Serial Killers

I have seen this film on my local video store shelf for years but never rented it until last night. I must say it is not what I was expecting, but I found it quite entertaining. It was one hell of a crazy trip, and every time I thought I knew what was going on there was another twist. I recommend it to those who loved the insanity of Natural Born Killers, or if you just want to try something different. Dave Larsen as Odessa displayed some great acting abilities and reminded me of Mickey Rourke back in his hay days, not to mention he looked bad ass with skeleton face make-up and wielding a shotgun. The acting by C.T. Miller as Mr. Ryan and Nanette Bianchi as Jami entertained the hell out of me, and I loved every minute of it. This movie had me cracking up from beginning to end, and was quite surprised by all the crazy twists. See this film........

This is a great example of a movie that has a lot more buried in it than what you see on it's cover. Depending on your inclinations, you'll either love it or hate it when it's twisty-turny bits start to do their thing.

There are some reviews claiming that the acting is very poor. Honestly, they are not far off. The acting is slow, and so is the development. The lines are overly written, portraying a little too much imagination in long-winded passages that are almost poetic in nature. Still, I would say that the lines are delivered with as much sense and effectiveness as the actors could have mustered up. Watch it and ask yourself, "How would I have delivered that line?" and I suspect you will find yourself beginning to agree with the simple candor that the actors used on screen.

Also, in the case of the main protagonists, you start to realize that the excessively verbose mannerisms actually make a certain sense, and even become relevant later on as the characters begin to reveal their more interesting secrets. While the characters seem unreal at first, you start to see why they are the way they are later.

The film's biggest drawbacks are it's poor filming, slow movement, and it's highly unlikely circumstantial timing. What I mean by the timing is that events happen that leave you scratching your head and asking yourself, "Why, when and how did this happen?" The director feels no need to answer these questions, as the film's magic is contained almost entirely in the house where the events occur. The writers felt no need to explain why the world outside kept intruding.

Lastly, the filming is all blue and moody. It's a silly method of filming, I never liked it. Stop using the filters, bring in some dang light and make a movie we can see.

I really feel like I did NOT waste my time on this one. I don't know if I can call it original in any way other than it's incredible and unusual mix of themes, but it was definitely entertaining.

And that's really the point. Entertainment. It's the bottom line of movie making. I recommend this movie, simply because it's so.. bizarre.

I really feel like this is something of a hidden gem. It deserves a redo, a more modern reiteration to work out the bugs.

I saw a midnight premiere of this movie in college and it quickly disappeared, but it stuck in my head long after I forgot the title, and I'm lucky I re-found it. No one in that theater knew what to expect from this movie, and it start out as everyone's worst nightmare: a cheap, clichéd crime drama. A lot of people walked out after the first 20 minutes, but I was determined to stick it through. And I'm really glad I did.

At the twist point in this movie, the horrible clichés and acting and directing of the first half feel like an amazingly underplayed setup to a punchline with actual humor and shock. Imagine "From Dusk till Dawn" if the vampire angle hadn't been completely ruined by over promotion.

It's really rare that a movie seems to be one thing but then turns completely around halfway through into something 10x better, but this is one of those. It used the low expectations and low budget to it's own advantage and turned out a movie I never forgot.

Having seen "The Convent" years earlier, i was expecting a much more juevenile film than the one i got. What i got was a well filmed movie with much more sophisticated dialogue and plot devices than "The Convent", but still a movie plagued with spotty acting and a B movie atmosphere.

The main thing to appreciate here is the dialogue. Like most things in a Mendez film, its quality fluctuates, but said dialogue is consistently quite good in this film, and the police shop-talk seems to have been pretty well researched, as well.

The main thing this movie is, is fun. I'm personally one of those cinephiles willing to forgive the bad elements of a film in favor of the overall vision and scope of the film. However, while i enjoyed "Real Killers" overall, i must say that the social criticisms and commentaries felt second-hand and that the film has no real "message" as far as I'm concerned, but more mimed and aped morals from movies the director admires. However, the story istelf is whats most prevalent in the movie, with the "pithy" dialogue an underpinning for the whole production.

Not a terrible film, not a brilliant film. "Real Killers" is some good B-movie fare suitable for fans of this type of genre.

M.

I bought the uncut German Pal DVD of this movie as a blind buy a few months back. Looking back, I'm not sure why I purchased it - I rarely buy purely on instinct. I finally decided to watch it last night and was blown away - what an unexpected treat! I'm not going to give much away as it's one of those movies that's best viewed with little knowledge going in. What starts out as a "Desperate Hours"-style movie soon proves a much more interesting ride.

This scores as my unexpected delight for the year. It's a low-budget gem. Some of the acting is "love it or hate it stuff" - the writer Dave Larsen plays Odessa James as a cross between Kiefer Sutherland and Mickey Rourke and I found some of his dialogue a little unintelligible - but, ultimately, I loved the cheesy charm of this film. It's also great looking - the film's scenes are bathed in a lovely blue light in the early scenes - very stylish.

The DVD set is a 2 disc set but the second disc has only trailers and a German-language only short on it. Still, it's a great looking Disc 1 and worth the purchase price, IMHO.