Bunker: Project 12 (2016) User Reviews (15)

I thought I was watching an Uwe Boll film...

[MamaPapaXP · 4/10 · 29 February 2016]

I watched this film in the vain hope it was an adaptation of a video game whose plot I remembered being quite interesting. (I couldn't remember it at the time but now know it was 2010's 'Singularity.') Sadly, I was disappointed. (On more than one level.)

The plot sees Eric Roberts hiring a team of mercenaries to retrieve a long since discontinued Russian cold-war experiment which is buried in a remote bunker. With a fairly decent premise for the ultimate nature of the experiment, six different story locations, the presence of Game of Thrones' brilliant James Cosmo (Jeor Mormont) and no less than five plot 'twists', reveals and 'turnabouts' you'd be forgiven for thinking the film was, at the very least, good-ish, but you'd be wrong.

The problems begin with the script and the way it's delivered; "Do you mind if I smoke in your house" says a merc to his boss while he's already sat smoking. (Not funny, not necessary, not delivered well and does nothing for the scene.) Or some tasteless racist comments from one character that are also not funny or necessary. (His opponent was going to kill him anyway, he didn't need a contrived reason.) There are so many places where the lines, or their delivery, just fall flat or detract from the pace or tension.

On that note, it is sad to see the formerly brilliant Eric Roberts totally phoning his lines in. (When an actor has over FORTY films due for release in 2016 alone, that's not a good thing and it really shows.)

Next, there are the asinine plot decisions, such as a merc in desperate need of lots of artillery who finds a room full of AK47s and takes one. Just one. And no extra ammo; or the totally inexplicable appearance of the boss, near the end of the film, who really should have just gone there with the mercenaries. And the mercenaries? This crack team seem to know nothing about each other or their true motives and I couldn't imagine them working together by the end of the film.

Then there are the effects. Apparently, 1960's Russia were using 1990's white computer monitors for their excellent quality closed circuit cameras. I can forgive using the same couple of tunnels from dozens of angles, with different lighting each time, to simulate the effect of a maze-like bunker but adding some changing corridor furniture or wall decals would have made it more believable and less boring. As to the cheap and ludicrously obvious chroma key for cavernous rooms and absolutely dire and badly scaled CGI/image cloning for the battalion is totally unforgivable in this day and age, when better end results can be seen on you tube with free software.

Ultimately, this film is not so bad that it isn't watchable, (it's even occasionally enjoyable (especially the very well choreographed hand-to-hand fight sequence) but the let-downs outnumber the tolerable parts a little too much for my liking. It's curious to note that, despite my going into this thinking it might be based on a well-loved game, it turned out not to be, but it looked suspiciously like a film from the king of god-awful video game to movie conversions, Uwe Boll. That should say it all, really.

Some B-Grade movie fun to be had here

[eddie_baggins · 4/10 · 23 August 2018]

Take one brief look at the synopsis for Bunker: Project 12 and you will quickly understand that you're very much in B-grade movie territory, the type of landscape where you will need to switch your brain off and leave your better judgement at the door should you wish to enjoy the silly and budget-restrained goodies' that a film such as this often entails.

To call Project 12 a good film would be a lie, but against all the odds, Jaime Falero's high-concept action/thriller ends up being a film with enough neat ideas and scenarios to remain ever watchable, the perfect mindless film to put on for a rainy night and another chance to see Eric Roberts in one of the 100's of film's his seemingly appeared in over the last 12 - 18 months.

Interestingly for a film of Project 12's ilk, Falero spends a large portion of the early runtime afforded to him to slow-build his narrative as a collection of long-hidden Russian scientists involved in top secret experiments during the Cold War are killed-off until the film then moves into more horror/thriller territory when James Cosmo's soviet veteran Brian Balanowsky and a team of top-tier mercenaries enter into the fabled bunker to uncover its long dormant secrets.

It's a wise move by Falero to build up to this moment as the action and effects work on show here aren't much chop, no doubt hampered by a low-end budget, there's just not the tools available for Falero to fully enact out the potential of Project 12's idea, which is the type of idea you can see future film's riffing off thanks to its potential to be a highly over the top yet also highly entertaining mix of action and thrills in a setting that feels ripe for such a set-up.

