 The members of Bloodhound Pix are trying something new with the Dead and SudBuried Film Festival by tackling all the films they received in one article. Death Ranch Writer/Director: Charlie Steeds Starring: Deiondre Teagle, Faith Monique, Travis Cutner  1970s USA, Three African American siblings on the run from the police take refuge at an abandoned Tennessee Ranch, unaware their hideout is on the hunting grounds of a cannibalistic Ku Klux Klan cult...Trapped and tortured, the three must fight tooth and nail to escape alive and take down the bloodthirsty Klan. Special Guest, Dan Johnson. *SPOILERS* (To start with at the very top: I hope the three leads of Death Ranch, Deiondre Teagle, Faith Monique and Travis Cutner, are able to have long and successful careers as actors, and that, if nothing else, Death Ranch might be able to launch them on to bigger and much better things.) There’s a story my Dad told me a lot growing up, about one of the scariest experiences he can remember. An experience he had from long before he moved up north – landing in several places, but eventually in Michigan, where he met my mom and settled down. Back from when my Dad was still living in Alabama, where he was born, when he was about ten or eleven, so – 1965 or 1966. My dad was woken up one night, from a dead sleep, by his uncle. His uncle had a shotgun. He told him to be quiet and stay close. It was bright outside somehow, even though it was the middle of night. My Dad managed to peek through a window. The local chapter of the Ku Klux Klan had left a burning cross outside his uncle’s house. I share my Dad’s story to say this: is it necessarily my place to tell any particular artist – Black, white, queer, straight – what topics they can and can’t touch on as artists? Nope. What I would say is that, particularly if the art they choose to create depicts a history or culture outside the realm of their particular experience, that artist would do well to understand the specific history and context of the experience they’re attempting to work in, and how the art they create might affect those who do or have lived that particular experience. Or – they could not, and choose to treat history and culture as decontextualized, apolitical grab-bags of images, sounds, and data untethered from any human experience or meaning, but that can be endlessly combined in whatever combination the artist thinks is the most fun, or the most potentially provoking, or will sell the most. Which – again, they’re free to do. However, if that’s the approach they take, and if the end result is something like director Charlie Steeds’ film Death Ranch – in which three Black siblings in 1971 Tennessee run into a gang of cannibalistic Klansmen – then an audience member who might happen to have experience with, say, being Black in America, or experiencing racism, or knowing a family member who was personally terrorized by the Ku Klux Klan, is free to critique that result. To wit – Death Ranch is a pandering, inconsistent, and reckless piece of trash. It (sort of) attempts to use Blaxploitation as a touchstone (though really it’s more of a set dressing, and perhaps an excuse), while forgetting (not knowing?) that, stereotypical as those films frequently were, they centered Blackness – Black people, yes, but also Black experiences, Black culture, Black perspectives, Black concerns. I am absolutely sure that a good, or even great, horror film could be made from similar subject matter, but such a movie would require being willing to, for instance, engage the actual history and context of the Ku Klux Klan and their campaign of violence and terror against Black lives in the United States, or the history of white violence against Black lives in the United States in general, as a foundation for storytelling. Death Ranch is uninterested in that, so much as it is seeing Quentin Tarantino make Django Unchained (which, for all the critiques that can be made, did at least somewhat attempt to consider the historical context and brutality of American antebellum slavery) and going “Hey! I can do that too!,” but then getting tired of doing the hard work a third of the way in and deciding to patch the holes with bloody violence, because – Black people beating the shit out of the Klan and calling them “motherfucker” = anti-racism? Can you tell this movie got me all the way fucked up, reader? “But that’s unfair! It’s meant to be modern exploitation! Exploitation is fucked up!” Sure. Maybe white artists shouldn’t choose to exploit Black history, suffering and pain in such a facile and pandering way? Take a sequence in which our hero, Brandon (Deiondre Teagle), after escaping being whipped and having his genitals burned by a cannibal Klansman (did you know that castration was a frequent method of torture inflicted on slaves or lynching victims in the United States? That’s a fun little tidbit anyway back to the movie), and watching his brother, Clarence (Travis Cutner) die in front of him, finds