Serial Killers

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.

As far as my rating goes, I'm voting on the entertainment value of the movie, and not analyzing each category of the movie as far as cinematography, special effects, dialogs and stuff of the sort might go...

The movie is just a completely amazing and over the top adventure, with outlandish plot twists, cheesy lines and dialogs. The characters are just totally unbelievable and over the top that you can't help loving them and most of the movie just feels like a completely delusional experience, but it's AWESOME! It just grips you to it, and entertains the living crap out of ya! Well, at least it made my night! I'd recommend it to any movie-watcher that just likes having a laugh, with some fun involved.

AVOID if you take films too seriously!

I have to say I was pleasantly surprised by this film too. I bought it in a bargain store today....£1 and was one of the best pounds I've ever spent. Well worth wasting away an hour or so. Almost gave up at first as one of the characters is a little irritating but I stuck with it. Some of the cinematography is excellent and it became something completely unexpected and fun in a bizarre and twisted way. It's the sort of film that you feel doesn't really know exactly what it wants to be and yet it works either in spite or because of that and as a woman I was worryingly drawn to the two brothers. Even if you don't find this film in a bargain bin somewhere it would still be worth spending a few pounds on.

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.

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.