With limits to what the film can achieve with its production values and resources, it's great to see the films cast have fun with what they're given with Roberts, Cosmo and other cast members such as Joaquín Sánchez (who also co-writes) and Natasha Alam all understanding what they are a part of and delivering delightfully D-grade turns which helps make the film an at times laugh out loud experience with hilariously placed zingers and lines for the cast to deliver.

Final Say -

With TV movie of the week conception, Bunker: Project 12 is the type of film you're likely to find on late night TV after the majority of us have gone to bed but with a fun concept and some hugely appealing ideas, Falero's film may not be great, but it does offer some good fun along its journey.

2 flamethrowers out of 5

Let me see your papers

[nogodnomasters · 4/10 · 14 October 2017]

The film lets you know a top secret Russian Cold War project was abandoned in 1973 and everyone associated with it were killed except for 3 scientist who escaped and are still being hunted.

The mystery of identity of the project takes about an hour or so before they reveal it, and at that point the ending drags out about twice as long as it should. However, before that the film runs a number of subplots and gets us confused as to what is going on. This made the film a chore to watch. I am going to summarize the first 23-27 minutes which some might consider a spoiler: John Henderson (Eric Roberst) is part of an arms company. He wants Project 12. (I will omit how he knows about it.) He has hired men to get the remaining scientists as he needs 3 items: The code, the key, and the co-ordinates. They need to get them before the Russians get them. The opening bus scene is repeated 23 minutes later, so you can just ignore it. There is a double agent in the group, but that is not the worst of it.

It is an Eric Roberts film, so don't expect a gem. It is a mixed genre, one that has been done before. Timothy Gibbs gives us a George Clooney type of performance , that was pretty much wasted. The hand to hand/knife scene at the end was a joke of poor camera work and bad choreography. Natasha Alam provides the token eye candy. They missed out having a hot Asian chick.

Guide: F-bomb. No sex or nudity.

Not so bad folks

[loxford-53999 · 5/10 · 8 January 2021]

What made this movie OK for me was the location. It's stated as the Canary Islands but the bunker, the tunnels? I couldn't find any reference to them, what were they built for, where exactly were they? Not by any stretch of the imagination an award winner but nevertheless the cast were competent and once they got themselves stuck into the tunnels it was at least atmospheric.

Corny thriller that I thought to be tongue and cheek, but was trying to be real!

[alvaroinvest-22158 · 1/10 · 20 August 2017]

Spare yourselves the time wasted on this terrible movie. Some reasonable acting but the script is unoriginal, the effects dire, and the directing is all over the place. At the start I thought this was an 80's spoof cold war movie, expecting it to be a comedy, but it takes itself far too seriously and falls down after 20 minutes.

Watched by mistake, don't waste you time

[astr-79557 · 1/10 · 22 January 2023]

Before watching this I superficially checked the IMDB rating and found it at 6.7 which is decent for an action movie. At about 1/3 to half of the movie I started to get anxious about when the good part of the movie would begin. Alas, with each minute it just got worse. Somehow I made it to the end, frustrated and wondering what people see in this crap to rate it that high. And till the last sevond hoping for the best in the perception of the human beings, thinking - now the good part must begin... or - the ending must be unbelievably breathtaking surprise... Nope.

Then took a peek into the IMDB again, my bad, it's a different movie titled the Bunker..... This crap was rated at 3.4

Folks, don't waste your time. No one will give you it back.

Typical indie

[Leofwine_draca · 2/10 · 18 October 2018]

PROJECT 12: THE BUNKER is another indie sci-fi/thriller with zero redeeming qualities. The only difference about it is that it was shot in Spain, although it's no different to a bad indie from any other country. Some shady Russian characters conduct top-secret experiments and then attempt to cover them up by killing everyone involved. The rest involves cheap action scenes and characters running about in the dark. Eric Roberts and James Cosmo both play in support and should no better than appearing in such a hopeless production.

Would watch rather than Kardashians

[Christ-ian · 4/10 · 30 October 2023]

Quite unsurprising and seemed to be filled with some extra clutter to make it 90 min long. The acting wasn't great but I've seen much worse too.

