Rating:**
Starring: Ruta Gedmintas, Joshua Bowman and Perdita Weeks
This is why I normally don't trust Wikipedia when it comes to Slasher film hunting as one or two new upcoming titles often get misplaced and labeled as a slasher. When I took a gander at this title and read the plot, I was skeptical to even try this film but it did sounded like a good change to your typical teen-kill, so I hunted a copy and crossed my fingers. To be fair, this After Dark Film entry does serve some nice splashes of red but could this be our first "vampire slasher"?
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| Run, Amber, Run. Faster, faster! |
Thinking enough is enough, Amber and her friends finally took on a road trip to her apartment in Chicago which she plans to buy with a deposit before another tenant gets it. Halfway out from town, their car breaks down, forcing the group to patiently wait for a good soul to give them a lift and, by the luck, a truck eventually stops to offer them a ride. It was all good until the driver refuses to stop and the gang discover a cargo of human blood in cartons. Things go for the worse when the truck disgorges them into an abandoned warehouse where, much to their horror, a pack of blood-thirsty vampires are waiting to hunt them for not only food, but sport...
Slasher movies featuring monsters are not an unusual sight especially with the likes of Pumpkinhead (1988) and its vengeful teen-killing titular demon, as well as Stephen King's Silver Bullet (1985) (werewolf), Time Walker (1982) (mummy) and even The Lamp (1987) (magical djinn). So far, little, if not no one seemingly has tried doing a vampire-slasher and, unfortunately for this reviewer, Prowl is not the title that will change all that.
While the idea of the vampires here not just downright eating their prey and allowing them to run around and fight back to make their "hunt" more challenging is a neat idea, the execution for it is disappointing as, for starters, the story takes too long to get going before the mayhem starts, spending tedious amount of drama which doesn't work too well for me. I've seen these theatrics before, it's all the same for me, so why do I wanted to see another emo situation where they barely show any clues as to why she wanted to leave in the first place?
Another problem I have here is that it massacred most of its casts way too quickly, thinning it down to two characters left who now has little more to do other than run and hide from vampires. It's a big misfire of a direction for me and it kinda ruined the film as the anticipation built from all that waiting is wasted on a couple of girls playing hide-and-not-die.
The only thing that I find with some worth from this movie is that it's at least covered the mood and eeriness of the hunt quite well. Far from bad but not really over-the-top and easily forgettable. If only Prowl (2010) had a better execution for all of this I would had rated it higher, but as far as low-budget splatter films go, at least this one made an effort. (Not a good effort, but an effort nonetheless)
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| Bald, moustachoid, and a truck driver. Yeah, he's good! Or is he? |
While the idea of the vampires here not just downright eating their prey and allowing them to run around and fight back to make their "hunt" more challenging is a neat idea, the execution for it is disappointing as, for starters, the story takes too long to get going before the mayhem starts, spending tedious amount of drama which doesn't work too well for me. I've seen these theatrics before, it's all the same for me, so why do I wanted to see another emo situation where they barely show any clues as to why she wanted to leave in the first place?
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| Yum yum for a vampire's tum-tum |
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| How adorable, a runt! |
Bodycount:
1 male decapitated, then ravaged
1 male mauled apart, ravaged
1 female ravaged
1 male mauled then thrown to his death
1 male bludgeoned to death with metal weight
1 male neck torn open
Total: 6
The first half hour was pretty decent, but then it went completely downhill.
ReplyDeletehence, half a five.
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