Monthly Archives: February 2013

Walk on slaughter

Leave a comment

SLAUGHTER STUDIOS

2.5 Stars  2002/85m

“The place where nightmares come true.”

Director: Brian Katkin / Writers: Dan Acre, John Huckert & Damian Akhavi / Cast: Amy Shelton-White, Peter Stanovich, Nicolas Read, Allen Scotti, Tara Killian, Andy Chulani, Eva Frajko, Matthew Roseman, Laura Lawson, Serra Ellison, Lorissa McComas, Darren Reiher, Matt Westmore.

Body Count: 10

Laughter Lines: “Oh my god! The smell killed her!”

If you can get past the first moment of an incredibly annoying and stabbable director going on about what a big horror fan he is, there’s some mileage in this worn out premise, which is another film-within-a-film slasher flick, but unlike some of its contemporary vehicles from the same era, it drives a bit further before the radio breaks, engine blows, and the wheels fall off.

Said killable director leads a small crew and a bunch of airhead actresses with more cleavage than a January sale at Contessa to the abandoned and soon-to-be-demolished Slaughter Studios, home of numerous cheapo productions he’s a fan of.

There, he intends to shoot the last ever production before the wrecking balls arrive, guerilla style. They have just nine hours to film Naughty Sex Kittens vs The Giant Preying Mantis.

If you were to imagine a particularly violent episode of Scooby Doo that also featured Daphne and Velma getting their kit off and then making out, you’ve arrived at Slaughter Studios. Once the killing begins, it’s reminiscent of some of the old style slasher films with lots of POV work, spooky silhouettes wielding sharp implements of death and excessively ludicrous means of teen-dispatchment.

Is the ghost of hot-shot dead actor Justin Kirkpatrick – accidentally shot by a co-star at the studios a billion years earlier – responsible? The deaf security guard? One of the crew? The reality is a genuine surprise, and yet so simple in many ways. It’s down to the likeable couple of survivors to get out alive!

Where it fails is in trying to be too clever at time, parodying producer Roger Corman’s own cheapo micro-shoots – footage from The Slumber Party Massacre is wheeled out yet again. But there’s too much ham-brained humour and slightly perverse T&A exploitation: only the heroine keeps her top on, and other girls experiment in the usual soft core lesbo antics before meeting grisly ends.

Without the it-was-there-all-the-time twist at the end, Slaughter Studios would surely be found for less than two-stars, but as it is, they were trying to make something fun and, for most of the running time, they have, it’s merely a shame that what makes a slasher film good has once again been suffocated by a barrage of tits. Literally, that would be terrifying. For some. (Me).

Blurbs-of-interest: Darren Reiher was in Hatchetman; Brian Katkin later directed Scarecrow Gone Wild. Make of that progression what you will.

A festival of wrong

8 comments

wrongturn5dvd2WRONG TURN 5

1.5 Stars  2012/18/87m

A.k.a. Wrong Turn 5: Bloodlines

Director/Writer: Declan O’Brien / Cast: Doug Bradley, Camilla Arfwedson, Roxanne McKee, Simon Ginty, Paul Luebke, Oliver Hoare, Amy Lennox, Duncan Wisbey, Peter Brooke, Borislav Iliev, Radoslav Parvanov, Georgi Karlukovski.

Body Count: 10

Laughter Lines: “Can you help me, officer, I think I took a wrong turn…” / “Another wrong turn?”

Almost ten years ago, I drove some distance to see Wrong Turn on the big screen. Expecting little, I was stoked to get a lot. While not a massive commercial success, amongst the horror audience, it has quite a good reputation for its balls-to-the-wall high-octane survivalist opus, which pits inner-city teens against a trio of mutant cannibal woodsmen in the middle of the West Virginia boonies.