Would I not have read the synopsis I wouldn't have had any idea what I was watching until about halfway through the movie. I don't think you'd lose much is you just skipped to the moment when they reach the bunker.

I think it was watchable and with the topic had potential to be bad instead of just awful. I'd say it just a few ticks away from being bad enough to be good. It is a three star movie but anything with soviet scifi elements gets an extra star from me.

A B movie but a good B movie

[moorek · 5/10 · 12 June 2024]

When you see Eric Roberts is in a movie, you can be sure of two things. 1) You'll have an actor with the greatest hair in Hollywood and 2) the movie will be B at best. So this is a B and maybe not at best but close.

We've seen these types of movies made over and over. Why did I find this one stood out over the others?

GENREA SWITCH. The first half of the movie comes across as some type of international spy or heist film with a crew from all over the world. The second half is a B level, suspenseful, jump scare horror movie that should be lumped with zombie movies.

LOCATION. I read it was filmed on the Canary Island which I know nothing about but some of the exterior shots are different than most B movies. They at least spent the money to go to an exotic location. The latter half of the interior shots were clearly in some type of facility that also looked unique to me.

I felt they also did well utilizing small sets and then dark sets to project a variety of locations. There is one scene, in the dark, where they pass and old car while being told the bunker has not been open for 40 years or so and there is really nothing to set that scene except that old car.

EDITING/CAMERA WORK. While nothing in this movie would be considered unique, they did try and use different perspectives that we've seen in other movies such as sequential lights in a corridor; the use of up-close in focus to fade to distant focus. Nothing special but for a B movie they tried.

ACTING. Overall the acting was very middle-of-the road. But there were times when I thought the actor (or the screenplay) took a step beyond B level. The scene where Irina re-enters the corridor saying "we need explosives" and then see the Soviet soldier and draws her gun almost didn't seem rehearsed. When Alan is talking to. Tabeel about shooting the soldier multiple times, he appears to be on the edge of a breakdown. When I saw that, I was thinking that is how many movies should play the first experience with zombies or monsters or whatever. The character just not understanding what the hell just happened.

I liked Joaquin. Sanchez at Tabeel and would like to see him in other things. Natashia Alam could go on to do better movies with the right direction as she has some previous movie and TV credits but she's not done much since this movie. While I can't picture anyone other than Scarlett Johansson as Black Widow, I think Alam could have done the role justice.

PLOT. There's no need to think about the plot as there is really very little there. The "key" is actually a small key. Really? When we see what the key opens, you realize that could have been forced for far less effort than going to get the key. I don't think there is ever any reference to exactly what they were doing to make these super soldiers. Or why their eyes glow red.

It has the irksome things that many B level horror movies do like separating into smaller groups. Noises nearby that don't lead to jump scares. Although I think this movie did that well as that set the tone for what we would see.

A few plot points are given away too early, such as the Koreans,. But to give credit, it makes sense it would be the North Koreans as who else might know of these experiments? The two main "villains" are killed running from a blast which on one hand is fitting and a fast way to end them but on the other hand, we are used to there being some type of more focused revenge or ironic death.

I've gone on for too long as the movie really isn't that great but clearly I found it oddly interesting as many B movies are not interesting.

Jaime: Compliments, well done!

[idaint-54613 · 10/10 · 22 June 2016]

The film is a great action thriller very entertaining. In my opinion, also knowing the limited resources the project had, is quiet well done. I guess the idea is original and believable and if the setting is in the past, is bringing back to the reality an ideological conflict which is not yet over: even more, is very actual, unfortunately.

Jaime with really limited contacts, basically no support and by living in a remote island in the Atlantic as Tenerife, is achieving step by step a level of quality production which I find amazing compared to the relatively low production cost.

I wish him success for his career and looking forward to his next movies.

wait was that rammstein with flamethrowers in there ????

[godinamachine · 7/10 · 14 March 2022]

HEY EVERYBODY ITS ME (4) and today we review the movie ..... BUNKER :project runway ....the movie !!!!!!!!!!

This film started off ...strange to me ... i felt it would be more of a "trench 11" style movie ..or a "frankensteins army" type thing .. BUT it starts off some sort of action ..war , secret agent james bond in irac meets mission impossible deal going on ... but then it goes all indiana jones and the temple of lost nazi experiments ......ONLY for ONCE its not the nazis experiments lol.... i swear in EVER movie like this its always the nazis ...tell me im wrong .... .

