Bury the Bride

Five women from SoCal travel to a remote hunting cabin for an unorthodox bachelorette party. The filthy cabin is owned by the redneck fiancé of June (Scout Taylor-Compton) and he unexpectedly shows up with several of his hick friends for an unforgettable night.

"Bury the Bride" (2023) is cabin-in-the-woods horror helmed by the younger brother of Rob Zombie, Michael David Cummings (aka Spider One), who's the frontman of the band Powerman 5000. Like his brother, he features his spouse/partner in his movies, which is Krsy Fox (Sadie).

Despite the skankiness of Lyndsi LaRose's character, Carmen, she's a highlight on the female front; very stunning. Thankfully, Scout Taylor-Compton's June is more winsome and takes second place.

To appreciate this flick, you have to be able to stomach the white-trash-in-the-sticks horror of "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre" and typical Rob Zombie flicks. It combines the cabin-in-the-woods setting with bits of "Deliverance" and films that I can't name because I don't want to give anything away. Let's just say that the surprise at the 38-minute mark works well and there are a few genuine scares, as well as effective spookiness.

The movie runs 1 hour, 23 minutes, was shot in Los Angeles.

GRADE: B-

This movie was on its way to be a little hidden gym, but something happened halfway through. It's almost like they had a change in the script, or a change in the Director, because the whole tone of the movie changed, and sadly not for the better.

The first half of the movie is very well done. The unknown actors did a great job and I chuckled at several parts so it had a little comedy to it as well.

But then something completely changed with the movie. You will probably see what I'm talking about. It's when they wake up on the second day. From there it's not nearly as good as the first half.

Still, not a bad movie I guess, but it could have been great.

5/10.

Taking a road trip together, a group of girlfriends arrive at a remote house in the desert for a special bachelorette party but when the fiancee and his friends show up unexpectedly the girls discover the horrifying secret the men share and must race to get away before they're killed.

This was a pretty decent if generally underwhelming genre effort. One of the film's better elements is the rather intriguing setup that gives this one a rather solid starting point for its later shenanigans. The trip out to the desert and the amount of time spent alone with each other to get to know them and their issues, not just the issues that get brought up when they're both drunk but also sober that bonds them together despite those other factors, starts the film off well. The constant arguments that pop up are genuine issues that add a nice bit of spice to the proceedings which provides a nice bit of conflict to everything and setting this up nicely. That provides this one with plenty of fun once it gets to the crash from the boyfriend and his friends which sets everything in motion. The initial idea of what's going on is quickly changed by a great reveal sequence with one of the girls at their compound that really moves this along at a faster clip. Overall, this offers the type of high-energy action with the group attacking the girls and bringing about some frantic attempts to get away that are quite fun and feature far more brutal gore alongside the effects used for the reveal. As this generates a highly effective final half on top of the fun first half, there's quite a lot to like about this one. There are some issues at play with this one that holds it down. The main issue featured here is the somewhat confusing nature of the relationship that's at play between the sister and her fiancee, which is not handled all that well. There's very little about what makes the two attracted to each other since we're told they're different people leading very different lifestyles and what we know about him makes it seem quite odd how they would even meet, much less showcase what would make her attracted to him in the first place. There's way too much questioning happening about this part of the film, and it has a cheap feel as a result with no answers given. The other detrimental issue present, which isn't as big of a deal but still somewhat harms this, is the somewhat overlong and dragged-out finale that is trying to build some suspense in what's going on but ends up just leading this down a path of inevitability far more than it should. The endless scenes of the older sister running around the cabin, tidying up, and just generally not doing anything all for the sake of wasting time for a final shock it's quite clearly aiming for is a bit distressing with so much of the running time building up this obvious point so it can be somewhat distressing. Otherwise, there's not a whole lot else really wrong here.

Rated Unrated/R: Graphic Violence and Graphic Language.

Ordinarily I don't find it particularly difficult to come up with the required number of words in order to provide a review, but "Bury the Bride" is special. In fact, I suspect the filmmakers had the same problem when thinking up enough crap to regurgitate into the film cans in order to qualify it as a "movie." Now, I'm probably going to get some things wrong, but I was bored beyond words, blinded by the stupidity and frankly just didn't care. But here goes...

First off, we are introduced to the protagonists-an unlikable group of vapid young women who are celebrating a bridal party at a dirty shack in the desert. Then one girl's boyfriend crashes said party with his buddies. They are all very unpleasant rednecks and it's hard to follow the interminably long conversation they all have, not just because it's dumb, boring and seemingly pointless, but because you are mostly distracted trying to figure out how in the world these people met, why are they together as they seem so completely incompatible, and how is it possible to not realize said totally incompatible, unpleasant, redneck boyfriend is a vampire, as are all his buddies?

Oh yeah, redneck vampires in the Southern California desert.

Look, I'm not going any further exploring the movie, because I don't want to remember any more-I just want to finish this review, warn you stay away, and continue on with my life. But considering the script was written in a week and a half and the film was shot in even less time should be a concern in itself. And honestly, the only interesting side note is that Chas Bono is in it.

There is no redeeming value here. Its rating has been inflated by some questionably high scores. Then again, there's no accounting for taste. And if this kind of hot mess is your taste, then I suggest you stay far away from the Oscars.

So, these characters make some dumb choices. And then they make really dumb decisions. I mean how did you not miss the stupidity of the choices. Women on a bachelorette party have the groom and his backwater friends stop by to "meet and greet." The problem is, these guys (groom included) are obvious rejects from Deliverance, but this only seems disturbing to one of the women, and abrasive for a couple others. Once the intentions of the men are clear, things make more sense on one hand, but all the more unreasonable for the original question of "How did the women choose to get into this situation?" Nothing new then happens but standard tropes of this type of isolated backwater situation. The end isn't too surprising and has an underwhelming tone. Overall, I believe I only fast forwarded about 10 minutes toward the end to avoid the mind numbing chase scene.