I imagine it’s how people might’ve viewed A Nightmare on Elm Street twenty years earlier, and then mourned the dilution of the villain over the ensuing sequels. Freddy, however, at least retained a scary enough ambience in the second and third movies, before toting all the threat of a puppy thereafter. The mutants of Wrong Turn took the Chucky route to all-out parody ten minutes into the second film. A wrong turn of another kind.

wt5-2pics

While the second movie was camp and bloody enough to be entertaining, by the time the third came around, production had been outsourced to Bulgaria and all aspects of horror were lost in a sea of cheap prosthetics and low-grade CGI grue. They went to Canada for the fourth (a prequel) and it’s back to Eastern Europe for the fifth film, a sequel to the prequel. I’m dizzy now.

The sad result is that Wrong Turn 5 is even worse than the third one. A combination of misleading plot, British actors shipped to Hungary and there trying to sound American, sets that look like they’ve been made of a cheap Lego substitute, and cheapo Halloween-mask make-up effects for the villains.

Observe Three-Finger in the original and how he looks now, which is ironically supposed to be a matter of weeks or months before the 2003 film:

3finger2

…or rather then-er. Further back.

Here, five teens camping out near the town of Fairlake, Hungary West Virginia, for the “Tenth Annual Mountain Man” festival, wrap their BMW round a tree and have an altercation with Doug Bradley, adopted father of sorts to the mutant loons. All are rounded up by the plucky female sheriff and thrown in jail.

Pinhead’s boys soon come to town to break him out, crossing paths with the same group of teens as they go and inflicting all sorts of pain on them: one girl’s belly is slashed open and she’s fed her own guts as she fades away, two more are run over by one of those ice-shredding trucks, and there are burnings, stabbings, and guttings galore.

wt4a

A festival setting might’ve been fun, but the budget was clearly so low they couldn’t afford one. Almost everything occurs in the cop shop, a motel room, or the Lego street sets, rendering Wrong Turn 5 more boring than any of its other sins.

Virtually every attempt to be creative fails, save for a couple of real-enough looking car crashes. Third-time-returning director O’Brien fills the time with ad-hoc nudity, people arguing the same point over and over, and sloppy demises for all. Three-Finger gets most of the screen time, giggling like the godawful Child’s Play-puppet he’s become.

We’re a long, long way from the low-concept, high-result territory of the first film. Makes me wonder what those involved with that film think when they see Wrong Turn 5 on a shelf?

"Can you still hear the lambs, Clarice?"

“Can you still hear the lambs, Clarice?”

Blurbs-of-shame: Peter Brooke was later in the shameful Jeepers Creepers: Reborn; Iliev played Three-Finger in Wrong Turn 3; Radoslav Parvanov was one of the loons in Bulgarian-shot WT-rip off Stag Night. Look out for pre-Game of Thrones performances from Roxanne McKee and Finn Jones.

To the devil… bad hair

2 comments

bloodspell2BLOODSPELL

2 Stars  1988/18/88m

A.k.a. The Boy from Hell; To the Devil a Son

“Daniel has just become eighteen. Time to meet his real father.”

Director: Deryn Warren / Writer: Gerry Daly / Cast: Anthony Jenkins, Aaron Teich, Theodora Louise, Edward Dloughy, Alexandra Kennedy, Douglas Vale, John Reno, Susan Buchanan, Arthur Alexander, Christopher G. Venuti, Kimble Jemison, Heather Green, Jacque J. Coon, Tia Lachelle.

Body Count: 5

Laughter Lines: “Everybody is gonna be dead around here before you guys wanna do something about it!”

One of those demonic-child-cum-slasher things that has Jenkins as Daniel, a recently come-of-age teenager who is dropped off by his distraught mother at the St Boniface ‘Evaluation Center’ for troubled kids.

This is because his satanic dad turned up out of the blue and wants to convert sonny boy into a vessel of evil, primed to create the antichrist with a girl of his choice. He chooses suicidal Debbie, whose Chrissie Hynde-look-a-like boyfriend Charlie is suspicious of the newcomer, especially when others at the center begin dropping dead.

