DVD Review: RED RIVER (2010)

RED RIVER (2010)

Label: Bloody Earth Films

Rating: Unrated
Duration: 77mins
Video:1.85:1 Letterboxed Widescreen
Audio: Dolby Digital Stereo
Director: Jacob Ennis
Cast: Megan Marie Wilson, Ronica Jones, Dustin Roe, Jason Crowe
Tagline:The Lucky Ones Will Die

Director Jacob Ennis's backwoods slasher RED RIVER is set in rural Kentucky and opens with two Kentucky State Park Rangers on patrol who discover possible human skeletal remains near the dilapidated Thatcher house. They search the property and discover some odd skeletal art and some apparently human eyeballs in a canning jar. That's pretty alarming on it's own but it's when they discover a woman held captive in a cage, a deformed freak on a chain, and encounter old man Thatcher (Dave Haney) that the shit really hits the fan. Thatcher's one of those buttoned-down weirdos, whom by day is a snake-handling Christian, a respected member of the community and a successful small business owner who turns a tidy profit selling homemade fertilizer with one very special  ingredient, wanna guess what it is? Roland feeds the scraps of his victims to his cannibal-freak son Hamburger Head (Jason Crowe) whom he keeps in the basement chained to a dog house. Thatcher is quite the character, true to his twisted religious beliefs he performs a baptism of sorts upon his victims. It's bizarre stuff as he quips religion with the assistance of a mechanical larynx, apparently having lost the use of his own vocal chords.
 

When a group of teens from the city set up camp on the fringes of his property for a wild weekend of smokin' weed and skinny dippin' you know it won't be long before Roland takes 'em out. Once the campfire stories are told, the marshmallows are toasted and the titties come out to play (the first of many) Roland wastes little time stalking and dispatching the stoners in a series of satisfyingly grisly kills. The deaths are top-notch and there's a little bit of everything here for the gore enthusiast including a new one on me; a rotor-tiller kill, which was pretty sweet. RED RIVER packs quite a punch for a micro-budgeted gore-flick. It's knee-deep in viscera and splattered in blood, very gruesome stuff and it was great to see the use of practical gore effects instead of relying on lame CGI, fun stuff.

The art design here is pretty great, too. Ennis wisely chose to use existing rustic dwellings and it pays off big from a production values standpoint, giving the film a look beyond it's meager budget. Story wise it's a pretty classic backwoods slasher we've seen countless times, hapless city folk venture into the wilderness and incur the wrath of the scary rural folk, it's borrows from THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE (1977), WRONG TURN (2003), THE HILLS HAVE EYE (1977), and even THE UNSEEN (1980). The acting is amateur but the characters are fun stereotypes. Haney's portrayal of Thatcher is perhaps a tad bit over the top, but it's fun. I felt some of the humor is a bit much (Ranger Ennis) but it's not what I would classify as a comedy-horror, it's pretty straight-faced with some humorous elements.
 

DVD: The film is presented in interlaced 1.85:1 non-anamorphic widescreen with no subtitle options. It's a good looking film, shot on the cheap but well shot. Colors are good, detail and black levels are decent but there is noticeable combing effects throughout. The fidelity of the stereo audio is likewise decent though the mechanical larynx is a bit hard to decipher at times. The DVD is crammed with sweet supplementals beginning with an informative behind-the-scenes doc chronicling the making of the film from script, special effects, locations, and on through to the finish. The 'Creating a Monster'  featurette documents the creation of Hamburger Head make-up from pouring the mold to a cool  time lapse of the actual sculpting of the features. The 'Deleted Scenes'  flesh out a few scenes but were rightfully excised and 'Video Blog: On Location' is video footage from location scouting trips, no dialogue, just video and fourscore. Rounding out the features is 'Bloody Earth Film's Trailer Vault' featuring 6 films trailer including Jacob Ennis's previous film STASH.

