FILM REVIEW: WRONG TURN (DIR. MIKE P. NELSON)

5/3/2021

WRONG TURN

Director: Mike P. Nelson
Writers: Alan B. McElroy
Starring: Matthew Modine, Charlotte Vega, Bill Sage, Adain Bradley

A chaotic fight for survival befalls a group of friends on the Appalachian trail in this iconic franchise reboot from the original creator Alan B. McElroy. When a dream trip turns into a nightmare, one group of friends finds themselves at the mercy of an urban legend - The Foundation. As a freak accident drives the group deeper into the mountains, they find themselves succumbing one by one to hunting traps large enough to take out anyone that dares venture off the beaten path.

The group soon realises they are not alone and what happens next escalates into a gruesome game of survival, as those who called the mountain home respond to this outside threat with their own swift and brutal justice. Starring Matthew Modine (Stranger Things) and rising star Emma Dumont (The Gifted). Directed by award-winning director Mike P. Nelson (The Domestics) and written by Alan B. McElroy (Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers). Wrong Turn is produced by Robert Kulzer (Resident Evil: Extinction)

Signature Entertainment presents Wrong Turn (2021) on Blu-Ray & DVD 3rd May

In order to give what we believe to be a more unbiased constructive criticism of the piece, the members of Bloodhound Pix are tackling each review as a panel of three. None of the members know the others’ thoughts on the content until after they submit their initial response.

Initial Reaction TO WRONG TURN

K. Wrong Turn begins with Scott (Matthew Modine) arriving in a small Virginia town searching for his missing daughter Jen (Charlotte Vega) who was hiking the Appalachian Trail with a group of friends. Then we jump back six weeks to meet Jen and her boyfriend Darius (Adain Bradley), and the two couples joining them, Milla (Emma Dumont) and Adam (Dylan McTee), and Luis (Adrian Favela) and Gary (Vardaan Arora). They stop in the same small Virginia town to spend the night before hitting the trail. They have a classic bar room run-in with a local redneck (Tim DeZarn) that plays out in a fresh way. The next morning they hit the trail.

In town they’re warned not to stray from the trail, but of course they do, and end up on the wrong side of a giant log rolling down hill. Gary is crushed to death. The rest are wounded and now lost in the woods. There’s the usual tropes of in-fighting, jumping to conclusions and the loss of their cellphones. This all culminates with Milla going missing and Adam being caught in a strange trap and pulled underground. Jen, Darius and Luis later spot two giant men in strange costumes with skull masks carrying Adam through the woods, his body tied to a log with a sack over his head. Darius charges toward them. Adam gets free and beats one of the men to death with a log. The other one gets away...and then Milla shows up, alive. There’s some back and forth as to whether or not Adam should have killed the man, though the weirdo guy’s intentions seemed to be sinister.

Then the group is captured by The Foundation, a cult-like community that retreated into the mountains before the outbreak of the Civil War to create their own society. Led by John Venable (Bill Sage), the Foundation has cultivated a way of life without society’s ills (war, race, violence), but these interlopers have murdered one of their people, and thus must be sentenced to darkness aka getting your eyeballs ripped out and thrown into a catacomb-like cell. Jen bargains her way out of this by offering herself to John as his wife. They allow Jen and Darius to join the Foundation and renounce the outside world. Then Scott shows up to free Jen...and I’ll stop my synopsis there because I’ve already spoiled enough.

Now the original Wrong Turn isn’t particularly a classic. It’s one of the many Texas Chainsaw rip-offs that we’ve seen pop up over the years. And this film starts with its feet firmly planted in the “Hipsters versus Hicks” genre but then subverts that in new and interesting ways which unfortunately negate its very genre. For example, the Foundation cult is humanized and we come to understand their justification in punishing Jen and her friends, albeit in cruel and unusual ways but this understanding equals not scary aka not horror. Delving too deeply into their motivations and making those motivations rational, actually turns our protagonists/victims into the aggressors here, fraying our sympathy for them and giving us a multi-faceted view of the conflict (which normally I would, and in some ways still do, commend) but here it serves to weaken the conflict and the sense of dread, sucking the horror right out of it. Furthermore, humanizing these cult members demonstrates that they can be reasoned with, had Adam not impulsively killed one of their members. As Jen proves when she negotiates for Darius and her to join them in order to survive. If you can reason with them, then they’re not scary. *(One exception being a scene where Jen and Scott have to escape through the dark catacombs filled with sightless, starved prisoners of the Foundation, which still plays more to the action).

That being said, the film has a lot going for it. The acting is solid throughout, despite a few melodramatic moments due to the writing. The cinematography, production design and costumes are fantastic, really intricate and creepy, though ultimately undermined by being shown too much. The script takes unexpected turns and plays off the hipster and hick cliches and then humanizes both parties. Despite everything I’ve outlined above about why this isn’t really a horror film, the choices that facilitated that are bold and fresh and would be more of an asset in another genre. Ultimately, this plays more as an action thriller and as such plays very well. But given the Wrong Turn title which firmly plants it in the horror genre, horror fans and Wrong Turn fans will likely find it lacking in scares and those who would enjoy this probably won’t seek it out because of the title. So, it’s a catch 22. I would recommend it over all, just know going in that it is not going to deliver on the horror.