First to go are the nasty kids, who meet grisly accidents that include being sucked into a woodchipper; the drop-in therapist is provided with a portion of heart attack-to-go.

Having noticed that Daniel is present at every one of these incidents, Charlie attempts to convince the live-in counsellors and Debbie – in overwrought Pleasence fashion – that Daniel is evil incarnate. Daniel then makes off with Debbie for The Sexening – unless Charlie can lumber to the rescue.

Although not as predictable as the set-up might have you believe, there’s not a whole lot more than sub-par anxious shouting for dialogue and one of the most vulgar wardrobes in movie history. Attach a sappy group-hug ending and the last chance for an inventive shock all but drains away.

Passable and entertaining for lovers of bad 80s fashion and hair, but the spell it attempts to cast is a dud.

Blurb-of-interest: Theodora Louise is actually Twink Caplan, who most famously played the flustered teacher Ms Giest in Clueless. She has the worst hair here; Aarin Teich was in Darkroom.

Sequel Showdown: 4s, Fours, and IVs

4 comments

In the last round, A Nightmare on Elm Street 3 was crowned best three-quel, and so now logically we move on to Part 4s…

Where are Wrong Turn 4 and Psycho IV you ask? They will be appearing the prequel edition in the future, so don’t be sad, they’ll get their moment. Or not, as neither is likely to win, are they!?

Onwards!

sequel4s1 copy2

1984-1991

Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter; A Nightmare on Elm Street 4: The Dream Master; Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers; Prom Night IV: Deliver Us From Evil

Teenage Death Camp Massacre Part IV: Revenge of the Overlong and Quite Unnecessary Suffix Title. OK, I’ve always felt Friday 4 was a tad overrated. Yes, it’s gory. Yes, there’s lots of sex and nudity. No, there’s not much character development or plot. The best thing in it is actually the little Jason Megamix that opens the film. Elm Street 4 – the “MTV Nightmare” – is one of my favourites from that series, but it pales in comparison to Halloween 4, which went all out to be suspenseful and just a little bit more thoughtful than its cohorts. Prom Night IV is in-name only, with tenuous links to its predecessors – but it’s alright.

sequels4s2a

1994-2003

Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Next Generation; Children of the Corn IV: The Gathering; Bride of Chucky; Cheerleader Massacre

Despite being a fairly uninteresting horror-icon, Chucky wins this round against quite pitiful competition from the worst Texas Chainsaw instalment so far (yes, even the new one was better), a plain boring Children of the Corn insert, and the is-it-isn’t-it fourth Slumber Party Massacre flick.

sequel4s3a

2003-2011

Saw IV; Return to Sleepaway Camp; The Final Destination; Scream 4

Why is Saw here, you squawk? Eleven is a prime number so I had to crowbar in another sequel to balance things up. Even so, I remember it being a bit of a dullard. Scream 4 runs off with the trophy with ease; though I’m quite fond of Return to Sleepaway Camp. The Final Destination was bitterly disappointing.

The Finalists

sequelfinalists2

The longer they go on, the worse they seem to get, one could say. But let’s shut up and be thankful that THIRTEEN slasher franchises (I didn’t forget you, Psycho and Wrong Turn) made it to a fourth movie.

Now, let’s choose a winner…

  • Bride of Chucky‘s out first. It’s easily the most entertaining Child’s Play entry, but the whole series is just a bit annoying in it’s we-know-we’re-taking-the-piss demeanor. I like it, I don’t love it.
  • Scream 4, on the other hand, may have been hugely divisive when it came to audience reception, but the nostalgic value of going back to Woodsboro was a nice shot in the arm, as was the amusing opening scene extravaganza and the killer’s bitchy exposition.

So, the winner of this not-so-thrilling round of the contest is Mickey himself…

The slasher debut of now-genre-fixture Danielle Harris is a low-key event to say the least; it’s neither gory, booby, or high-octane. In many ways it’s a slasher film on a sedative; slow and occasionally plodding, but nevertheless faithful to the original outing and incredibly well made.

