Thursday, May 2, 2013

The Hills Have Eyes Part II



Runtime: 90 minutes

Directed by: Wes Craven

Starring: Tamara Stafford, Kevin Spiritas, Colleen Riley, Michael Berryman, John Bloom

From: VTC

Yes, I finally watched an infamous movie last night. I say that this is infamous in a bad way. It is a movie that Wes Craven himself said he only made for a paycheck and after the fact he disowned it. Also, early on there are plenty of flashbacks where characters go back to events of the first movie and that is obvious padding of the runtime. Well, Beast the dog from the original returns here and BEAST has a flashback. No kidding. It is indeed as hilarious and dumb as it sounds. Turns out, that isn't the only issue with the movie, not at all.

The plot: Bobby (Robert Houston, who returns for a cameo) is now an adult and he created a special fuel for dirtbikes. Really. The team he is a part of goes off for a desert race without him, and they're on a bus. He doesn't go as it's near the location of the events of the original movie. The team is a bunch of asstagonists and an adult lady named Rachel. A reveal concerning his character will make you groan or roll your eyes. No one remembers that the day is Daylight's Saving so it's an hour later (really, that's the important plot point) and they have to take a shortcut. The bus breaks down and as it turns out, there are some “family” members still out there who enjoy the taste of human flesh. That includes Michael Berryman returning as Pluto and a new dude who is played by an actor (Bloom) that was a legit 7 foot 4.

As you can tell from the plot description, there are problems throughout. The script is just bad. It is an 80's slasher film throughout, and a bad one at that, with most of the kills not being all that exciting or gory. The way that it's presented is bad; they really should have been more upfront in explaining that a main lady in the cast was supposed to be blind. Sure, sometimes she doesn't really act like it and you wonder if she has Daredevil powers, but they should have made it clear early on as I was not sure about it for too long a time. A paycheck movie, it is easy to see after the fact.

It's like Jason in the desert and in fact, the composer here was Harry Manfredini, who has done the score for most of the Friday the 13th movies, and the music sounds like something from a Jason sequel; make of that what you will.

And like I mentioned, what asstagonist characters. Many of them are just damn annoying and you don't feel like rooting for them. The worst one was Harry, someone who bizarrely looks quite a bit like Andy Samberg, of all people.

So yep, this was as bad as I had heard, and not just for the dog flashback. I've never seen the remake and its sequel; I can say for sure that you should stick with the original 1977 film, which I talked about back in 2011. I'll be back tomorrow night.

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