Well, to be fair, a lot of other people get to share the blame. There’s Flint Dille, who co-wrote the script and is primarily known for writing loads of episodes of those Saturday morning cartoons that Hasbro want to make into a Cinematic Universe. There’s also Jim Gillespie, who directed this film. And let’s not forget the Weinsteins, who were trying desperately to find Dimension Films’ answer to the sudden appearance of the Saw juggernaut.
You can tell I didn’t like this very much, can you?
We’re introduced to a bunch of characters in a Lousiana town. There's Eden (Who Wants To Leave This Town For The Big City) and Eric (Who...Doesn’t Want Her To?) and....the Trashy Girl, and the Gay(?) Guy, and the Girl Who Reads Books, and the Girl Who’s Got A Car, and, CeCe, who is the Granddaughter of A Voodoo Priestess because Lousiana. Eden and Eric fail in saving Ray, the local tow truck operator, who was trying to save CeCe’s grandma, Miss Emmie. What Eden and Eric don’t know is that Miss Emmie had a suitcase full of CGI voodoo snakes that are filled with the souls of evil men, and those snakes bite Ray as he drowns, turning him into a scaly-skinned, befanged voodoo zombie tow-truck driver who is hankering to sacrifice people to the Dark Voodoo Gods. Ray goes around killing our characters except for Eden, who we know is the final girl because she was named right up front.
You can see the problem here. This is a movie filled with the stockest of stock characters who are there only to build up the nature of our potential franchise monster by dying in ‘creative’ ways. It’s obvious that Ray (and I have to say a monster called Ray is decidedly unthreatening; the publicity for the film dubbed him ‘Mr. Jangles,’ but he’s never called that through its 83 minute running time) is where all the script’s energy is. We see Ray get a signature weapon (a crowbar), some signature moves (etching runes in the victims’ blood), some horror-related special effects (eyes that move under his skin), and a ‘he’ll be back’ ending shot...but in creating this Wicked Monster, the script forgets pacing, atmosphere, characterization and other things that make for a memorable horror franchise. We don’t even get gory kills, as the film relies too much on quick cuts when another actor falls.
That being said, it surprises me that no one bothered to at least spit out a direct-to-video sequel. I mean, the same year saw a sequel to Urban Legends and a second(!) sequel to The Mangler. If also-rans like The Mangler squeezed out sequels, surely Venom could have had something....
This is an aggressively mediocre film that wanted to be a big deal but ended up forgotten. Hell, I’d forgotten it until the release of that Tom Hardy super-hero movie reminded me it once existed. I would certainly not recommend this.
How YOU Can Curate The 2nd Half Of The Horrorfest!
There's still one more week to help curate this year's Halloween Horrorfest
If you donate $31 to the Rape, Abuse, and Incest National Network before October 15th and send me the receipt proving you did, you can name one movie I have to watch during the Horrorthon. Keep in mind there are some things I won’t do (so no Eli Fucking Roth movies, for example), and it has to be a movie I can find. If you’re an independent filmmaker and are willing to make the donation, by all means send me the film. I will do as many as I can before October 31st, and those I can I will view in the days after Halloween during ‘Beyond Halloween Horrorfest.'
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