these are some of the ultimately praising comments I encountered on "Dust Devil" and apparently a lot of people are astonished if you claim you're a horror fanatic and yet haven't seen this film. Now, after borrowing the deluxe DVD-edition from a friend and finally having seen the film, all I can say is … Is that it?!? This is the supposedly brilliant and original 90's classic that I desperately had to watch in order to keep calling myself a horror buff? I mean, it's a respectable and ambitious film and definitely benefices from a handful of unique elements, but I honestly expected more in terms of plot originality and production values. "Dust Devil" boosts an incredibly rudimentary and hugely derivative plot, but writer/director Richard Stanley ("Hardware") effectively camouflages this through sensationally breath-taking filming locations, ultimately ominous sound effects & music and some extremely blatant gore effects. Filmed in one of the most beautiful regions of the world – the South African/Namibian deserts, "Dust Devil" introduces a drifting stranger who gets picked up by a beautiful woman and brought back to an isolated guest house for a night of passionate sex. However, the drifter is an ancient demoniacal African shape-shifter feeding on the despair of depressed people and thus viciously butchers the woman and sets her house on fire before hitching onwards. Next victim is the insecure South African housewife Wendy Robinson, who finally dared to leave her dominant husband and now journeys through the desert on her way to the sea. Meanwhile, the fatigue police officer Ben Mukurob hasn't got the slightest trace to follow and enlists the help of a spiritual cinema projector to learn more about the unusual serial killer. Basically, "Dust Devil" is simply a standard horror story about a traveling serial killer and all the supernatural gibberish and typically African talk about magic are totally irrelevant. The film is amazingly atmospheric and often downright scary, but only thanks to the godforsaken and desolate locations and nightmarish music, because all the rest is disappointingly amateurish. The narration, for example, is completely uninformative and quite annoying. Stanley's subtly processed lectures on South African politics feel somewhat obtrusive whereas the actually relevant dialogs are extremely weak. Worst of all, however, are the irredeemably awful acting performances from the ensemble cast. I personally never liked Robert John Burke but definitely expected a better and more vivid job from Chelsea Field.

Christopher T. Chase So you know how I feel about movies I've never even heard of. When I saw that DUST DEVIL: THE FINAL CUT had not one or two, but FIVE discs in the set, I was really skeptical. The ONLY reason why I was willing to cut it any slack was because of the director, Richard Stanley. I do remember seeing his sci-fi/horror/action cult favorite, HARDWARE, back in the good old days of VHS, and it kicked MAJOR butt-cheeks back then.Here's the deal: apparently, DUST DEVIL went through the usual headaches and hardships during filming, Bottom line: a finished 'director's cut' of this movie as of now, does not exist. What Stanley and his co-conspirators had to do is piece together a rough version, using additional scenes pulled out of a work print. It's very similar to what had to be done when a "completed" cut of THE WICKER MAN was reconstructed.The result is an erratic, but visually stunning piece of work, but it goes pretty deep into the metaphysical and supernatural aspects of native folklore in the country where it's set...Africa, particularly South Africa. Translation: people in this movie spend a lot of time talking, including the narrator. Sure, lots of stuff happens, but there's also a lot of time in between those events, so if you don't feel like putting up with a lot of dialogue, you might want to save this film for another time.Robert John Burke (the ROBOCOP series, OZ and RESCUE ME) plays the title character, who is also called "The Shapeshifter." If he seems very familiar to you, he should be. He's a figure that runs through a lot of the mythologies of different cultures and has been used to represent both Good and/or Evil in many popular books and movies. But make no mistake about it - this 'Dust Devil' ain't here to help anybody but himself. He's a demon trapped in our world in human form, feeding off the souls of the lost and the lonely who have given up on everything but life itself, gathering strength until...well, as far as I could tell, it was never all that clear WHAT he was trying to do - return to his shadow world, or eventually take over ours. Anyway, Burke plays the role really well, and he's believable as a charismatic