C. While I’ve had a fascination with The Wrong Turn series for some time, it is sadly a blindspot for me as a horror fan. I know by number 2 it enters the realm of self awareness and embraces the violence and absurdity of the tired backwoods, cannibal, hillbillies/mutants. Wrong Turn (2021) or Wrong Turn: Foundation is not that. Rather it is a reboot/sequel that was labelled as bringing it back to its serious roots (was it ever that serious?) and taking the setting into a new direction by focusing on a different group. The latter I know is true. Take Wrong Turn, Wicker Man and a serious version of Tucker and Dale and that will give a clear layout of what they were going for. It goes from backwoods horror, to cult horror, and even sprinkles in revenge action thriller elements.

First, I have to commend the movie on taking a chance with the new approach and also having the setup where the “crazed hillbillies'' are just kind of trying to live their lives while the outsiders come in, misjudge the situation and mess it all up. I mention this mainly because it’s something I’ve been dying to see for a long time, again, the backwoods horror subgenre has entered, for many, a paint-by-numbers format that has become difficult to set themselves apart from either The Texas Chain Saw Massacre or The Hills Have Eyes. This was able to set itself apart in some aspects.

Yes, we ultimately follow the same tropes, which you wish they would completely take a new spin. The group are sexy, college-age people. We get the final girl and the impregnation that “needs'' to happen in all these plots. Torture. However, part of where the movie shines is in its attempt to provide weight to the story and the brutality opposed to the gratuitous sex and violence that has been the standout trait this series has become known for. The acting is solid, it’s shot well and attempts to be more atmospheric than one would expect from these kinds of movies.

I feel the biggest issue is in its attempts to set itself apart from the others in the series. Wrong Turn (2021) gets lost in the details. It’s not as fun as the previous installments are meant to be (from what I’ve been told) and by providing clear motivation and moments of potential empathy for the villains, it loses the horror of “why is this happening to us?”. Quite the conundrum but I know for fans of the series it will become a divisive entry from those that love it for its fresh take and those that feel the movie should have been called a different name and was only using the title for a marketing ploy because original properties don’t sell. Can you guess this argument has popped up for most of the major horror franchises?

For someone that hasn’t seen the others (me), I think it was very well done. I just wish there was a little more time spent honing the story and finding consistency to really drive home all the ideas used to attempt an anti-backwoods horror film.

J. Let me start by saying this film should not have Wrong Turn in the title. We’ve come to expect certain things like, cannibal, inbred, mutant monsters associated with the Wrong Turn franchise. This film has none of that. Second, the dude that plays the lead villain, in this “Foundation” looks just like Orson Welles, which is amazing. Third, the script is structured in a rather unique way whereby we go about 45 minutes as a faux Wrong Turn film and then it completely shifts gears into something else entirely. I give the writer Alan McElroy credit for that but it just didn’t work for me. Fourth, we learned nothing from Prometheus about running the correct way from something rolling toward you that will make you dead. The first 45 minutes were tense and creepy but then after that it sort of becomes a stretch to suspend disbelief. Like a serious stretch. And this is a Wrong Turn film. It’s brutal as all hell which is a plus and the score was amazing, which is also a plus as I dig awesome music. But man, after that 45 minute mark… eh… I can’t spoil it so just take my word. Just don’t go into this thinking you’re getting a Wrong Turn film because you’re not. The runtime was a problem too. It didn’t need to hover at 2 hours by any means and there were about 4 false conclusions which was unnecessary. The characters were all pretty annoying, especially the one who constantly is taking pictures of herself with her phone, which makes me wanna puke but they do get put in their place by the titular “Foundation” and you’ll see what I mean. I was actually pleasantly surprised for the most part and suggest you all check this out when you can.

RESPONSE TO WRONG TURN

C. For the fans of the Wrong Turn franchise, this is going to be a divisive entry. While using the same general location, the movie leaves everything else associated with the previous installments behind. There’s no denying it feels like they slapped the Wrong Turn title on a movie that was not intended to be a part of that universe. However, since original properties aren’t as profitable and it was the screenwriter from the first film, the powers that be probably assumed it’d be a proper fit. Even this idea that many of these series have had lately with their requels (reboot-sequels), of “going back to our serious roots,” doesn’t work the same as Halloween or others, because this series was never to be taken that seriously.

As a movie on its own merits, I think it’s fine. There are some solid moments and I love the idea of the city-folk being the ones to actually draw first blood because of their misunderstanding of these people. But, I think in its attempts to be different, it struggled with an identity from hillbilly horror, to slow-burn cult horror (kind of), to backwoods revenge thriller, which ultimately drains any aspect of horror out of the horror movie.

J. We pretty much hit on all the vital details one could want in a review of the new Wrong Turn movie. Don’t expect a Wrong Turn movie and you might enjoy yourself.

K. As we’ve said this will not satisfy your itch for Wrong Turn style backwoods blood and gore. The film has its moments but ultimately suffers from an identity crisis that prevents it from really delivering the goods on any of the various genres it veers in and out of.

Bloodhound’s average score: 3 ½ out of 5