Excellent! Unpredictable! Chilling!

Rating: 8/10 (29 August 2012)

Two things that I require from a film are being interesting and being convincing. And horror movies need to be scary and bloody. And Hills Have Eyes has it all! After seeing few mediocre clichéd horrors, I was quite pleasantly surprised with this one.
Characters are very believable and likable. I could easily relate to Bobby and Brenda and my favorite was Doug. That guy turned out to be a quite amazing action hero, which was not obvious, but had most sense. Some characters in horrors do things just for the sake of action/killing, but Doug was motivated by returning his baby. I think that is the strongest reason someone could have for facing possible gory death. All the good characters were well acted and acted like people in their situation probably would.
Furthermore, villains were awesome too. Nuclear experiments amongst mining inbreds would cause a lot of damage to their physique and intelligence, but I guess that surviving the radiation would make one more enduring. And unlike many other horror environments, this one actually makes sense to be isolated and have no phone signal. Also, most governments probably would try to ignore/hush down failed experiments with human casualties.
When watching this film, I was anxious all the time, at the same time enjoying every moment while also being afraid what the future scene brings. It wasn't illogical or boring at any time.
After seeing it, the scenes, the characters and the atmosphere stuck to me. I love this film and I can't find anything that I think is wrong, too much or obsolete nor anything I would have changed about it. Even the ending is very nice and rewarding to see.
Sequel is also worth seeing, being very original in it's own way and not being the replica of the first one.
9/10