You may have noticed that the winners so far have come from the three big franchises… That’s a bit annoying really, but if these other schmucks can’t bring it, what are we to do?

Buckle up for those Part 5’s next month.

Bad Brits

3 comments

Did you catch the premiere of The Following the other week? Kevin Williamson’s serial killer cult thriller detective thing has got Kevin Bacon as the usual washed-up ex-FBI agent who fell from grace after catching cutter-upper of college chicks, Joe Carroll. The loon has a sort of entourage of other loons who need to be tracked down and eradicated…

joecarroll2

While the Scream echoes are nice, what struck me most about the pilot is that, yet again, the chief bad guy is English.

Seems to be one of the major tropes of American cinema is casting a British actor – more specifically one with a very well-spoken English accent – as the nasty, scheming villain. Die Hard had Alan Rickman, Jason Isaacs in The Patriot, General Zod, Billy Zane in Titanic, Elizabeth Hurley played the fucking DEVIL! Even the kids’ Disney film Bolt name-checked the cliche: “…the villain with the creepy English accent.”

So how does horror stack up? Well, most iconically there’s Dr Lecter, played with theatrical gusto by Sir Anthony of Hopkins.

lecter2a

In slasher territory, British villains aren’t massively over-represented, but in the handful of mystery-body count films where there’s a character with an English accent, it’s never turned out to be anyone else behind the lunacy… As ever, MASSIVE SPOILERS ensue.

dtoxvillain2D-Tox (2001)

Who else could be knocking off the traumatised cops at a remote rehab clinic in Nowhere, Wyoming? Why, of course it’s Christopher Fulford – the only British geezer, who moonlights as a maniacal serial killer on the side. Naturally it takes super-buff American Sylvester Stallone to stop him. Didn’t stop the film from being shelved for three years and barely getting a release at all, though.

The Pool (2001)poolvillain2

Who else could be slashing up a group of teenagers of various nationalities at a swimming complex in Prague? Why, of course it’s John Hopkins – the only English geezer (James McAvoy was already murdered and is Scottish so doesn’t count). Naturally it takes the American final girl and her manly boyfriend to stop him.

*

 

Mindhunters (2004)

Who else could be doing in a group of FBI agents during a profile training expedition? Why, of course it’s Jonny Lee Miller – the only British geezer. I can’t remember his motive n’ all that – serial killer, I think. Naturally it takes super-masculine American LL Cool J and final girl-slash-woman (who I also can no longer remember) to stop him.

Elsewhere, British characters are instead done away with once they’ve wrung out the red herring card: See Cal in Harper’s Island, the pair of backpacking buddies in Turistas, Kelly Brook in Ripper, and the doomed girlies of Wolf Creek.

However, it should be noted that, in Hack!, the only surviving chick is the hot English girl, though she was earlier assumed dead and doesn’t really aide the final boy much, and in bizarro South African flick Return of the Family Man, the post-punk proto-Spike dude also escapes the chop.

So what’s it about, Hollywood? Some would claim we’re just an island of toffy assholes, which, when you consider none of these villains EVER have a regional accent, would be a skewered opinion. Conversely, America being such a patriotic place, it’s surely a short cut for them to cast an outsider as the villain, and to overcome any confusing accents or bad translations, why not choose the country whose language they speak?

However, I think it comes down to that horrible term: Theatricality. British actors are more ‘stagey’ than most American film actors. With little film industry of our own, actors are more adept at ‘treading the boards’, therefore enabling them to camp it up in the way the best super-villains do. And judging from the stiff-upper-lip tripe we keep churning out, it’s no wonder…

downton_abbey3a

By now though, it’s gone beyond a cliche. The Following probably elicited a few groans when the lead-loon was revealed to be a literature-obsessed Englishman who charmed the pants off sorority girls before killing them. So, like, cut it out filmmakers, it’s way too predictable.

1 2