Horror Movie Review: Minutes to Midnight (2018)

Boasting an impressive cast that includes William Baldwin, Richard Grieco, Bill Moseley, John Hennigan and Viva Bianca. Minutes to Midnight sees a group of friends terrorised by masked men with murder on their mind.

Like all horror movies with these set-ups/premise, the movie opens with a couple having an isolated break in the woods. They want to relax but end up being killed by our movies villains. It’s a violent opening but incredibly unoriginal, something that bogs down the movie quite a bit.

Sometime later, Travis (Hennigan) arrives in a small American town looking for his brother and girlfriend. These are the two from the beginning. He is polite and just asking the townspeople if they’ve seen them. However, he is treated as though he has leprosy.

You see, this town has suffered in the past. They really don’t want to bothered by any strangers asking questions about missing people.

It’s not just the townspeople that Travis has problems with though as a group of young adults have arrived to celebrate the impending New Year. They hole up at an isolated lodge (of course) as a big storm approaches with a few of group being obnoxious and rude to Travis when he comes knocking.

It’s the New Year though, right? Time to tick some horror movie tropes by drinking and having sex!

Unfortunately for them, the party is about to be crashed by a trio of mask-wearing psychos!

Minutes to Midnight has a few things going for it. Namely the calibre of the acting (good from most with only a few stinking up the screen), a couple of decent characters, some nice gore and the look of the killers. The trio’s masks are eye-catching and they stand out amongst the bland location and dark night.

While there is little fresh here, Minutes to Midnight tries hard at delivering a solid slasher flick. The tropes that are trotted out are tired as hell but it does enough elsewhere to be somewhat entertaining.

The overly familiar feel is detrimental though. Especially when you see the likes of Bill Moseley throwing out a performance that we’ve seen from him in a few of his movies now.

Thankfully, he’s far from the focus. That instead is given to one of the killers whose size makes him a terrifying prospect to deal with.

How you feel about this level of familiarity will likely affect your thoughts on Minutes to Midnight. It’s cliched and unoriginal but it has got good acting, decent effects and a solid enough plot for most horror fans to enjoy.