It is lurid, furious, bloodthirsty fun.

| Sep 9, 2021

The Dead Lands is a solid action movie of the straightforward type we don't often see anymore, a rather simple revenge plotline enlivened by a sense of place and culture lacking in your standard action fare.

| Jan 20, 2021

The Dead Lands is a journey...one that the majority of American audiences will be introduced to for the first time. While this is a Māori story, it's one that will have quickly fans from genre lovers all backgrounds with its mythology, action...

| Jan 21, 2020

It's the same old ride, just packaged in a more interesting way, and for that reason The Dead Lands can only offer minor pleasures.

| Original Score: 6.5/10 | Jun 6, 2019

The bruises and path may be familiar, but The Dead Lands does enough to seem fresh and grips throughout.

| Original Score: 3/5 | Apr 5, 2019

It's in te reo but The Dead Lands never feels like it's trying too hard to say anything important. All the same, it may well become a very important film.

| Original Score: 4/5 | May 23, 2016

It certainly makes viewers reluctant to hassle anyone carrying a patu with authority, which is something the film can hang its hat on.

| Original Score: 3.5/5 | May 20, 2016

Situating death as the catalyst to action whereby legends, apparitions and spirits mobilize the command to vengeance, Fraser's narrative teems and trounces with relentless bloodshed, slaughter, violence and gore.

| Original Score: 2/5 | May 12, 2016

Seldom have I seen a more foreign film than this one. This is a story set, not only in a language, Te Reo, totally separate from Indo-European languages, but in a very different time and culture, as well.

| Original Score: B+ | Jan 5, 2016

A grisly, Maori revenge flick tailor-made for fans of high body-count fare.

Full Review | Original Score: 2.5/4 | Dec 24, 2015

Highly entertaining.

| Original Score: B | Nov 13, 2015

At once violent, exotic and compulsively strange: a fable of revenge with a haka vibe.

| Original Score: 3/5 | Nov 12, 2015

Powers away relentlessly and soon becomes numbing - except when Makoare waggles his tongue in traditional warrior manner, which is genuinely a fearsome thing to behold.

| Original Score: 2/5 | May 31, 2015

By the final stretch, the combat is pure tedium, with each skuffle filmed and edited in the same way each time and the makers refusing to scale things up in the name of idle spectacle.

| Original Score: 2/5 | May 29, 2015

An exotic and satisfying alternative to the average Hollywood punch-'em-up, an offbeat war story with a neat sideline in ancient magic-realist philosophy.

| Original Score: 4/5 | May 28, 2015

The Dead Lands is a distinctive tale that blends coming-of-age with some muscular action sequences.

| Original Score: 3/5 | May 28, 2015

This tale of a young warrior's blooding resembles Apocalypto in Maori instead of Mayan, although the comparison does it few favours.

| Original Score: 2/5 | May 28, 2015

A fun thriller that'll have you reaching for the travel brochures.

| Original Score: 3/5 | May 26, 2015

Neatly balances a folkloric coming-of-age tale with violent action thrills.

| Original Score: 4/5 | May 25, 2015

Although undoubtedly a worthy piece of indigenous action cinema - and how often can you say that? - The Dead Lands still feels like a haka without end.

| Original Score: 3/5 | May 25, 2015