Best movie ever!

There are moments in this movie where the great movie it could've been peek out... They're fleeting, here, but they're worth savoring, and they happen often enough to make it worth your while.

The movie's not perfect, but it sticks the landing of its message. It was engaging - thrilling at times - and I personally thought it was a great time.

One of the most extraordinary films you will see this year. Take that as you want.

Natalie McMillan (Schilling) is the "rich girl" in her small town, and Zach Taylor (Thomsen) is the poor local mechanic. Before this West Side Story/Romeo & Juliet-like romance can get off the ground, their buddy Brad Deville (Fralick), who appears to be a cross between a lunkhead and a meathead, drives drunk and they all die (?) - but before "The Man" (Estevez) can collect their souls, they realize what's going on and they all run away from The Man and his partner (again a ?), Angel of Death (Z'Dar). This race between life and death intensifies because Natalie reminds The Man of a woman he used to love in a past life. Who will win - those who collect the souls of the recently deceased, or mulleted, 37 year old teens on the run? Okay, we all know Soultaker was famously tackled by the MST3K guys. Let's try and put that aside for a moment, if possible, and realize that it is indeed AIP April once again, so we have to put in our two cents as well. Rather than mercilessly bash the poor movie, we choose to dwell on the positive: the first half. Any scenes with Brad Deville - and David "Shark" Fralick does indeed look like a dude named Brad Deville - are gold. The "Summerfest" sequences provide solid entertainment/laughs/80's nostalgia, and the presences of Robert Z'Dar and Joe Estevez are comforting and familiar. To see them working and walking together as an "afterlife team" was pretty cool. And we applaud the effort all around, even if the final result is (pleasantly?) amateurish. But that's what we look for. Not everything has to be absolutely perfect and we cherish the quirks. But it's not all a Summerfest bash… The second half of the movie is boring, dull, and repetitive. Even the powerhouse team of Z'Dar with his unintelligible electronically-lowered voice and Joe Estevez with his black guyliner can't remedy that. Their characters are supposed to be menacing because of these things, not to mention their black coats. They also disappear and reappear quickly thanks to what can only be described as "Blip-cuts". There's also a green special effect that will remind you not of Slimer from Ghostbusters, but of his Hi-C Ecto-Cooler. Zach Thomsen gives Billy Warlock a run for his money, and Vivian Schilling, interestingly enough, is credited with screenplay/story on the film.So as a glimpse of the end of the acid-washed 80's, with plenty of 80's coolguys and coolgirls and their various fashions, Soultaker has some value for that reason alone. Pounding, generic 80's rock/metal seems central to their lives, though the end credits song, "Somewhere in Paradise" by Karen Lawrence, would seem to contradict that. Yet again we have a movie of two halves - the first being better, of course - but it's largely sunk by the dull second half.

This is not a bad movie at all, in my opinion. Though I love MST3K, I was disappointed that they chose this movie for one of their episodes.The story is pretty good. The acting is pretty good. The "effects" are certainly no worse than average. The only thing remotely "cheesy" about it is the "eighties" feel to it, and HELLO it was just about that time period, so that should be expected. Really, the music could have been much, much worse.Vivian Schilling contributed to something that was, all-in-all, very well-done! I kinda resent MST3K's Pearl referring to her as an "ambitious young lady". Schilling's performance wasn't "hammy" or anything like that. I thought she brought just the right sweetness and intensity to the character of Natalie.The only thing I'd change about it is more of a background story of the relationship between the soultaker and the woman Natalie so closely resembled.

But at least this movie got what it deserved - to be sent to the Satellite of Love to be ridiculed on by Mike, Tom Servo, and Crow T. Robot from Pearl Forrester on "Mystery Science Theater 3000!" "Soultaker" is one of those long lost, forgotten movies that are so bad you'll be guaranteed to have nightmares or depression later on in life. Even though the movie is not that old, it's still a very forgotten type of movie. If it had never been for the intelligent minds at "Mystery Science Theater 3000," the movie would not only seem like it was never made, but the movie wouldn't be very enjoyable by us moviegoers.In real life: this movie is really bad. In the Satellite of Love: this movie is excellent!

I find it funny that the director would actually come on IMDb and post his feelings on MST3k's take on his movie, and yet completely overlook the fact that his movie might've just been bad. Not the worst that I've ever seen (I'm afraid Carnosaur has that distinction), but let's face it; it wasn't that great either. I will admit that the cinematography was actually pretty decent, and that the locations were actually pretty nice. As for the actual story, script, dialogue, casting, actors, acting, and that sort of thing, the movie falls flat. Why don't I pick it apart? The story isn't good. The writer obviously wrote the story as a self-congratulatory piece, one in which she is apparently the beautiful center of the universe. There's nothing exactly original about it, it's been done before, and, without giving anything away, it's been done BETTER before.The script is just awful. Dialogue is stilted, motivations are never very clear, and it's clear that this was a first or second attempt by the writers. Please correct me if I'm wrong, or at least surprise me by proving me otherwise. This is like a student film written by freshmen that should never have been marketed.Casting was also pretty bad. There's some sort of class conflict between the lovelorn pair, but it's barely believable. One is the mayor's daughter and the other didn't go to college in a Southern town. Oh, the scandal! It's just like Romeo and Juliet or West Side Story except the characters are so shallow and one-dimensional that you don't really care whether they get together or not. On top of that, the two principal actors are not cast very well, at least insofar as she's upper class and he's working class.The acting's pretty flat. Robert Z'Dar is, of course, deep-throated and mythical, and I like him in a campy, not good movie sort of way. He generally shines in whatever narrow confines he's given. The same is with the other Estevez, who appears to be a decent actor who never really got a fair shake. The rest, well, I fear that they were either summer stock or newbies to the acting scene, because their acting was either very affected, over-the-top campy, or missing. Watching some scenes was more like watching a live performance of Das Boot by Miss Newsome's 8th grade class; actors would obviously forget lines, botch them, or improv them unconvincingly. If they actually stuck to the script, BOY would I be surprised.Skip this one. Please, save yourself two hours to crochet a beer cozy or solve a kitten puzzle or kick dogs, but don't abuse yourself with a movie like this. Even with Robert Z'Dar.