Special Features:
- Creating a Monster (9:19) Letterboxed
- Video Blog - On Location (8:00) Letterboxed
- Deleted Scenes (4:08) Letterboxed
- The River Runs Red: The Making of Red River (36:26) Letterboxed
- Bloody Earth Film's Trailer Vault: A FEAST OF FLESH (1:12), AMERICAN PUNKS (1:49), BLOOD AND SEX NIGHTMARE (1:08), SHOCK FESTIVAL (0:46), STASH (1:58)


Verdict: One of the bloodiest shot-on-video entries I've seen in a while. RED RIVER is a classic backwoods slasher with just enough new elements to keep it from becoming a tired genre rehash. At just 77 mins it's all killer and no filler, steeped in gore and loaded with nudity, this one is sure to please horror fans. 3.5 outta 5

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DVD REVIEW: Dismal (2010)

DISMAL (2009)

LABEL: Cinema Epoch 
RATED: R
GENRE: Backwoods Horror
RUNNING TIME: 90 Min.
DIRECTOR: Gary King
CAST: Lydia Chandler, Tim Morris, Jack Harrison, Bill Oberst, Jr., Laura Kimsey, Will Triplett, Capel Kane
RELEASE DATE: December 21st 2010
TAGLINE: Eat Or Be Eaten


PLOT: Dana is failing Biology. To pass she must attend an extra credit assignment with several classmates that will lead them into a remote region of the Great Dismal Swamp, a place teeming with life... and death. While the group keeps one eye out for hungry bear, deadly snakes and lurking gators, they are unaware of the real danger. For the top of the food chain lives in a dingy cabin not too far from their campsite, and he has an appetite for human flesh.


FILM: I do enjoy a good ole backwoods horror film, them rural folk sure is scary. From TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE (1973) onwards through to the under-valued WRONG TURN films there is some goodness to be had with this sub-genre of horror. How does DISMAL fare? What we have here is a pretty standard group of college-type characters that include survival-girl Dana (Lydia Chandler), good gal Kimmy (Laura Kimsey), good guy Gary (Will Triplett), token black dude Jamal (Jade Arnold) and his sex-crazed gal-pal Shelly (Capel Kane) who head out to the Great Dismal Swamp to earn extra credit in their college biology class. Leading the trip is teaching-assistant Curt (Tim Morris).

Once settled in the group pitch their tents and separate into small groups and head out into the wilderness to take notes, samples and observe nature in action or something. Gary and Kimmy spend time together and develop crushes on each other, it's innocently sweet. Jamal and Shelly find a nice quite spot in the swamp and get their freak on. These two are a couple of horn dogs and Shelly provides a more than adequate amount of nudity to the film. That's a plus. Meanwhile back at camp Dana and Curt get to know each other a little better, it's pretty obvious that Curt sees Dana as more than a student but she's definitely not interested. Curt's a strange one, better keep an eye on him. As night settles in over the swamp the group start getting picked-off one by one by a hulking 7ft. freak called Idiot (Jack Harrison) that's fond of bashing people upside the head with a spiked club and occasionally snagging them with a grappling hook. The gore in the film is pretty good with the exception of some laughable CGI that wounds some otherwise well executed gore scenes. My favorites is a nasty little scene as one of the gals runs through the swamp and it tripped up by a bear-trap that takes her leg resulting in her falling face first into another bear trap, good stuff. Turns out the 7ft. freak is not alone and there's actually a trio of human flesh craving cannibals prowling the Great Dismal Swamp. Bill Oberst, Jr. as Dale (the patriarch of the cannibal clan) is a foreboding and demented son-of-a-bitch and he's got screen presence to spare - the definite stand-out performance of the film.
 

The story well paced but not original by any means. Your typical group of stereotypes out of their element hunted by cannibalistic backwoods folks, it's been done a zillion times (and better) but this one is decent if not very memorable. The swamp setting is a great set-piece and the shots are well-composed but the film is pretty standard backwoods horror that hits all the beats you'd expect and little else.

DVD:  DISMAL is presented in 1.85:1 anamorphic widescreen with 2.o stereo surround. It's a good looking film and the presentation looks great. Not much in the way of special features aside from previews of other Cinema Epoch titles.

VERDICT: This is director Gary King's first foray into the horror genre and I must say it's a decent effort but it's derivative and familiar material that we've seen time and time again. That combined with some lacklustre special effects work knocks the grade down a bit on this one. It's strives to be a WRONG TURN (2003) or HATCHET (2006) but falls short of the mark. Not quite a recommend but perhaps a rental. DISMAL (2009) comes to DVD December 21st 2010 from Cinema Epoch. 

 **1/2 (2.5 out of 5 stars)

- McBASTARD