Happy Hunting

I was very interested in 'Happy Hunting' once I found out it was directed and written by Mel Gibson's son Louie Gibson. Mel is one of the finest directors working in Hollywood today so I thought it would be very interesting to see if his son possessed any of the same talent. So does he? Possibly, it was harder to work out than I had anticipated. 'Happy Hunting' is quite a strange film. It sets out to be strange, but I think managed to be even stranger than intended and in unintended ways. I would say I enjoyed it, without loving it.

There's a point halfway through the film where you will likely ask yourself how are they going to stretch this out for another 45 minutes? They manage it though and while I wouldn't say the pacing of the film is its strongest point, it's not a bad effort considering the way the film is set up. I also liked some of the creativity used in certain scenes. This is the main indication to me that Louie Gibson might have some real talent because creativity in film making seems to be the thing most directors struggle with today. It is sorely lacking in many modern films, however not this one. I wouldn't call this a "must-see" but if you stumble across it on Netflix it's worth a watch and you'll get basically what you're promised.

As many others have said on here, not a bad movie. It takes the surviving the game premise and makes it slightly more realistic to me. But it's still not very likely to happen. What I didn't understand was that if our hero and bad guys chasing him did not show up when they did, they would have only had 2 people to hunt. Is that really enough? Or do they have the hunt when they have enough people? It was a little bit different, our hero was not some white knight or former navy seal. I didn't like the ending at first, but then when I thought about it, at least ot was different. If you are looking for free movies, and come across this one, Which is what I do, Then take a shot. I have watched many a bad movie for free, Before reading reviews. Now I come to the reviews first. Well enough acted and just realistic enough to keep you interested.

Seen at the Brussels International Fantastic Film Festival 2017 (website: www.bifff.net). Starting with an original premise, it has even more original developments in its favor. Of course, the prey has slim chances to survive as per the initial setup of the hunting "game", yet it takes some time for the villagers to learn that the prey this time does not give in so easily as in previous years. In a series of scenes, switching from prey to prey, one falling after the other, yet this time with victims on both sides. Luckily for us viewers, it all went differently from previous years. Alcohol plays an important side role, primarily (of course) for main character Warren throughout the running time, but he also makes productive use of alcohol near the finale.

Entertaining throughout, apart from Warren's alcohol addiction and related cold turkey phenomena, and despite the unnecessary violence, the latter not shown in all gory detail yet suggested with not much left to outguess. For example, when someone's head is beaten with a baseball bat, the movement of the bat is clearly shown but not the ultimate effects on the receiving end. A concession towards content advisory ratings?? It won't help, as the whole movie is riddled with unmitigated violence all over. But it is not Horror in the old-fashioned and literal sense of the word, so no dark corners nor ancient buildings, no monsters nor ghosts, only ordinary (yet redneck) people operating in broad daylight (or some at night) with destructive intentions.

All in all, casting and acting make this movie stand out in the first place, in addition to the original plot with many unexpected developments.

Its strangely entertaining to watch, but at the same time god dang awful.

The "hunting humans for sports"-formula is one of the oldest, yet most consistent formulas in horror, cult, and exploitation cinema. This thrills-guaranteed sub-genre delivered a landmark classic already 90 (!) years ago, with "The Most Dangerous Game", but also still very recently, with Craig Zobel's "The Hunt" in 2020. And during the in-between period of nine decades, there were several more highly enjoyable and often downright eccentric variations, like "Blood Camp Thatcher" (1980), "The Hunting Party" (1971), "The Woman Hunt" (1973), and "Surviving the Game" (1994).

"Happy Hunting" is a nicely fitting addition to the long but pleasant list. It's not exceptionally good or highly memorable, but it does feature the obligatory excessive violence, loathsome characters, and creative death-traps. What makes the film slightly special, perhaps, is that it blends the hunting-humans concept with another traditional cult/horror sub-genre, namely that of the "creepy little town with a secret". The hunting game is presented as an annually returning festive event at a remote Texan border town called Bedford Flats. The sneaky locals, led by the authorial Sheriff, round up dubious passers-by and even their own misbehaving fellow town members, and let them loose in the desert with a small head start. In this year's edition, the alcoholic drug-addict Warren Novak, who was already on his way to Mexico for some vague reason, is the only participant capable of fighting back.

The first half is slow and rather tedious, notably because protagonist Warren Novak is a very anti-sympathetic character himself. You don't really care for his motivations to travel to Mexico, and his constant mumbling whilst drinking heavily makes the dialogs difficult to understand. The fact he's such a thug makes the actual hunt more exciting, though, since you don't really care who wins. Both the hunters and the preys are total scum, so as long as the bloodshed is outrageous & plentiful, it's perfectly fine!