'Trailer Park of Terror' is trashy, gory fun

Trailer Park of Terror (2008)
Starring: Nichole Hiltz, Jeanette Brox, Brock Chuchna, Stefanie Black, Matthew Del Negro, and Trace Adkins
Director: Steven Goldman
Rating: Six of Ten Stars

When a bus-load of troubled teens on a church retreat crash during a rain-storm, the passengers and their chaparone (Del Negro) take refuge at a nearby trailer park. Unfortunately for them, the trailer park is merely the ghostly reflection of a murderous den of hillbilly criminals that died in a gory, revenge-fueled massacre decades earlier. They now re-inact their brutal ways on hapless travelers, under the command of Norma (Hiltz), one of their victims who has turned victimizer thanks to a deal with the devil (Adkins).

"Trailer Park of Terror" has something for just about every horror fan. It takes nearly every disgusting thing you've seen in a Killer Hicks movie from the 1970s forward and combines them with a sadistic sense of humor that will put you in mind films like "Spider Baby" and "Re-Animator", as well as slightly more modern off-kilter horror features like "From Dusk 'Til Dawn". Further, the ghosts mostly manifest themselves as disgusting walking corpses, so lovers of zombie films will have something to sink their metaphorical teeth into, while admirers of Torture Porn flicks will get to watch one victim get her arm sawed off while tripping so high she doesn't notice until after the fact, and another victim is turned into jerky meat while still alive. And then there's the horny teens that are forced to be the stars of a snuff flick.

I'm not a big fan of mean-spirited and sadistic horror films, so there was quite a bit about "Trailer Park of Terror" I didn't care for. I also like my gory ghost movies and slasher flicks to have a "morality tale" aspect to them, and when they don't--or it's a weak part of the film, as it is here--the film invariably loses me, so that was another reason for me not to like this flick.

However, this thing is so well-written and so finely acted by everyone involved that I couldn't help but like it. Virtually all the characters are so purely one-note and cliched with the hillbilly ghosts  that combining them all in one place manages to breath a form of demented freshness into the film--the writers didn't even try to expand the victims beyond horny teen, asshole teen, druggie teen, and so on; nor to give the ghosts more definition than rapist redneck, robber redneck, cannibal redneck, and so on.

The only character with even the slightest depth to her is Norma, who in life was the only non-psychotic inhabitant of the trailer park... at least until she decided she had enough of them and gunned them all down and killed herself. But the facets to the Norma character never manifests itself quite in the way one expects as the film unfolds, something which becomes which is highlighted and becomes even more interesting due to the plethora of one-note stereotypes that otherwise inhabit the film. It also helps, of course, that Hiltz is a better actress than her repeated casting as a white-trash bimbo (here, and in the television series "The Riches" and "In Plain Sight") warrants. I'd like to see in more horror movies, and in different roles than what she seems to be playing over and over.

The only real down-side that I saw to this film is its somewhat disorganized structure. It starts with an extended sequence in the past and then interrupts the present with a couple of extended flashbacks that both fill in back story but also stand alone to some extent, giving the film the fell of a half-baked anthology. Given the film is based on the anthology comic book series "Trailer Park of Terror", I understand why the filmmakers wanted to make a nod in the direction of their source, but I just wish they had done it in a less choppy fashion.

In the final analysis, though, "Trailer Park of Terror" is well worth watching.

A small-budget film with a big-budget feel

The Craving (2008)
Starring: Lesley Paterson, Grayson Berry, Wallis Herst, Jesse Boyd, Anselm Clinard, Curtis Krick, and Jason Kehler
Director: Sean Dillon
Rating: Eight of Ten Stars

Five friends on their way to the Burning Man festival (Berry, Boyd, Clinard, Grayson, and Herst) take a shortcut across the desert, only to get lost. When the drive up to a ramshackle cabin, its crazed resident (Krick) opens fire on them with a shotgun, disabling their van and causing them to be trapped with him in the desert. The murderous hermit is the least of their worries, however, because when night falls, a creature emerges from its den... and it is very, very hungry.


"The Craving" is an old-fashioned monster movie with a very modern sensibility. The set-up is like any number of "beautiful young people on a road trip Meet a Bad End" movie that you've seen in recent years, but it quickly veers into a territory that's as stylish and well-photographed as anything Terence Fisher or Mario Bava ever offered up, and as gritty and intense as early Tobe Hooper and Wes Craven films with each other.

What seperates this film from the pack it shares some similarities with is its well-crafted script and the performances given by its actors. It may be a fairly traditional tale of a group of dimwitted people stranded in the wilderness with a monster that's messily picking them off one by one, but it's told with a style that's all-too-rarely seen in movies of this sort.

