The Burrowers is half a great film that descends into embarrassing lows in the final frames. The atmosphere of a horror western is reduced to a laughably bad movie once the monsters are revealed. This is an absolute pity because the first half is a beautifully shot, perfectly paced eerie suspense thriller with an interesting take on a familiar story. This is a direct to DVD film at best and a strange choice for a film festival.

Promoted as a cross between Tremors and The Searchers, the film is set in the Wild West in a pastoral bliss. Out of nowhere an entire family goes missing, seemingly swallowed into the ground. A posse is put together to find the culprits who most suspect may be Native Americas. The search reveals a series of shallow graves that hide the existence of a breed of bloodthirsty creatures that enjoy feasting on human flesh.

The great:
A horror western seems like a stroke of genius and the first half delivers a beautifully crafted suspense thriller. The film borrows all of its ideas from better films but before the big reveal it manages to improve on the monster concept with a gruesomely innovative creation.

The good:
The cast is made up of a veritable who’s who of television science fiction actors doing their best given the material. Fanboys will recognise the cast from their previous works including Doug Hutchinson (Tooms from The X-Files), Clancy Brown (Carnivale) and William Mapother (Lost).

The not-so-good:
When the film has to show its cards it becomes abhorrently bad due to lacklustre special effects and the ridiculous design of the main creatures. In the last act the script resorts to strained developments that seem like the work of a scriptwriter who has never seen a horror film in his life.

The Burrowers is half a great film but is severely let down by the last act. The beautiful scenery and decent acting isn’t enough to overcome what equates to a cheap and poorly concluded monster film.

The Burrowers screens at the Melbourne International Film Festival this evening (Wednesday, July 29 at 9.15pm at the Kino) and on Saturday, August 1 at 11.30pm at Greater Union. For tickets head to the MIFF website.

Here's the (R-rated) trailer: