Runtime:
87 minutes
Directed
by: Joe Giannone
Starring:
Gaylen Ross, Tony Fish, Harriet Bass, Seth Jones, Jan Claire
From:
The Legend Lives Company
This is not the only film I saw this weekend. I'll talk about what I watched a few hours ago on Monday afternoon. Late Saturday night I rewatched Interstellar, which I am still "meh" about. This I can say was at least fine:
This
was an obscure slasher that got attention when Vinegar Syndrome put it
out on Blu a few years ago. They aren't Criterion so a few scenes of the
print they scanned at 4K have deep dark scratches yet I was fine with
that as otherwise it looked great. This is a slasher at its most
elemental (so I understand why people would not care for this) and yet
it was done fine enough to where I can give this a decent grade.
The
plot will sound familiar: at a camp “for gifted children”, they are
around a campfire one night telling spooky stories (and one sings an
amazing and atonal acapella ditty) when the camp's owner mentions the
legend of Madman Marz, a horrible human being who killed his family, was
hanged... only his body and the bodies of the murder victims all
vanish. Like Candyman, Bloody Mary, or Beetlejuice, if you say his name
out loud, he shows up. A kid yells out the name and yep, that hulking
brute starts killing. His weapon of choice is an axe but that isn't the
only way he dispatches his victims.
What helps is that this is not poorly made... as long as you ignore how not everything always makes logical sense. There are some suspense scenes that are drawn out yet never boring. There are some teases of how Marz almost attacks someone but the person obliviously avoids it. There are a few gory moments for those that love such things. The setting (the woods somewhere in the state of New York) are well-utilized and help set the mood tremendously.
But the two biggest assets are the characters and the music. None of the characters are annoying, which is always good in a slasher. Yes, the counselors look rather old for what I presume are supposed to be teenagers, and naturally most of them are pretty horny. The score was dark brooding synth, which is always appreciated by me. There's another song sung, and it's about Madman Marz! What a tune that is, along with what you hear during a humdinger of a scene involving a hot tub. It does help with the rating somewhat yet most of it was that even if the trappings are familiar, I found this to be fun and if you like old slashers, you might like this too.
What helps is that this is not poorly made... as long as you ignore how not everything always makes logical sense. There are some suspense scenes that are drawn out yet never boring. There are some teases of how Marz almost attacks someone but the person obliviously avoids it. There are a few gory moments for those that love such things. The setting (the woods somewhere in the state of New York) are well-utilized and help set the mood tremendously.
But the two biggest assets are the characters and the music. None of the characters are annoying, which is always good in a slasher. Yes, the counselors look rather old for what I presume are supposed to be teenagers, and naturally most of them are pretty horny. The score was dark brooding synth, which is always appreciated by me. There's another song sung, and it's about Madman Marz! What a tune that is, along with what you hear during a humdinger of a scene involving a hot tub. It does help with the rating somewhat yet most of it was that even if the trappings are familiar, I found this to be fun and if you like old slashers, you might like this too.
No comments:
Post a Comment