Can We Please Have a Moratorium On… (UPDATED)

Action and horror films using “Reality Television” in their plots? It’s annoying because they all seem to try and have a not so subtle message asking “who is worse…the killer or YOU for watching???”

One of the “perks” of working at a video store is getting to rent the movies before they hit the shelf. Last night I brought home 28 Weeks Later and Wrong Turn 2:Dead End. Fangoria says that Wrong Turn 2 blows other 2007 Horror films right out of the water!!! How can that be bad?! If you have seen other 2007 horror films, well, you know that is a far less impressive accomplishment than it sounds. And to limit it to 2007 plays it pretty darn safe. So it’s pretty hollow praise. But it made the back of the box. Mainly I thought I would check it out because it starred Henry Rollins and some guy named Texas Battle. I mean, that’s a pretty intense sounding name. He has apparently starred on several TV shows (or had guest appearances) and was in Final Destination 3 and some movie called Senior Skip Day. It also features an actress named Daniella Alonso who apparently is drawn to roles about tough military women hunted by cannibalistic mutants, as she was also in the Hills Have Eyes 2. And there is also the actress who played Hot Party Girl # 2 in Fantastic Four 2: Rise of the Silver Surfer. Outside of Rollins and Erica Leerhson (Texas Chainsaw Massacre remake), it’s pertty much a cast of bit and television players.

Oh, and Kimberly Caldwell of American Idol plays herself in the movie. The role calls for being a snot and looking hot. apparently. I don’t know if the idea was to portray her as the opposite of her real life persona (is she known for being really sweet and kind?), but she is not introduced as a character you root for.

I was informed that the previous version of this was dull.  So I tightened it up.

Spoilers are coming…

The plot is this: People go into the wood.  They meet mutant hillbillies who kill a bunch of them.  A few people fight back.  More people die.  It’s a bloody mess.  Rip offs of Predator and Texas Chainsaw Massacre abound.  Other films are ripped off as well.  Proceed at your own risk.

As for some general thoughts on the film?  This is a first time director with Joe Lynch, and I give him credit. He worked to make this memorable. We get lots of gore….we get Kimberly Caldwell getting her lips bitten off before getting chopped in half (with one stroke. Them mutant are strong buggers), Hot Party Girl 2 gets sliced up by a jealous mutant girl who finds her brother jerking off while he spies on Hot Party Girl # 2, said mutant brother and sister knocking boots, arrows through eyes, bodies thrown through giant meat grinders, and Henry Rollins being a total bad ass.

Except for the Henry Rollins part, it lacks much in the way to keep you interested. For one thing, the film commits the sin of so many horror films since about the late eighties. And that is making almost the entire cast unlikable. Somewhere along the lines, it became more about the stomach churning deaths and therefore, to get the people “excited” for the kills, the filmmakers started making all but a couple characters totally unlikeable. I will give some credit to the people this time, as one unlikeable character ends up becoming one of the heroes by the end. People seem to forget, the true horror is not in the mode of death itself…it’s in that you want the characters to survive.