Headhunter

Caught this film at a packed midnight screening last night. What a surprise! Solid acting in all, with a stand-out performance delivered by Benjamin Parrillo... playing Ben Caruso, the film's lead, a character who does so many wrong things, yet you laughingly cheer for him to somehow make it through... thus reminding me of the Ash character from Evil Dead but instead of the woods, Ben finds himself having to survive his ordeal on the graveyard shift at his new office job... While the humor isn't quite as over-the-top as Evil Dead, it still had me laughing out loud (along with the rest of the audience) quite a bit.

The gore FX are fun, with a cross between physical and CGI working quite well. There are definitely some gory spots that will have the fan's of blood & guts movies cheering.

The sound in Headhunter was especially good, with what seemed to be deep layers of sound fx. Normally indie films are far too simplistic, not layered like typical Hollywood films... But this film took it's sound serious, from cool creature voices to eerie sound fx, it delivered.

Between Parrillo's performance and Paul Tarantino's directing, Headhunter delivers the goods.

Something about the script and the director make up for the wretched generally worthless actors in this movie. I actually liked this film enough to watch it all. Don't get me wrong, there are moments in this movie where the actors are actually pretty decent, followed by a scene where they are just cue-card reading horrible. There's some attention to detail in this movie that just shows a lot of effort and a lot of heart went into this production even if it is obviously low budget. There is actually a plot of sorts which is a big step up for this genre. It's really the lack of special effects budget that kills this film. The sex scene was great but we needed about 3 more really hot ones, especially with his girlfriend.

What results is a watchable low budget horror film- more for a single corporate guy than anyone else since it is office space horror with a corporate backdrop (of sorts).

THE PLOT:

A very hot corporate headhunter gets a guy the job of his dreams but he has to work very strange hours and it seems like his coworkers are not completely from this world. She has the hots for him but she's nothing but trouble it seems- With a huge budget and some more creative plot elements, this could have been a blockbuster, but the small budget keeps it in the watchable yet crippled category and I am sure the plot elements had to be warped down to the low budget.

Ambitious young go-getter Ben Caruso signs on with sexy corporate headhunter Sarah Tierney. Sarah gets Ben a new job with great pay working the graveyard shift. However, Ben soon discovers that Sarah is a witch and his coworkers are the tormented souls of Sarah's previous conquests.

There is not much I really have to say about this one other than it is boring and just not a very great film. I love good horror and I love bad horror, and this is neither -- it is just a half-baked idea in the oven. And strangely, it seems to have a very similar cover to "Tamara", which came out the same year.

The professor who knows the Middle Eastern things was interesting and this could have been developed more. I am not at all clear why they thought a cheap trinket from a gumball machine could pass as an ancient artifact... this needed more thought.

Saw this movie at Dances with Film and thought it was really well-done. There are moments when you can see that the budget wasn't huge, but not many. Overall, the direction, acting, and story were very strong. I saw one of the director's first films, "Courting Coutrney," and that was a refreshingly original romantic comedy. Here he displays a real knowledge of what makes an offbeat horror film good; a creepy setup, dark humor, good looking girls, and delivering the gore when needed. Impressed also by the CGI. This was a fun but dark film that shows Paul Tarantino has talent. When this comes to DVD I hope other can check it out and see for themselves.

A campy horror show about an insurance salesman who is befriended by a business man that has a ten year old secret. The businessman sends the insurance man to a headhunter to find a better job and that job entails – other work as assigned. The salesman spends the majority of the movie trying to understand why strange things are happening to him and winds up actually fulfilling his job function much to the dismay of the businessman who suffers for a job well done. The camera work and direction was surprisingly good. The dialog was austere and functional with a few giggles. The acting was pretty good. The special effects were in league with the films budget. The movie cover was nicely done and was one of the major reasons I picked up the DVD.