out that his sister, Angela (Faith Monique) is trapped in the evil Klansmens’ “fuck pit,” and goes to rescue her. Donning a bloody Klan outfit, he goes down into the fuck pit to see Angela, duct-taped and tied down on top of a filthy mattress, being barked at to “open those legs” by a Klansman straddling her on his knees. The Klansman also barks at Brandon (who he mistakes for a Klansman named Cletus), telling him to get out because “you done had your turn a half-hour ago!,” and fellow Klansman Joe Bob (Christa Jones), who he orders to hand him lube because “this bitch done gone dry.” *sigh this fucking movie* So – of course Brandon kills Joe Bob (with the prerequisite one-liner: “Where you goin,’ Joe Bob? You wouldn’t want to miss your turn.” #CivilRights), and the Klansman who’s straddling Angela, and is able to free her from the fuck pit. However – ...WHAT THE FUCK?! ...who exactly is this scene for? 1.) Rape/the threat of rape is an worn-out, tired, dramatically ineffective, and now generally accepted as a wildly offensive trope in general. 2.) Rape/the threat of rape against a Black woman (who, historically speaking, have been marginalized and stereotyped in American society in general, let alone in media) is particularly worn-out, tired, and offensive. Especially when the aggressor is a racist white American male, because (and I do hate to keep bringing racism up in discussing a movie featuring Black people trying to survive murderous racists, but) – y’know, lines getting drawn between fantasy depictions of racist white men raping Black women and actual documented history of racist white men raping Black women, and being confused about the point of using that particular scenario in a piece of entertainment, because literally no Black woman in America would thank Death Ranch for it (even with #progressive values because she’s not completely naked so - y’know, #feminism) 3.) It’s not even effective as a means of raising tension/stakes, because the Klansman straddling Angela, in confusing Brandon for Cletus, tells him he already had his turn a half-hour ago – meaning Angela has already been raped. The scene (like much of the violence against the Klansmen) is framed as victorious, righteous, kick-ass vengeance, but – the worst has already happened. Great that Brandon is able to prevent it from happening again, but it’s already happened. (Which the movie doesn’t want you to consider, in the same way it doesn’t really want you to fully consider any of the violence done to Black bodies – it’s the strange film that wants to have its colorblind, apolitical cake and eat its Blaxploitation revenge-fantasy cake too). So again – what the fuck? And who is this scene for? Certainly not for Black women, and not really for Black people in general, but almost certainly for Charlie Steeds, and his particular idea of what Black audiences would want to see – which is to say, Black people sticking it to cartoonish racists. (The scariest moment in the actual movie actually occurs much earlier, when Brandon discovers a woman, played by Jade Alexandria, being dragged, screaming and alone, in front of a burning cross, surrounded by Klansmen. The weight and context of that particular moment, thoughtfully considered and expanded upon, could have easily developed into a much better movie. Alas.) The problem with a white person unilaterally deciding what representation looks like for a group that they aren’t a part of, though, is that – well, some of the people you’re deciding to speak for might have problems with how you’re speaking for them. And I definitely have problems with how this movie thinks I, as a Black person, am supposed to be entertained – without context, without care (did Charlie Steeds consider the kind of place he has asking Faith Monique, as Angela, to put herself in as a person and a performer during the “fuck pit” sequence? I would argue that, by asking her to do it in the first place, the answer is “no”), without an actual centering of perspective, but merely depictions of Black characters beating down interchangeable boogey-man racists and being asked to applaud the “representation” and “progressiveness.” Which also – whether Steeds, and white audiences who applaud this movie for “representation” and “progressiveness” might like to admit it or not – lets them off the hook. Because they’re making fun of racism, get it? Because racism is a gross, disgusting and abhorrent concept and practice and should be made fun of – and yet, by placing racism as something completely and cartoonishly outside of themselves, they fail to see how enabling movies like this, or making them in the first place, allows them to take the vantage point that racism, in more commonplace and everyday circumstances, isn’t something they may be personally responsible for, or complicit in. So – Death Ranch, ultimately, is yet another movie that panders to Black people, however ineffectively, and reassures white people about racism. AWESOME. (Does this