force of evil who can convince his victims to stick out their necks while he pulls out his shiny axe...or knife, in this case. As it happens, there are two souls on a collision course with Mr. DD: a police detective, Ben Mukurob (THE SERPENT AND THE RAINBOW'S Zakes Mokae) whose wife left him after the tragic death of their child, and a woman named Wendy Robinson, (Chelsea Field of PRISON and THE LAST BOY SCOUT), who has just left her clingy husband, Mark, (Rufus Swart), after he finds out she's been having an affair.With his job the only thing he has left to look forward to, Ben dives into the investigation of the murder of the Dust Devil's latest victim with a vengeance. Adding an extra layer of substance to the story are indicators that the story takes place not long after the fall of apartheid, but the residual effects can still be seen in Ben's grudging relationship with the uniformed officers he supervises, and the friendship he has with his immediate superior, Captain Beyman (William Hootkins, everybody's favorite "red shirt" from HARDWARE and a little flick called STAR WARS: A NEW HOPE). When symbols at the crime scene indicate that the murder has undertones of ritualistic sacrifice and black magic, Mukurob consults a shaman he knows named Joe Niemand (John Matshikiza), who warns him that forces are at work that he shouldn't be screwing with...unless he's ready to go all the way. Meanwhile, Wendy runs into a mysterious, Western-garbed stranger hitching rides. She picks him up, and at first, she's attracted to the handsome and unusual "dude from Texas." Until some freaky stuff happens that indicates he's not quite who she thinks - or is that hopes? - he is.There comes a point where he reappears to her, when you figure that a) this Wendy chick is one screwed-up piece of work, or b) this guy really does have a power to attract his victims beyond all reason. Because most women I know at this point (and you'll know it when it comes) wouldn't care if this guy was Brad Pitt - they'd be beatin' feet out of there faster than Usain Bolt going for a one-minute mile.Wendy's husband Mark goes looking for her, and he runs into some trouble that has nothing to do with supernatural events of any kind. But eventually, the paths of all three people will cross at some point and all of them will encounter the Dust Devil...though not all of them will live to tell about it.I wish I could say that including the shots from the work print does the movie justice, but the transition between clean, sharp cuts and the fuzzy, murky segments from the dailies doesn't allow the movie to weave the completely seductive and creepy spell that Stanley was ultimately after, and it makes you wonder what the finished film would've been like if he'd been able to gain all the resources and money he needed to give it that proper 'polish.' As is, though, it's still pretty heady stuff. Casual fanboys sniffing out a "Triple-B" movie (Babes, Boobs and Blood) may want to wait for the next Eli Roth extrava-GORE-za, and leave this one on the shelf. I'm just hoping that whatever he does next, Stanley will be given a proper budget and the leeway to see at least one more film through to a completed AND finished version of what he envisions.

Anthony Pittore III (Shattered_Wake) After leaving her abusive, purple-track-suit-wearing husband, Wendy (Chelsea Field) encounters a mysterious hitchhiker (Robert Burke). She invites him along for the ride, but realizes her mistake when strange things begin to occur after he joins her. Meanwhile, a police officer (Zakes Mokae) asks the help of a local shaman to find the hitchhiker, who is more than he appears to be.Review: The film was not at all what I expected. Reading the synopsis and hearing nothing of it beforehand, I had assumed something like a supernatural version of 'The Hitcher'. . . with that same tone to it. While I do prefer 'The Hitcher' to this film, 'Dust Devil' does not deserve to be entirely passed up. It's beautifully shot with a strange, but interesting, story about the myths in the real world. It is rather slow-moving for quite some time, but during the times it picks up, it's rather frightening and gory. The performances are fantastic, as is the written dialogue. My major gripe would have to be, again, with the pace. Not so much that it's slow, but that its spikes are so high and brutal that when it reaches its lulls, it feels boring in comparison. However, if you're one simply for the visuals, for the landscapes, for the cinematography. . . you will very much appreciate the beauty of the film. Who knows. . . it might've been great in one of the sliced-up editions. But the 'final cut' edition I viewed was, simply, just good.Final verdict: 7.25/10.