Wow. It's not that bad. People should chill out. But anyway, yes, the middle to end falls short from following the basic horror flick annoyances. But it isn't unwatchable. People are acting like it's freakin sharknado stupid or something. I implore potential viewers to ignore that rating and the thumb downs people like to give reviews the disagree with (as I'm sure this one will get a lot of those). Boo hoo.The movie will have you wanting to see what's around the corner and behind that door. It's really good on suspense. That is probably its strongest point. As a horror freak, I actually loved the amount of suspense. Whoever complained about it being too dark, just, no. It wasn't too dark. You could ALWAYS see the characters when you needed to. The production did not have poor lighting, I'm guessing that reviewer doesn't like surprises or something. I don't know. The slightly Rec 3 ending was not that great. Seemed a little lazy compared to the suspense that was given throughout.The found-footage-but-not filming style is not distracting. If that annoys someone, I'd say you're being faaar to picky. We all know it's not found footage. The director knows that too. Just watch or don't.Acting is a little annoying in the beginning, it just is. I've seen worse, but I was not entirely convinced of their relationship to one another.Any way, it's not perfect, or at the top 10 or 20, or 30 of the best horror flicks, but it is worth watching.

Waste of time, makes me angry watching this kind of crap

It just goes to show that a lower budget does not necessarily result in an excellent film, particularly of this genre. The scares were non-existent, consistent shaky cam and one-dimensional characters. I expected nothing more to be honest. A group of tourists have been travelling around Europe, during their stop at Kiev they come across an extreme-tour to Pripyat. Yet, the desolate ghost town may not actually be so abandoned after all. Everyone and their pet dog knows about the Chernobyl disaster, which is why it makes such an interesting location for a horror. Early one morning an entire town had to evacuate immediately before succumbing to the leaking nuclear radiation. The problem with this film is, in my opinion, it's insensitive. This was a horrible accident to which innocent lives were lost, to then exploit that with such mediocrity felt wrong. Personal views aside, this film was boring, predictable and tame. The setting of Pripyat and Chernobyl did create a chilling atmosphere, and the first fifteen minutes genuinely had good character development. Then when our characters arrive, they just become expendable. The "scares" are simply loud noises, literally. There's a scene where an irradiated bear suddenly charges through a hallway...midway up an apartment complex. Oren Peli lost me at that point. Then Brad Parker's directing style, whilst bold with various long takes, lacks confidence and slowly succumbs to shaky cam. A horrendous scene that perfectly illustrates this is when the van is mysteriously attacked. Filmed through the perspective of a phone, the camera is tossed around like a rag doll. I physically could not see anything! How is that scary!? Heck if I wanted to be scared of the unknown, I would've taken a stroll at midnight without a torch instead of watching this. The ending was rushed, I'm talking "concluded" within thirty seconds. It also ends on a jump scare...yep, pretty much sums this up. Chernobyl Diaries? Hardly a diary, more like a note. A post-it note. Chernobyl Post-It Notes.

This film revolves around the forbidden excursion of a group of students to an abandoned city near the old Chernobyl nuclear power plant. Everything goes well and the film manages to introduce the subject very well. Suddenly, things go wrong and the group becomes isolated and uncontactable in the middle of the city, while nightfall quickly and mysterious things seem to walk in the dark.It's a great idea for a horror movie, no doubt. Original, relatively little explored, the subject touches a situation well known to people. The big problem is that the script did not know how to properly exploit this, it develops well until the terror should begin to feel more intensely, and its at that moment that the script loses itself. After that, it develops in a hurried and predictable way, without scares or fear, in a relatively warm way. The end is disastrous. To make matters worse, the characters almost did not deserve psychological development, they are just meat for the kill. There are absolutely unlikely moments, and the creatures chasing the characters are absolutely rudimentary, undeveloped, and boring. The sound effects are quite elementary. The scenarios are the best of this film: they really can transport us to the original places and give the idea of ​​the drama that was the evacuation of the region around Chernobyl. The radiation issue is addressed, but its very undervalued and has little interest for the plot, which is bad. It could have been used in a smarter way, like all the rest of this film. This was a good idea, but the final product is very dumb.