seem harsh? Well, I thought it was a little harsh that Steeds decided to signify how evil the ultimate bad cannibal Klansman at the end was by having him use the word “nigger,” but hey white people have said “nigger” so it’s a fact and I can’t be mad, right? Besides how would I know how evil and racist the leader of a cannibalistic gang of Ku Klux Klansmen was if he didn’t say the word “nigger?” I mean – duh) It’s competently shot. The music is frequently annoying. Check out the work of Tananarive Due, watch Brotherhood of Death (a movie Steeds said in an interview he was inspired by) or check out literally almost any other Blaxploitation movie instead. The end. 1 out of 5 (the one star is for everybody who wasn't white involved in this film ) Redwood Massacre: Annihilation Writer/Director: David Ryan Keith Starring: Danielle Harris, Damien Puckler, Gary Kaspar  The hunters become the hunted after a stranger obsessed with the Redwood Farm murders convinces bereaved family members to venture into the wilderness in hope of proving the existence of the notorious burlap masked maniac. Kyle: Redwood Massacre: Annihilation is dead on arrival. A sequel to Redwood Massacre (2014), a film I’m assuming no one saw. I certainly didn’t. This film follows Tom Dempsey (Jon Campling), best selling author of a true crime book on the Redwood Massacre, a mass murder that claimed the life of his daughter. Max (Damien Puckler), a serial killer with a morbid fascination with the Redwood Massacre (what a surprise), lures Tom and his other daughter Laura (Danielle Harris) into a search for the Redwood Killer. Tom and Laura call in two friends Jen (Tevy Poe) and Gus (Gary Kaspar) to watch their backs, friends who just so happen to be special ops commandos armed with machine guns…and then all five characters behave like ex-military types. They discover a strange military-like complex and find evidence that the Redwood Killer may have been part of a group of genetically engineered masked killers, which is a cool idea that isn’t used enough. There’s lots of dumb tough guy back and forth and a few gratuitous murder scenes to try and establish Max as an utterly sadistic killer, but they are painfully banal. Despite his close proximity to the protagonists, there’s no real tension there, and Puckler plays the killer angle so blatantly that it’s excruciating to wait for him to be finally unmasked. While it’s visually polished with decent make up effects and superficially well made, the film is soulless. The actors do what they can, but the script is devoid of drama, humor, character development and anything else that might make this watchable or engaging. It drags along with a monotonous Hallmark movie energy, as flat as a dead man’s EKG. I’d rather be massacred than watch this again. 1 out of 5 Slaughterhouse Killer Director: Sam Curtain Writers: Sam Curtain, Benjamin Clarke Starring: Craig Ingham, James Mason, Kristen Condon  A passion for slaughter keeps Box in line at the local abattoir where he can quench his thirst for blood. When Nathan, a young parolee arrives in town, Box is instructed to take him under his wing, and soon the two men bond over a murder. Unable to resist the bloody temptations, the two form a friendship revolving around their sickness for killing. A friendship which is bad news for everyone in town. Kyle: Slaughterhouse Killer follows Box (Craig Ingham) and the recently paroled Nathan (James Mason) who both work at a slaughterhouse and befriend each other. Box is ridiculed by the other slaughterhouse workers and then they turn their sights on Nathan. This immediately makes us relate to Box and Nathan, and we totally understand when they cross the line and murder the head bully Blake (Dean Kirkright). Afterwards we discover that Box has killed before and he inducts Nathan into his twisted serial killing world, echoing the sick duo at the core of Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer. Unfortunately, the film then descends into more and more gruesome murders rather than delving into the perverse psychology of the characters. The performances were solid and they made good use of the low budget, but the script wasn’t quite deep enough to add anything new to the serial killer genre. Still it was a welcome change of pace and I think filmmakers have potential. 