One heck of a Spring Cleaning: Cabin Fever 2: Spring Fever (2009)

Cabin Fever 2: Spring Fever (2009)
rating:***1/2
starring:  Michael Bowen, Noah Segan and Rider Strong

I'm a big fan of Roth's Cabin Fever and I remember being hyped to hear about Ti "House of the Devil" West directing the sequel to the backwoods survival horror back in 2009. Now, I remember feeling anomalous once seeing the sequel but I guess it's high time to feel anomalous again as we take a school bus ride down to a new leaf.

Previously, Paul, the last to be infected by a flesh-eating virus, was seen lying in a creek that leads to the town's water supply. As soon as he wakes up, he finds himself disfigured by the disease but clumsily walks away in hopes of warning everyone about the water. But by the time he reached the open road, he is hit and blown to bits by an incoming school bus. Called in to check the accident is the first film's Deputy Winston Olsen, the smooth-talking procrastinating cop who, like before, assures that everything's will be alright and passes the whole incident as a "Moose road kill". The shocked bus driver buys it, leaves to go on with his day and insert animated opening credits featuring the creek water being processed into bottled water, which leads to a nearby school.

We now move our attention to John, a high school senior who's deciding whether to go to prom with his long-time crush Cassie or stay home and geek out with the nerds. His best bud Alex initially prompts him to stay home but he soon changed his mind after getting his junk sucked, the girl assuring him that she'll be at the prom. Thus, Alex forces John to reluctantly attend just to accompany him, much to the nuisance of Cassie's bullying boyfriend, Marc.

All the while, Winston bear witness to a trucker's sudden "blood attack" and realizes the creek's contaminated by the same sickness that took the lives of those kids back at the cabin one movie ago. After an unsuccessful attempt to warn officials of the contagion, Winston tags his cousin along to runaway and hide as soldiers from the Contamination Control Division suddenly shows up, killing off anyone who has the disease as well as locking up the whole town.

As the sickness began to infect nearly everyone at the prom, can John confess his love to Cassie when everybody else is vomiting blood and dying from the flesh eating virus?

Cabin Fever 2: Spring Fever steps up the game with gore and humor so much of an ante that it's ridiculously mental; it's a standalone sequel in a sense, with only two- um sorry, one returning character which barely did anything but cover his own sorry ass. (but with style! ;D )

Interestingly in the first Cabin, the virus didn't kill anyone; yes, people were infected but what killed them were the dangers around them from loose dogs, angry rednecks and even themselves. Here, the virus handled the killings and nothing's clean ever again. The virus has turned into a "gag" where folks vomit projectile blood in mere hours after consuming so much of the water, which I find slightly odd since none of them actually show signs of sickness until they started throwing up, something Cabin Fever uno made terrifying in a psychological sense. Spring Fever's approach was more on the splatter-comedy, more on the outlandishly gross from liquefied miscarriages to "blood piss", that seeing it is equivalent to saying goodbye to your lunch as well as to force a chuckle or two since the whole scenario is just plain crazy. And that even includes this film's none-horror set-pieces. (Super glued nail anyone?? How about a strip show with sore-lined tits?)

Even the characters are over-the-top "colorful" albeit their one-dimension persona; while some are excusable since they're to be executed moments later, never to be remembered again, that doesn't mean they're no less as interesting as a live action cartoon background. The 70s vibes and cinematography gradually helps give the film it's wildly cartoonish aura with a sense of dread, something that will surely be for the fans of Splatter flicks or anything that's eye-candy bloody.

And that's what this film is all going to be; a fun, romp splatter comedy that strikes a nerve if you're a utterly serious person, or at least a die-hard fan of the first. It's certainly not a slice of pancake for everybody, nor will it be a fine glass of milk to go with the 2003 Cult classic; So far, it's still far from unwatchable for me, nor is it completely unbearable, not with all that imaginatively funny and messy gross-outs. Relatively not the finest way to follow-up Cabin, but since it's here so might as well.

Bodycount:
1 male splattered to bits by a incoming bus
1 male choked on his own blood from to infection
1 female drowns in pool
1 male hits his head against the pool edge
1 male gunned down
1 male gets a sniper shot to the head
8 females and 5 males glimpsed dead/dying from infection
2 males crushed in stampede
1 male seen dying from infection
1 baby found in pieces due to miscarriage and infection
1 female bled to death from infection
1 mascot seen dead from infection
1 female shot on the head
1 female glimpsed impaled by the mouth with an ice sculpture
A large number of students seen dead from infection
1 male had his head beaten to bits with fire extinguisher
1 male succumbs to infection, dies
1 male gets a nailgun shot through the head
1 male seen infected (animation)
1 female seen infected (animation)
1 male killed, method not seen (film)
Total: 33+