SmugKitZine Tied for the best movie I have ever seen

Ava-Grace Willis Story: It's very simple but honestly that is fine.

Asad Almond A clunky actioner with a handful of cool moments.

Kirandeep Yoder The joyful confection is coated in a sparkly gloss, bright enough to gleam from the darkest, most cynical corners.

David Weiner Doesn't anyone read anymore? The creature, setting, and story line were lifted whole cloth from F. Paul Wilson's "Repairman Jack" series. The creature is called a "rakosh", a demon from Indian mythology. Read the Wilson story (it's available on a free download from the Guttenberg Project) Then re-watch the movie. When plots and other things are lifted from other sources and no credit is given, it's very irritating, if not downright dishonest. Imagine if someone made a film about a scientist who tried to animate a dead monster that he stitched together from stolen body parts, and tried to pass it off as an original plot. If the screenwriter had Wilson's permission, then why not list it in the credits? Shame on you SyFy.

bkoganbing In Carny Lou Diamond Phillips is cast as the police chief of Reliance, New York a small town in the most rural part of upstate New York where the big event of the year is about to take place, a carnival has come to town. Not just any carnival, but one specializing in some of the rejects from the Creator/Deity work table. In this film's makers must have been inspired by Todd Browning's classic film, Freaks.Would that this film was anywhere close to being as good as Freaks, but it sadly isn't. The biggest attraction in the show is some kind of gargoyle like creature billed as the New Jersey Devil. When it gets loose and starts terrorizing the area, Lou as the sheriff takes it upon himself to organize a hunting party.This is where it really gets ridiculous. When he was a smalltown Texas sheriff in Bats at least he called in some help. Why he didn't in Carny is totally beyond me.The film was shot in and around Ottawa to simulate the rural atmosphere of upstate New York which is not as rural as when Jimmy Stewart made upstate New York's fictional Bedford Falls famous. The rest of the cast is made up of Canadian players.Of course getting this gargoyle proves to be a rough go for Lou and his posse of hunters who are used to more docile creatures like deer. I tell you this, George Bailey would have known when he was overmatched and would have sent for help should the gargoyle ever be threatening Bedford Falls. There's also a side story about a crazy preacher wanting to see the carnival destroyed before he even knew about the gargoyle.Carny is one big mess of a film. Hopefully Lou Diamond Phillips got to get in some rural pursuits while making this feast for his next Thanksgiving table.

Michael O'Keefe Lou Diamond Phillips in yet another movie that will briefly entertain and then be forgotten. CARNY is little horror flick filmed in Canada for the Sci Fi Channel. Alan C. Peterson plays a greedy and murderous carnival owner that has just acquired a hideous monster for his traveling freak show. The carnival comes to set up shop in a small Nebraska town. Hidden amongst the roustabouts and sideshow oddities like the two-faced man is a steel cage where shackled is the newest attraction...half animal/half devil creature...Jersey Devil. Influential citizen and Pentecostal minister Owen(Viasta Vrana)warns Atlas, the local Sheriff(Phillips), not to let the carnival open for business. Nevertheless, the freak show opens to a good size crowd and after being taunted, the blood thirsty Jersey Devil breaks loose and begins to feast on the township. Sheriff Atlas now has a hell bent monster to catch and a mess to clean up. Actually the Jersey Devil is visually cool. Also in the cast: Domenic Cuzzocrea, Simone Elise Girard and Joe Cobden.

Gene Crokus An amusing diversion, the folks responsible for "Carny" trot out that staple of the Sci-Fi network, the monster that seems to not really be a science fiction imagining. One that causes mayhem, for certain, but not nearly as much as a few of the humans involved.A carnival visiting a town has as its star sideshow attraction a beast which remains hidden from us until it escapes from its cage. The carnival master has assured Lou Diamond Phillips (the local sheriff) that there will be no problem with the sedated and incarcerated...thing.We know different. There is another problem - a local preacher that hates all things carnival, and he particularly is interested in seeing that the escapee is captured.I will leave it to you to find out how this whole thing ends. As tepid as this movie is, it will be far more interesting to the next generation of MST3000 fans.One and a half stars.