2.5 out of 5 Chestersberg Director: Jamie McKeller Writer: Jamie McKeller Starring: Natalie-Clare Brimicombe, Paul Coulter, Sonia Francesca Di Lorenzo  Chester Mapleforth first seceded his cul-de-sac from the United Kingdom in the early 1990s, and the first thing he did was to make murder legal. D. Is it weird to describe a movie that features beheadings, disembowelings, random acts of masturbation and homicidal mayhem left, right and center as somehow charming, or even downright quaint at times? Weird it may be, but director Jamie McKeller’s splatter-comedy Chestersberg is indeed quaint in its way. Set in pastoral Yorkshire (and drolly presenting its rural, tea-and-Battenberg-loving murderers as merely another type of English eccentric), Chestersberg feels like a throwback; it’s cheerfully gory without being gruesome, it flirts with horror without ever crossing the line into genuine dread or terror, and manages to (mostly) sustain a tone that’s both ridiculously silly and completely deadpan. It’s a high concept held together, more or less, by situational set-pieces and bits of gross-out humor (though again – without ever being truly gross), but then it knows that, unlike many other movies that it might remind you of, you’re not really in the audience to deeply consider complex moral or ethical questions – you’re there to have a good time watching people with lilting northern English accents slay and slaughter as messily as possible. Chester Mapleforth (Andy Love) was a man who wanted only one thing out of life – the ability to live in peace in the English countryside and murder whenever he wanted. After becoming fabulously wealthy, he was able to (somehow) secede from the United Kingdom and create his own territory – Chestersberg, an idyllic land where, within its borders, murder is, to quote Chester, “nice.” (Outside Chestersberg, murder is, of course, very “naughty.”) Along with his wife Beatrice (Rosy Rowley) and feral daughter Trixie (Sonia-Francesca Di Lorenzo), Chester has managed to build a small, relatively peaceful community of like-minded neighbors, and even inspired copycats (indeed, Chestersberg informs us that there are not one, but three murder villages oop North). However, all is not crumpets in Chestersburg – there’s tension (of all sorts, including sexual) between the neighbors, a rival murder-village may be plotting a takeover, there’s the annual Murderfest to deal with, and of course, our man Chester wants to expand the borders of Chestersberg, which the beleaguered-yet-powerless lawman on the outside, DI Matthews (Alexander King, who co-wrote Chestersberg with McKeller) very much does not want. To a one, the main cast involved know exactly what kind of movie they’re in, and overplay accordingly. With that said, it’s committed, serious overplaying, and, even while going comedically broad, there are several genuinely great character performances, including from Paul Coulter (as Martin, a loon even by Chestersburg standards whose repeated pleas to join the community go ignored), Matt Pattison (as Thomas Fulford, the violence-abhoring nebbish in charge of the increasingly complicated task of body disposal in Chestersberg), and Natalie-Claire Brimicombe (as Natalie, Thomas’s more murder-inclined wife, who not-so-secretly longs to become the next Mrs. Chester Mapleforth). As Chester himself, Love, while being as ridiculous as the rest, manages to nevertheless remain both charming and dangerous, with a gaze and presence that can (and does) turn from twinkling to chilling in a flash. The special and makeup effects (by Simon Brodie, with additional makeup by Charlotte Clemit and Ceri Roberts) takes the more-is-more approach (why merely bleed when you can gush blood in torrents?), which is, of course, why we’re all here anyway, and is delightful throughout. Chestersberg is a movie that would be very easy to boil down as a cross of movies that you’ve seen before, but what sets it apart is the fundamental gentleness of everything. Again – it’s not meant to make you think too much, it’s not meant to gross you out (too much), there’s not necessarily a grand point to any of it, but it is there to make you laugh, make you marvel at the sheer amount of splattery goodness the film is able to pull off, and ultimately provide, to quote Chester himself, “release.” It’s the easy, breezy, deviant-village-of-crazed-yet-very-proper-English-murderers-mockumentary the whole family can enjoy. Which again – feels a little weird to say about a movie that features a murder-by-drowning in a bin full of the victim’s own bodily waste, but there you are. 3 out of 5 Nefarious Director: Richard Rowntree Writers: Matthew Davies, Richard Rowntree Starring: Nadia Lamin, John Vangdal Aamaas, Richard Rowntree, Toby Wynn-Davies  Darren, Lou, Jo and Mas live a meager existence on the fringes of poverty. Indebted to the criminal kingpin of their social housing development, they routinely fear for their lives. On the other side of town, the already wealthy Marcus and his disabled brother Clive receive a windfall in the form of a winning lottery ticket. When their worlds collide following a botched robbery, the would-be criminals get more than they bargained for, and will be tested to their limits in a desperate attempt to survive a predator of monstrous proportions. C. While it has become a common response for reviewers to say that they don’t like giving “bad reviews” right before they eviscerate (which I have no intention of doing) a movie. Well if you’ve read or listened to my prior reviews you will know that to be true but here we are. Nefarious markets itself as a gritty British crime