Sawney - Menschenfleisch

SAWNEY: FLESH OF MAN is another stab at low budget torture porn, made with maximum relish. The director seems to be trying to make this film as grisly and unpleasant as is humanly (and inhumanly) possible, and he certainly succeeds in that. But while in horror terms he summons up an appropriately oppressive atmosphere, in terms of scripting and narrative this is a complete dud.

The legend of Sawney Bean is a classic slice of Scottish folklore that's interested me for a long while. I've even visited the locales where he and his clan were supposed to live, so when I heard about this film I was eager to see it. What a shame, then, that Bean is reduced to such a typical cannibal killer with nothing to distinguish him from the bad guys of a dozen low rent American slasher flicks.

The film deserves kudos for casting the creepy and imposing David Hayman as the titular killer, but then proceeds to waste him for the entire running time, filling his mouth with B-movie lines. The plot involves one character ending up in his clutches, then someone goes looking for the first and becomes the next victim, and so on. Realising how thin that plot is, the writer throws in the most predictable 'twist villain' ever, alongside a random monster, but none of these elements makes this film anything more than completely forgettable. No story, no merit...

Trying to uncover the truth behind a rash of disappearances, a Scottish journalist traces a murderous clan of cannibals in the area and must stop them from serving up his friends for their insatiable thirst for human flesh.

This frankly turned out to be quite average overall when it really could've been something. What ends up working so well for this one is the fact that this one is really just so good at hiding the true criminals so well here that it really doesn't seem likely that it's a whole family. The deranged sons are all the focus here with their puzzling display of martial arts moves that come out of nowhere here but still contain a rather creepy edge to them so that their scenes work quite well. Put on display in the final half, with all sorts of action-packed confrontations including the tunnel ambush, the capture at the river and the cooking station shootout which makes effective use of their darkened lair and disorienting walkways for great effect with this giving off an extremely tight, dense feel for launching attacks and ambushes out of anywhere, causing this to get some chilling suspense moments here and there. Of course, none of this is really all that good compared to the effective treatment of the main killer who is utterly slimy and repulsive in great fashion. From the near-orgasmic blood-drinking on his victims, the delight of chopping and chomping bodies and the severely nasty and gruesome effects work here to make the kills look quite nasty, there's a lot to like here and this is quite effective in these scenes here. However, it still doesn't make up for several rater big flaws. The biggest issue is the fact that this one is really more of a crime drama investigating the family's actions around the town during the middle scenes which is quite dull and boring overall. Since this is played as an investigation angle, it hardly has anything happen as all we do is simply read newspaper articles, hear the investigator recite information already learned and basically do nothing while the brief intervals to acquire new meat is hardly enough to counteract this boredom. On top of that, the fact that this throws in the final twist the way it does here is quite a lame and overall stupid idea that's not even done with any real intent to do anything other than to totally screw over the audience by wasting all this time during the mid-segments that would've ended the film much earlier and causing these to just be as flawed as possible.

Rated R: Graphic Language, Extreme Graphic Violence, Brief Nudity, a Rape scene and drug use.

Most serious historians consider the myth of Sawney Bean to be exactly that - a myth , someone who never existed and a dark fairytale . It's interesting that people who consider Bean to be based in reality can't agree on where he lived . Some say he lived in Ayrshire whilst others say he lived in Galloway . If you can't even agree on where someone is supposedly to have lived that might tell you something . No one said films had to be realistic especially horror films and this movie uses a premise of " What if a descendant of Sawney was living amongst us in present day Scotland " and from the opening titles reality goes right out of the window

It's not so much the lazy exposition of using captions and voice over that's the problem but feels the need to end it on a long mega laugh out loud that wouldn't feel out of place in a pantomime but if you're expecting high camp you're going to be disappointed if not alienated down to the lack of humour and excess of graphic gore . The action then cuts to a Doctor being driven through the snow clad mountains of the Scottish Highlands of 1990 . Right so the Sawney descendants of Ayrshire / Galloway have relocated to the Highlands ? You can guarantee that no matter what it'll never be revealed why Sawney's descendants have left their ancestral home . The Doctor is supposedly about to deliver a baby to a woman hooded and tied to a giant wooden cross but doesn't get to do this because the man who drove him there pulls out a shotgun and shoots him . So someone went to all the trouble of getting a Doctor to deliver a baby and then shooting him without delivering a baby . It doesn't make the slightest bit of sense but since we're now two minutes in to the running time things can only improve . Except they don't because we're treated to abysmal acting and a plot full of holes and contrivance such as busy city centre streets not having any CCTV cameras

Where the film does deserve some credit is for its cinematography and for a film that obviously didn't cost a fortune it does give the proceedings a haunted bleak feel , so much so it makes VALHALLA RISING seem like a musical comedy . However this is often negated by performances that give the impression the cast are reading out their shopping list . The only exception to this is David Hayman who thinks he's appearing as a villain in a pantomime . Sawney is also portrayed as a religious Scottish maniac but for some reason no one thinks of asking him if he's a Catholic cannibal or a Protestant cannibal . Now that takes some swallowing

High-quality, well-made Scottish (British?) made horror film with plenty of practical special effects. Aftr seeing the 4.6(!) rating I took a chance anyway and was stunned at what a good flick it is. U wimps that hate horror need to STOP reviewing it already.

It's simple , this is not a family drama or a kids comedy movie. Agreed it's not an original either, but what do the audience expect when they come across a title like this , blood, gore, a passable story , decent direction and acting. So what's not to watch? For all the jokers and self made critics out here on IMDb who wrote bad reviews for this movie, better not watch horror, thrillers in the future and waste precious review space. My word , decent passable fun ,thrill ride.