Trolls may enjoy giving a movie one star and pundits feel really smart for explaining why this film is boring, but nothing has any value out of context. The context of Flora is that it is a student film, with amateur everything trying their best to make a good movie. And it is not great, but it's not that bad either. The premise promises a lot more than the movie delivers, but consider how many big studios tried similar theme movies and failed miserably.

That being said: imagine a cross between Lovecraft and The Ruins or maybe The Happening. This film is not it. The premise, though, comes really close. It is set in 1929 and the people caught in an area devoid of all animal life an fighting for their lives are scientists (well, students). When a member of the expedition starts dying in horrible ways, the others don't turn one against another, shout "let me out of here" or run around like headless chickens; they try to solve the problem with science. Unfortunately, being 1929 and the story being written by artsy people, that doesn't do them a lot of good, but the atmosphere was nice, the clothing gave the film an fresh look (even if the girls didn't act like 1929 girls at all) and the plot was original. They even used an old 20s car!

I would say that the film failed, but it was so close to something marketable that I can't help feel for its makers.

Rudyard, there are no people living in this forest. Do you see any animals? There's no flora with any color, nothing to allure insects!

Are you someone who prefers to spend his free time in his perfectly tended garden? Is your lawn as if a delegation from the International Golf Federation could arrive any minute to ask if it could be used as a "green" at a next golf championship? Do you spend hours in your garden staring at freshly planted and potted flowers and plants? Are you an expert in fertilizing, scarifying, digging, pruning, grafting and draining? Well, I guess this film is really suitable for you. Because "Flora" is actually nothing more than a nature film that every botanical film viewer will be excited about. Do you know which film quote always came to me? "Run, Forrest, Run!". Only here the main characters are running away from a forest. They might have used the following alternative movie title: "Attack of the killer pollen". That about covers it.

"Flora" certainly isn't a bad film. But for those who don't see themselves as purebred nature lovers, this film may seem terribly boring. What they managed to do, is to show a decent image of the 1920s. I found the props and atmosphere perfect. All the pieces fitted. The oldtimer, the costumes, and the used music. Perfectly chosen. Everything seemed innocent and frivolous in those days. The naivety and insufficient knowledge are portrayed in a proper way.

The resources available to the six scientists are fairly limited. Plants are cataloged in notebooks. Illustrations are made with the use of a whole array of colored pencils. No electronic worksheet and digital camera as one would use in the present time. You won't see the main characters wandering around with a tiny headphone connected to a compact MP3 player. No, here they are lugging around with an impressive gramophone with a huge horn. Before you know it, an old-fashioned foxtrot echoes through the forest after putting on such a fragile record.

Praise for the creators of this indie-horror. Because despite the extremely limited budget, film-technically it looks fab. Even the for me unknown actors made themselves meritorious in the field of acting. Admittedly, sometimes there was a touch of overacting. And they tried to bring drama in a forced way. But this was certainly not irritating. Unfortunately, it was all fairly superficial with a painfully slow pace. It seemed after a while that the entire film consisted of exploring the surrounding nature. And yes, the discovery that no living organism can be detected in the surrounding area can easily be called troubling. But it's never really exciting.

Trust me, I'm not someone who only associates horror with gory slaughter and diabolical entities. And also, a forest in a horror movie isn't automatically linked to a lonely, deserted wooden cabin. Or a wandering, bloodthirsty creature that suddenly shows up from behind a tree and rips you into pieces. So all the praise to try a different idea and for once think out of the box. However, I don't think this symbiotic fungus that kills every human and animal life is something that ensures it to be a movie with nail-biting suspense. All in all, the starting point of the film wasn't bad when you talk about originality. But apart from some beautiful nature shots and moments in which the dialogue seemed interesting, it's all relatively boring and monotonous.

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There's some gorgeous location filming here, in addition to very effective and evocative set pieces. The cast did a very good job portraying the immature, often irresponsible students of the jazz age who are forced by bizarre circumstances to become responsible for themselves and each other. Juvenile panic is replaced by scientific investigation. In this film are echoes of Lovecraft, Faulkner and Hawthorne, harkening to a time when the wilderness was unknown and a realm of peril, terror and evil.