film (awesome) mixed with Don’t Breathe and Hostel, which has the potential to either be a lot of fun or incredibly intense for fans of those types of movies. From the first scene we are presented with a common plot device in many crime films as our known surviving character (not a spoiler) is being interrogated by detectives about the events that occurred. Though a lot of the movie isn’t really from her perspective so how would she be able to provide that information to the detectives? Normally if the story is engaging enough then narrative mistakes like that can be forgiven. However, it’s just one of the many elements that leads to the bitter aftertaste. I don’t have a lot to say on this because it’s like a project made so the cast/crew could test their abilities or get content for their sizzle reels. For those reasons, great! Snatch two solid minutes within the feature to showcase your skills. Not that the movie doesn’t make sense but it’s a carbon copy of more effective examples. Watching it gives the feeling that those involved saw Don’t Breathe, said “I’d like to make that,” and that’s the extent of the creativity and passion they put into it. Maybe they are film students or learning by trial and error, still on their journey to discover their own artistic voice. I’d normally support that if it wasn’t so offensive to the audience’s intelligence and its representation of certain characters, mainly shown through the portrayal of a character with a mental illness and one with a substance abuse problem. They are juvenile representations (done by adults) that one would expect from an untrained middle schooler acting student, in South Park or Scary Movie or “Simple Jack” from Tropic Thunder but this isn’t meant to be a parody. I don’t want to harp on this stuff because it’s a small part of the whole but this doesn’t even meet minimal expectations. One could maybe forgive a fraction if there was some self-aware humor to the piece but the fact that it tries so incredibly hard to be this intense, thought-provoking, crime horror only makes these issues standout all the more. It’s insulting. It makes a feature-length worth of time, some people got to practice their crafts, and a lot goes into making a movie, even if it’s bad so for that I’ll show my respects. At the end of the day, Nefarious was made as a bragging right so someone could say, “I made a movie.” I would continue to explain more of the movie and its heist-turned-torture plot but it’s not worth anymore of my words. 1 out of 5 Witchstars Writer/Director: Federico Sfascia Starring: Guglielmo Favilla, Raffaele Ottolenghi, Giulia Zeetti  On Halloween, with the help of some sexy girls, four friends must confront an alien invasion that will force them to face monsters of any kinds, including the ones from their past. Kyle: Witchstars is a horror comedy that boils down to an alien invasion siege film. On Halloween night stars crash down from the sky and interrupt the holiday plans of our cast of characters. There’s some convoluted backstory about the stars being related to witches, but then they mutate people into aliens and this is when it would make sense to note that Federico Sfascia made a film called Alienween in 2016 and this is apparently a re-edit of that film. There’s lots of broad and bold flourishes, some very off putting homophobic humor, fun and well done effects, Ed Wood style miniatures, a bit overbaked in its color correction and post production, but overall the film is swinging for the fences and you can’t help but admire it for that. It’s very much in the vein of a midnight movie, so a lot of criticisms would be taking the film more seriously than the filmmakers themselves did. 2.5 out of 5 Butchers Director: Adrian Langley Writers: Adrian Langley, Daniel Weissenberger Starring: Simon Phillips, Michael Swatton, Julie Mainville  A family of sadistic butchers has dug into the backcountry and, from the deep freeze of winter to the dog days of summer, anyone who crosses their path is dead meat. C. I’d love to see a backwoods horror movie where the villains aren’t generic southern hillbillies. This is even in the snow and the characters are still given all the cliche tropes out of the Texas Chainsaw Massacre or The Hills Have Eyes playbook. You know the story already, young, good-looking people find their car breaking down on a specific stretch of backroads, where they are then hunted, tortured, killed and/or raped/used to continue their lineage. Despite what comes with these types of movies, Butchers falls into the indie filmmaking trap of having a ton of drawn out information dump or dialogue-heavy scenes used as filler to make that feature-length time. Those scenes are cut with quick flashes of creepy imagery to remind us we’re watching a horror movie of course. Really it’s one of those plots with the synopsis and influences listed above you should be able to know where the movie will go without having to watch it. Your version might even be more