So here we have a TON of back stabbing and all sorts of weird "back story" that REALLY doesnt actually happen to do anything for telling any sort of a legit back story .... other than "hey some sort of experiment a long time ago .... need more info .... eric roberts rounds up a team of obviously great people to find this place and get in there to grab up the equipment that was lost but never actually went anywhere so i mean he could have done this years ago BUT didnt ? .... i know ..they needed the one guy who knew where ...and the other guy who knew had the key ....in his butt ...dont ask ....

but the story aside ...the film does a pretty good job over all ... at first your like ... okay ..though its got a lot of double cross action going on its kind of a slow burn and "meh" ....but once your done the entire thing as a whole seems ... fullfilled ..... like .. it all fit well enough to work .......... NOW there is a TON of green screen in this one for sure .... MOST people might not notice it and some may just think they some of the backgrounds might look a little bit "off" at times ..usually the BIG open hall area etc .... but its actually done very well compared to most greenscreen attempts of that nature ...so cudos ..........the over all set designs and locations are pretty nicely done it seemed ........and everyone did a decent enough job ..the lighting was on par and the quality of he film was great, obviously filmed in a high end digital format ........

the ending WAS expected DUH .... but thats okay ...it was still a fun romp in the tunnels ........i DO wish there would have been more to the zombie troops / super troops thing though maybe earlier in the film giving that concept a bit more room to breath on screen BUT they still did do a good job halving the film into indiana bond vs zombie super soldiers ......

all and all ill give this one a solid 7/10 ..... if nothing else because ta some points it almost felt like i was watching a rammstein music video LOL.

Fun B-flick

[Woodyanders · 8/10 · 24 March 2020]

A group of mercenaries run afoul of an army of genetically enhanced Russian super soldiers in a top secret underground bunker.

Director Jaime Falero keeps the enjoyable story moving along at a constant pace, maintains a generally serious tone throughout, brings an admirably straightforward pulpy sensibility to the cool premise, and stages a few exciting action set pieces with skill and flair. Moreover, it's acted with zest by a game cast: Eric Roberts as the shifty Henderson, James Cosmo as wise old scientist Brian Balanowsky, Joaquin Sanchez as the fearsome Tabeel, Natasha Alam as the foxy Irina, Timothy Gibbs as the lethal Bruno, and Tony Corvillo as the tough Alan. Both Juanmi Marquez's sharp widescreen cinematography and the pulsating score by Ivan Palomares are up to snuff. An on the money movie.

Enjoyable and fast paced

[penelope-31558 · 7/10 · 8 August 2021]

Whilst the plot isn't really original, it moves along at a good pace with some reasonable acting. It's entertaining, and doesn't pretend to be anything else. We found it enjoyable for a wet and cold weekend.

Why so underrated???

[jmlgalaxytabandroid · 10/10 · 13 June 2024]

I really do not understand... Cr@p movies like "Inception" get a 10/10 and this movie only gets a 3.7/10, seriously??? There is nothing truly special about this movie, but it is very well done and very entertaining! I've seen so much bad movies that were really bad indeed, this one was actually pretty good, well paced, with a modest sense of humour... very underrated! It was quite entertaining, against all my expectations. I am glad I watched it!!! Again nothing really out of the ordinairy, but if all "bad" movies were as good as this one, then I'd be able to enjoy them all without fear of wasting hours of precious life time... Kudos, I really enjoyed it, and for that a 10/10...

Paco Arana is the executive man

[pacoaranacarcedo · 10/10 · 16 April 2023]

Juan Francisco Arana Carcedo is Paco Arana.

Today is a very special day for anyone that has been wotking for Jonh Henderson.

He is a tireless leader that has made the arms history ,the most powerfull one in the world.

The anual budgets were presented at the last stockholders meeting,and they included a special entry for what we are all comvince willbe the project,that warrantees , the future od pur great company.

This was my second work with Director Jaime Falero.

A self producted film that can be watched in Asia,Europe and the United States

Ladies and gentelman,with all od you...Mr Jonh Henderson.