Lowlifes

Tubi original Lowlifes breathes some new life into the old 'city folk vs. Hillbillies' genre, blending comedy and gory horror to great effect. It's best to go into the film blind, so I'm not going to summarise the plot or mention any spoilers, suffice to say that it serves up some neat twists along the way.

Directors Tesh Guttikonda and Mitch Oliver deliver a fun movie that isn't to be taken seriously and their cast act accordingly, putting in enjoyably campy/comical turns. This doesn't mean that the horror is any less effective when it happens though: there's some genuinely nasty stuff in the film with plenty of graphic splatter along the way.

Don't watch this one expecting it to be a game changer -- I don't think the film-makers had such aspirations -- accept Lowlifes for what it is... a bloody good time with its severed braised tongue firmly in cheek.

While in places Lowlifes teeters on the brink of dismal, there is just enough to keep you watching to the end.

The storey is run-of-the-mill blood and splatter. There is a twist, which leads to an interesting finale. Beyond that, there is no noticeable character development. Which is a shame, as there is a lot of room to expand on some of the characters' motives.

Given the fairly narrow scope of the film, it is not surprising that the cast could do little more than service the script. The dialogue revolves around vignettes designed around shock or humour, rather than narratives that build a story. Because of this, the characters are quite superficial.

If you do make it to the end you might find yourself thinking, as I did, this is a mediocre film that could really use a better written prequel. There's novelty worth exploring, and for that reason I am glad I watched it.

The film seems to draw heavily from another horror film called "You're Next" which is one of the few decent American horror films of the last 25 years. Lowlifes is worth a watch because of strong performances from a few of the actors, especially the actor who plays the father, and several plot twists.

The story basically involves a road-tripping, normal-appearing family who come into contact with rather stereotypical and exaggerated redneck-type locals. The plot is anything but predictable, but again seems to draw inspiration from a horror movie known to horror enthusiasts but probably not to the general public. I agree with other reviewers that the ending was for lack of a better word disappointing.

I don't remember recently such an artistic/professional "suicide" like this. Director/writers came up with pretty good ideas. LOWLIFES somewhat grabs you by the throat, it's never boring, of course it's not that original and creative but for a 2024 horror movie, it's almost great. Characters are well written, actors do a good job, there are nice twists.

And then it goes down the drain. The ending was disgusting. Look, i could live with unsatisfying endings but this is not an art drama neither a crime thriller. This is something like a dark comedy with horror elements. You can't end your movie like this after all the things that happened. Writers wanted to end it unexpectedly, and i respect bold choices. But not in this movie. This movie DEMANDED a different ending.

Ending aside, this lose its steam during the last 20-ish minutes. It should have been at least 10 minutes shorter. Pace/rhythm got worse, and it was not that anxiety-inducing during those minutes. Something was off. It was bordeline funny and as it seems, unintentionally funny.

Actors were very good though. And the build up was good enough to make me invested.

It was an entertaining enough movie to watch its nice when a horror movie attempts to do things different to the rest, which was unexpected especially from a tubi original. It helped that i didnt watch a trailer before hand as ive heard it kind of spoils it.

And although the pacing at times was off and there wasn't alot of plot you often don't need it in a horror for it too be worth watching. Felt like the acting for the most part was good.

I recommend this for anyone who just enjoys watching horrors, feel like alot of these bad reviews are from people who didn't enjoy being taken down a different path to the usual horror movie setup.