entertaining. I will say they start off during the winter, which feels like a nice change of pace from the summer sundrenched stylings associated with those films but that’s quickly dropped for the story to jump several months ahead to… a sundrenched summer scenario! What Butchers is commendable for attempting is it takes a very well known horror film story and tries to make a character-driven drama within the confines of the paint-by-numbers backwoods horror tropes. If that was the intention, and I’m not reading too much into it to salvage the movie, then they would have really invested in the acting and character development to create something unique. However, the characters themselves fall into cliches of cheating on each other or fighting for patriarchal dominance in the butcher family, lazy character plot devices we’ve seen a million times in the genre used to create quick tension and inner turmoil. There’s nothing unique to draw us in and allow Butchers to stand on its own. As I write this review I’m getting excited at the potential of a character-study movie that is set in a Texas Chainsaw/Hills Have Eyes world… that’s fascinating. On a technical level the film is decent and the story that they tell plays out well. There’s just very little to say, it’s one that I just finished as I started writing the review and am already forgetting most of what happened besides the general plot points. The case of Butchers is either fans of the previously stated films wishing for their version but have nothing to add or someone trying to bank on a tired horror subgenre in hopes that it can ride the wave of the next Texas Chainsaw Massacre reboot. 1 ½ out of 5 Game of Death Directors: Sebastien Landry, Laurence Baz Morais Writers: Sebastien Landry, Laurence Baz Morais, Edouard Bond Starring: Sam Earle, Victoria Diamond, Emelia Hellman, Catherine Saindon, Erniel Baez D  Kill or be killed is the golden rule of the Game of Death. Sucks for seven millennials who ignored that rule. Now each one's head will explode unless they kill someone. Will they turn on each other to survive, or will this sunny day be the last for the innocent people of their middle-of-nowhere town? C. No, this doesn’t have any connection to the famous Bruce Lee film of the same name. Normally I wouldn’t care about using the same title (since there’s a lot of stuff coming out nowadays) but Game of Death is one of those iconic films that has inspired and been parodied by others since its release in 1978 (though it was shot in 1972) that it is difficult to separate the title from the martial arts flick… Anyway, now onto the review. Game of Death opens with an amazing introduction with a score and visuals like something out of an original Playstation game. It provides the mystique that we are being led into some creative, unique world and I am all for it. Unfortunately all we’re led to is awkward scenes of dialogue, masturbation, doing drugs, moaning/loud breathing, and hanging out by the pool/lake juxtaposed with Snapchat-like stories so we can kinda get to know our characters. This all feels like an attempt at creating a natural, slice-of-life opening mixed with video poetry that’s a knockoff of a Terrence Malick-knockoff. As much as I’m all for supporting the mumblecore style it’s one of those movies that would have benefited from a more standard cinematic approach. The artistic stylings ultimately don’t fit leaving us with two versions (the “fun” version and the arthouse version) of the movie battling throughout the feature’s runtime for supremacy. The filmmakers deserve credit for trying to tackle this type of premise, which would actually be a really intriguing concept if they gave into the satire or excitement that’s associated with the game horror subgenre (Saw, Would You Rather, Ready or Not, Escape Room, Beyond the Gates, etc.). There are moments throughout that embrace the absurdity and gore, allowing for something miraculous based on the budget. However, when one of those delicious moments happens we’re instantly pulled back into the other version of the movie because someone wants it to be “elevated” or taken “seriously.” Game of Death is a decent enough calling card for those involved if they’re working on a project with someone willing to guide them and force them to better hone their artistic voices for craft and consistency… or maybe it was a case of too many cooks in the kitchen. 2 out of 5 Bloodhound Pix is made up of: Craig Draheim, Josh Lee, and Kyle Hintz They are joined by Dan Johnson for the Dead and Sudburied Film Festival.  Follow them at https://www.twitter.com/BloodhoundPix https://www.facebook.com/BloodhoundPix/ https:/www.instagram.com/bloodhoundpix/ If you wish to hear more of their thoughts on the festival, be on the lookout for new episodes of the Bloodhound Pix Podcast every Tuesday. Available on Itunes, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Anchor, and Youtube.   |
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