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In order to uncover the truth behind her father’s inexplicable vanishing deep in the Belizean jungle, a scientist seeks out the US army. Along with a fearsome guerrilla army volatile under the control of a supernatural warlord, a horrifying creature descends onto the arena- giant mutated wasps that seem to be ferociously thirsting for blood.
The ‘dragon wasps’ had terrifyingly bad CGI and unengaging acting, the dialogue made me want to cringe, and the entire narrative was laced with an unfathomable amount of cheese, but somehow, I managed to have a good time. Although in its essence it is very dull and senseless, the best part is that it acknowledges this and builds on it! Even though it pains me to admit it, I have deep respect for any movie that acknowledges how completely absurd it is, like the movie about a telekinetic tyre called ‘Rubber’, now that’s a bizarre film! Having been introduced to the giant wasps in the first scene, I could tell exactly how the rest of the movie would unfold; it was completely predictable. For that reason, my advice would be to keep your expectations for Dragon Wasps a little more grounded so you do not end up disappointed. To some degree, calling it a horror film does injustice because it lacks the thrill and has the typical feel of the ‘action’ genre. Definitely not scary at all. My bad.
This is the most basic shape of the narrative trust me, I mean basic. An entomologist by the name of Gina, or in layman’s words, a bug fanatic, sets off in search of her father, who also happens to be an entomologist and has gone missing in the jungle. She ropes on board her friend, Rhonda, yet another entomologist (!), and gets even more assistance from an army officer, John, and his group of army buddies who happen to be guarding the area. It isn’t long after they set off to the jungle themselves that they start being attacked by an evil rabble of drug dealing gangsters and ‘gigantic wasps’ which have a tendency to change size from scene to scene. They only seem to spawn for the sake of attacking the crew which is simply hellish. The leader of the gang is a ‘witch doctor’ a stereotype made true. To add to my point the winged beasts also breathe fire, giving an extra push in that direction to watch the film. If that’s not an incentive to watch the film, I don’t know what is.
I am delighted by how the action scenes started within the first scene of the film, and they also kept on raising the bar chaos-wise at an incredible rate. On the other hand, detailed atmosphere and buildups were never delivered so sadly nothing can scare, frighten or intimidate in any single way. To make things far worse, the CGI wasps were less frightening than laughingly pathetic as I am positive that not even a six-year-old would be scared of them! To put it in a different way, there are tons of gunfire and explosions to please and entertain the audience which is appreciated because it keeps them on the edge of their seats and engaged from beginning to end. From where I stand, the two female characters other than being overly knowledgeable about insects were not all that useful to the team. No surprises there then. Duh. Somehow, one of the women managed to confuse a bag of cocaine with an explosive device at one point! I could go on a bit more about whether that was very judgmental, but I seriously do not think that there are many entomologists who look as pretty as they do but I guess that is something I will have to deal with. Even movies with such ambious deadly wasps need a tinge of esthetic appeal.
In my opinion, there are maybe a few things in common that can be made between Dragon Wasps and Eight-Legged Freaks both are a bit of a parody and the rules of ‘reality’ have to be put aside for the time being. It also has the characters going back into the lairs of the monstrous creatures towards the end of the story in order to save the other characters that, for no reason, managed to survive! While in Eight Legged Freaks, they are caused by some sort of radiation leaking, Dragon Wasps is actually about a government secret trying to breed a super insect. Yeah, I don’t get the reasoning behind that either. The premise itself is not a stunner, but it is a bit entertaining, I guess. The other comparison to be made is Predator (a bit of a stretch I know! Ok, A LOT of a stretch!) because they have in common that they are both set in a jungle where a group of people get lost and are attacked by some weird monstrous thing.
Joseph Knee, the director of Dragon Wasps, has won some awards for his work in the past and has the potential to become a renowned name in the film industry if he continues working on projects with the same zeal. Who doesn’t enjoy a tacky B-movie once in a while? This is certainly a movie that one needs to be in a certain mindset to enjoy, and I would actually recommend doing so in a group setting. With alcohol. Personally, I feel this is the best way to enjoy this movie because if taken too seriously, the film will be disastrous. But, I’ll give the movie that much, it is entertaining at least for the most part.
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