Following the loss of their home, a father and son eventually move to a small cabin in the wilderness to reconnect but when a group of friends arrive for a hunting trip they find themselves stalked by a ravenous group of sasquatch looking to protect their home and must get out alive.
This here was quite an engaging effort in this particular style. One of the film's greatest strengths is the fact that a lot of this rests on the father/son relationship at the heart of the story, and the first half here gets this done particularly well with the two of them at the cabin basically trying to reconnect with each other. The emphasis on them at odds with each other brings them to a state where they're not butting heads but a more realistic disinterest in each others' chosen activities yet still trying to reconnect and stay involved with each other's lives. It comes off rather nice and believable and is a great way to disguise the fact that there's not a whole lot of action for the first half of the film by getting to know these people. As time goes on and their hunting expedition turns slightly crazier and much creepier, that is paid off in fine form with the slowly-dawning realization that something is out there, watching and waiting. Eschewing the obvious sounds of grunting or loud, inhuman wails until they've already gotten good and freaked out, this one instead opts for the silent assassin waiting in the woods following behind them unseen or continually crashing through the bushes just out-of-sight which offers up a far creepier experience here. The scene where it all breaks down when they find Bigfoot has invaded their camp and go off chasing it through the woods works so well due to the hysteria of the moment, and that spills out into their series of encounters not only with the creature and each other. Given that there's all the action here in the later half, that's where this one really gets quite fun. The creatures have a rather fun, extended battle with the group trapped inside the cabin which has a lot of enjoyable action in this one, and their sense of hunting strategies and cunning makes for some fun times in their ambush on the cabin. Wrapped together with real practical effects and some nice gory kills from the creatures, there are some solid features throughout here. While it's all well and good, it does have a few minor setbacks to it. The low-budget nature of the film means that a lot of the time the darkness with which it's shot doesn't equate to a really easy time telling what's going on. Campfire scenes, in particular, are so dully lit that it's impossible to make out what's happening at times, and that these occur during the film's biggest moments is all the more frustrating. Even the final ambush comes under this problem as the film manages to really undermine the events where they fight against the creature is spoiled by the low light present and it really brings this one down when it shouldn't. Likewise, there's also the film's lack of action in the first half which is where the build-up to the father/son relationship holds the bigfoot action down to the point of featuring nothing for quite a while into the movie, and it can be a challenging introduction for some who don't really enjoy that kind of drama in their efforts. These here are what end up holding the film down.
Rated R: Graphic Violence and Extreme Graphic Language.
