Synopsis: Get ready for one of the most talked-about, red-blooded American horror movies of the past 20 years: When a group of New Orleans tourists take a cheesy haunted swamp tour, they slam face-first into the local legend of deformed madman Victor Crowley. What follows is a psycho spree of seat-jumping scares, eye-popping nudity, skull-splitting mayhem and beyond. Joel David Moore (Dodgeball), Deon Richmond (Scream 3) and Mercedes McNab (Buffy The Vampire Slayer) star – along with horror icons Kane ‘Jason’ Hodder, Robert ‘Freddy Krueger’ Englund and Tony ‘Candyman’ Todd in this screamingly funny carnage classic.

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Hatchet 7.5

eyelights: the cameos by horror greats. excellent blend of humour and scares. the soundscape. the kills.
eyesores:  the look of Victor Crowley. the group’s inability to finish off Crowley.

Ben: “Come on, this is gonna be fun.”
Marcus: “About as fun as crabs.”

It’s called ‘Hatchet’. It’s a horror film. I had no intention of seeing it. It sounded either like a film filled with gratuitous violence or a picture like so many I’d seen before. Either way, I wasn’t interested one bit – even if I kept hearing good things about it. Because, let’s face it, the bar is very low in the horror genre, so that didn’t mean much.

But then I picked up ‘Frozen‘, by Adam Green, writer-director of ‘Hatchet’, and thought it was really good for what it is. I thought that he used the clichés of the genre in novel ways and actually managed to create a tension-filled, gripping picture. So, based on that alone, and given that ‘Hatchet’ was going for 5$, new, I decided to reconsider it.

It turns out that ‘Hatchet’ does indeed deserve the praise that it’s received, after all.

It’s nothing new though: a group of people get stuck in the bayou and end up being hunted down by a savage, mutant killer. On the one hand, the story is prototypical of the genre and, thus, cannot garner much respect. On the other, however, it’s very well made for the genre, and may even be better than most of its forbears.

‘Hatchet’ is basically what ‘Friday the 13th‘ (both versions, frankly) would have been, had it been made by clever and skilled filmmakers: it  delivers an excellent mixture of humour, chills, and innovative brutality. And sex, of course (you can’t have a slasher film without the requisite T&A). It’s the manner in which it’s thought-out and presented that makes the difference here.

‘Hatchet’ does an exceptional job of starting the movie with chills – by introducing us to the swamp, the setting of our film and a key character backstory, in the form of two fishermen trying their luck after dark. In no time flat, it proceeds to giving us some laughs, serving up dysfunctional family dynamics before a few visceral scares take us to the credits.

Only then are we introduced to our key protagonist, who is at a Mardis Gras fiesta with his buddies. A down-and-out loser who’s still stuck on his ex and can’t seem to get into the spirit of things, he wants to go on a haunted swamp tour –  much to the derision of his drunken, horny friends. He manages to coax one of them, but the bickering and jabs have begun.

We soon meet the complement of the piece, who are all involved in the tour by means of a small chartered boat. The characters are nothing exceptional but they all stand out from one another – there is no personality-less “cannon fodder”, which is nice. They’ve also all been written in a more modern fashion; there’s very little old school naiveté on board.

Personally, I really enjoyed these characters; as two-dimensional as they were, they were familiar enough that we could fill the blanks in for ourselves, but they also each had their moments – be it as comedic relief, emotional anchors or as relatable counterparts. The banter was quick and frequently funny, rife with satire and irony.

Jenna: “Seriously Doug, I can’t work with that. I’m a professional actress. I went to NYU.”
Misty laughs.
Jenna: “What’s so funny?”
Misty: “Like anybody’s ever even heard of that.”
Jenna: “New York University?”
Misty: “Never heard of it.”

The arguments between Jenna and Misty were so funny to me because they were inane and played up the blonde one’s low IQ and lack of general knowledge. She had some riotous lines. They were total stereotypes (a wannabe actress slumming it by doing nudity for a “Girls Gone Wild”-type video and an idiot socal girl), but they were also send-ups – which was great.

Shawn: “The tour is leaving right now, it’s forty bones each.”
Ben: “Forty dollars?”
Marcus: “Can you spot me?”
Ben: “/What, you don’t have any cash?”
Marcus: “No, I’m just not paying for this bullshit.”

I also enjoyed the mixture of camaraderie and intolerance that was played up  between Ben and Marcus. They’re obvious the closest of friends, or else Marcus wouldn’t have left the party behind for a lame boat ride, but he also gets annoyed with Ben, who is obviously not living up to his notion of cool; he wants his buddy to smarten up. And he isn’t afraid to smack him when he isn’t.

What’s terrific is that the actors all play it up appropriately, but keep it credible enough that ‘Hatchet’ doesn’t become parody; Adam Green made some great choices in casting and directing them. Also amazing is that he managed to lure horror icons Robert Englund, Kane Hodder and Tony Todd for cameos in his low budget movie. What a coup! They’re all loads of fun in their short on-screen stints.

Hodder not only has a few moments sans make-up, but he also plays the villain of the piece, Victor Crowley – appropriately enough, given that he is also the most popular of the actors/stuntmen to play Jason Voorhees. He’s bloody sensational as the rampaging psycho, serving up a brutal arrangement of kills that are surprisingly memorable in a genre that has done it all. I’ll never forget Ms. Permatteo’s death scene, for one. Nasty.

My problem is that, as much as the character is a somewhat impressive beast in action, it’s also a horrible figure to look upon. And by this I don’t mean so much that he is ugly (which he most certain is!), but that his design is weak: he’s monstrous and human, but not human enough that you could believe his deformity. Thankfully, unlike Gunther, he’s lit in a way that it can sometimes be ignored. Sometimes.

Otherwise, my key issue is that his victims frequently put him out of commission but failed to take full advantage of the situation and finish him off. This is a genre convention, of course, but they all seemed intelligent and capable enough until those points. Seriously, they had managed to take him down, so why wouldn’t they think of getting rid of him – especially after he’d proven his lethality?

‘Hatchet’ has become a small cult favourite, oft-referred to as a notable entry in the genre, and producing thus far two sequels. Is it novel? No. Is it thought-provoking? Not at all. Is it fun? Yes. Is it well done? Absolutely. It serves up all that one might want and/or expect in the slasher genre, but with a quality rarely rivaled. It’s not a game-changer, but it’s a standout for what it is: a bloody, nasty, tension-filled slaughterfest.

It’s called ‘Hatchet’. It’s a horror film. And what more could one want?

Story: 7.5
Acting:  7.5
Production: 7.5

Chills: 5.0
Gore: 7.0
Violence: 6.0

Date of viewing: October 7, 2013