A post apocalyptic romp of the ‘bad things in the night’ will come and eat you variety. Staring Nicholas Cage as Paul, the erstwhile father trying to keep his twin sons alive against said bad things in the night. Sons, Thomas (Jaeden Martell) and Joseph (Maxwell Jenkins) not only have the creatures to contend with but also their raging hormones and disparate personalities.
Brief daytime forays away from their Arcadian lifestyle in an old farmhouse. Scavenging what they can survive and live the best that they can while Paul teaches them how to thrive. Including some help and hindrance from their neighbors who handily have a daughter of a similar age as the twins.
Night falls and everyone gets shut in for the night. The dog stirs and the doors are rattled by the unseen creatures. The sounds fade and the family can relax again. Putting in a great performance for about half of the movie, sees our Nic Cage unconscious – some say this is a good thing. People die, creatures attack, creatures are killed and the young ones head off to find another hapless enclave.
The good:
Gotta love a post apocalyptic horror, there is so much fodder for tension and action between people and situations. Creature features are also great for thrills and chills and the reveal of the scary monsters is usually satisfying in a survival horror way. It’s not a great movie, but it is really not that bad. If you have a bit of spare time and want a horror that does not demand much of you, put this on even just to have a giggle about how far Nicholas Cage has come from the likes of ‘Con Air’ and ‘Lord of War’. But then again his production company, Saturn films, was part of this movie and let’s not forget that Saturn brought us ‘The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent’ as well.
The bad:
This movie suffers from a lot of pacing challenges with some large tracts of mundane situations with brief interludes of action. The night creature scenes are far too dark and we do not get a great view of the action with these ape/insect/crocodile looking creatures. The story is very formulaic and the viewers do not get much information – what caused the apocalypse? Where did the creatures come from? What is your house made out of that these dervish beings can’t enter from ground level? Why are your neighbors such dicks?
Let’s make it better:
I’m not sure where the title Arcadian fits in with the story. Is it because they’re living in the beautiful countryside? Anyway, let’s use the Arcadian riff and merge our cast into Greek mythology. Father Paul is Arcas, king of Arcadia of his little countryside compound. The apocalypse befell humankind with a mutation causing the change into the ape/insect creatures. Echoing his mother Callisto being turned into a bear in the mythology. While Paul is trying to keep his family safe and is happy enough to kill the creatures. The helpful/hindrance neighbors are aware that these creatures are just mutated family trying to get back with their loved ones and tries to form new bonds with them. Paul while out after dark confronts a creature and tries to kill it, but it is his wife now in creature form. Paul becomes a creature and now with his creature wife returns to the house to try to make a new life with his children.
That may not be a better story but Arcadian does not give you much in the way of imagination to start with.
Uncanny Lounge 
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