User Reviews

Steve is an investigative reporter so bad at his job that he doesn't realize that Natas is Satan backward and even after dealing with gunslinger zombies, he still brings his friends into danger and a ghoul murders a bunch of them and then a demon shows up. Yes, 1986 was a wild time for movies, a moment when anything could end up on rental shelves.

Jack Dunlap only made one movie. This is it. This is what he has left us to remember him by. Well, that and some minor acting roles.

Of note, the mystical Indian named Smohalla in Natas the Reflection was played by the Nino Cochise, the real life grandson of one of the most famous Native American chiefs of all time, Cochise. He was 104 when this was made and never got to see it because it sat around for three years and he died a year after this movie. I think we can all agree that while death is inevitable and sad, he lived a full life and thankfully never had to sit through Natas the Reflection.

An ultra-rare low-budget tale, filmed in Arizona, which starts off with a really interesting, original plot before degenerating into more routine fare which is not without interest. I always find that lower-budgeted movies with rougher edges than the more modern glossier fare are always better at sending shivers and chills down your spine than the more expensive stuff and this film is no exception, a creepy story only ruined by some unintentional cheesiness and a sad reliance on 'slasher' aspects of the tale, i.e. a group of irritating twentysomethings getting gorily offed one-by-one by a scary monster. However the before and after parts of the story surrounding this slasher episode are pretty darned good for an extremely low-budget, almost amateurish tale, one of those films where the cast also act as the crew and the extras are local rednecks.

Technically the film is efficiently made with an effective soundtrack of eerie tunes and noises and not too much irritating music. It's fairly well shot in places and makes great use of some isolated but picturesque Arizona locations such as the desolate mountains or scrub land in the middle of nowhere. During the film's course all kind of strange little events happen (because our characters are investigating near the portal to hell or something) such as water turning to sand, a phantom carriage appearing out of nowhere in the middle of the night, and in my favourite scare, a tin can suddenly springs to life and out pops a lizard - a fine moment. These help to give the movie a weird ambiance and an unsettling unpredictable edge so that you never know what's around the corner.

Things kick off very well with a reporter, Steve, venturing into the midst of nowhere to meet an old Native American guy whom the credits claim is 109 years old in real life. This may or may not be a fabrication on their part but he certainly looks very old and speaks in an echoey voice to boot. After receiving a magic talisman Steve finds himself in a wild west town. This is where the story gets odd. Apparently the film-makers had access to an old wild west set so they had to fit it into the story somehow. The town is a "ghost town" in the literal sense, inhabited by the shuffling desiccated and zombified corpses (thanks to some cool make-up) of the former inhabitants who plan to string Steve from the nearest tree. Thankfully he escapes and finds a magic mirror on his way back to civilisation.

Here's where the story takes a turn for the worse. Steve brings four friends unexplainedly back with him to the town to investigate. These guys are just zombie fodder from the start and none have any character development aside from maybe Steve and his girlfriend and even that's minimal. Being a film made in 1986 the fashions are also appallingly dated and make our hero look like some kind of rodeo rider. Anyway a couple of jocks are killed by stabbing and surprise decapitation with a falling scythe whilst one of the makeweight bimbos loses her clothing (naturally) and jumps into her sleeping bag with what she thinks is her boyfriend. No prizes for guessing a mouldering zombie is lurking inside who attacks her. Then the sleeping bag bursts into flames and turns her body into a charred skeleton within minutes - weird, I like it! Eventually macho hero Steve escapes with girlfriend (who wears a skimpy vest-thing of course) in tow. They venture into the mountains for the climax in which things get very cool because they meet ol' Natas himself, a winged demon guy who actually looks pretty darned good for such a cheap costumed guy with makeup. Natas transfixes our hero with a death ray or some such beam (hurrah!) and it's up to the trusty blonde girlfriend to transform herself from bimbo into heroine by deflecting the ray back into Natas and sending him back where he came from. A very cheap, amateurish battle played for maximum drama and great fun in this viewer's opinion. Finally there's time for a twist and happy ending.

Sure this film has plenty of flaws. For instance the acting is wooden throughout and from every single cast member, not surprising when you have a cast of amateurs at hand. It's not so bad as to make you cringe, just wooden and pretty dull. The story drags at places and too much happens at once in other parts but for the most part it's watchable entertainment. Kudos to director Jack Dunlap for inserting chunks of originality into his tale and mixing up a number of elements, making one unpredictable whole. The worst thing I hate about low budget slasher horror fare is that most of it can be predicted a mile off, but that's definitely not the case with NATAS: THE REFLECTION. This is a film which it's best knowing absolutely nothing about to start off with, just sit back and let it take you on a wild and woolly ride through the furthest reaches of the imagination and then try to make some sense of what the hell is going on.