First of all, it delivers a number of unexpected twists as the story unfolds, but they're not the out-of-left field sort of twists that are increasingly the norm in horror films. The twists here are either well-founded in the plot (our crazed hermit has a very good reason for hanging out in the desert... and it's a reason that's both obvious and shocking and one that is in complete keeping with the theme and nature of the story) or ones that play with our expectations for how this sort of movie unfolds and concludes (it may be a small thing, but I really appreciated the third-act violations of conventions as far as the deaths of main characters and the order they get dispatched in--and no, that's not a spoiler... I mean, we don't expect ANYONE to survive in movies these days, do we?).

Second, the script presents dialogue that is far better crafted than what we've come to expect as standard these days. Not only do we have dialogue here that sounds the way real people might talk but screenwriter Curtis Krick has given each character a unique speech patterns and sound. It's dialogue that lets the actors bring their characters fully to live and make them believable even when they are doing things that I found unbelievable. (The only complaint I have in the "there went my suspension of disbelief" category is when two characters have sex after one has suffered a severely broken leg. Yes, he's on pain-killers, but, having been where he's at as far as broken bones go, I don't think they'd have been enough to dull the pain to the point where I'd be interested in a romp. Wallis Herst's character, Diane, is definatelly the sort of girl that every guy in the 20s dreams of having and every man in his 50s is a little fearful of... but I don't think Scotty would have been able to accomodate her with her broken leg, no matter how funny I found the scene.)

Another thing I found laudible in the film is the amazing use of sound in it. Too many indie films (and even a few studio efforts with huge budgets) suffer because not enough attention is paid to sound-mixing or the proper use of music.

"Curtis and I created a version of the film with sound effects added, but we soon realized that the film would only reach its potential if we engaged a really talented person to complete the movie's sound," director/producer Sean Dillon commented to me when I mentioned how spectacular the use of sound is in the film. "Then we found Josh Eckberg, a wonderfully talented sound designer and editor who shared our vision for the film. He found the time to do the sound right. For 'The Craving,' we understood how much of the tension came from the sound of the creature. If we hear it, we know it's near, but we still don't know exactly where. That can be much scarier than actually seeing the creature onscreen. Josh had the skills and the resources to actually execute an ambitious sound design."

The soundtrack music used in the film is also great. Composed by Krick, it's not the sort of music that calls attention to itself and instead builds tension and horror where it is deployed on an almost subliminal level. It's not only an example of great score music, but it's an example that other filmmakers should follow when placing soundtrack music in their films. For a first feature-length effort, it's exceptionally well done.

I just realized that I've gotten almost to the end of this review without discussing the film's monster. That oversight is a symptom of my desire to keep my posts here short and because Dillon and his crew handled the monster exactly as they should have.

The creature is "The Craving" is a bizarre one, with a number of surprising traits and behaviors, yet ones we can buy into as the film unfolds. I had a small WFT moment during the first monster attack, a moment where I couldn't quite get a read on what was going with the characters and their conflicting reactions to the creature's strong body odor and Diane's really bizarre behavior. However, as the film continued, it started to make sense and it made the creature even scarier.

Although the film takes place in the middle of the desert and the creature here isn't hairy--it looks like it's completely smooth-skinned it the quick glimpses we get of it--there are a number of things about it that reminded me of Bigfoot legends. Heck, the monster here explained some of the Bigfoot stories better than the Bigfoot stories do, such as why some people describe a strong stench around the creature while others don't, and why some say Bigfoot is frightening and others claim it to be a kind and benevolent creature. The strange creature is better thought out and more logical than something that many people believe is real.

In addition to being cleverly conceived from a story point of view, the monster in "The Craving" is also expertly handled from the technical aspects of horror filmmaking. Dillon and his crew wisely chose to have the monster remain mostly hidden from the viewer, showing only glimpses of it. This keeps the creature as frightening as possible as it then ends up residing mostly in the audiences imagination, causing us to picture something far more terrible than anything that could probably have been put screen--and given the highly effective and convincing gore we do see,
I think most of will imagine the creature as pretty damn horrible.

By keeping the creature's screen appearances limited to silhouettes and quick glimpses, Dillon not only shows that less really is more when it comes to this sort of thing, but any possible weaknesses in their monster design and make-up are also kept from view. This is not one of those independent horror films where the creators screw up their movie by giving the audience extended shots of a badly done monster. The opposite is the case here--we've got a good-looking moster that is still shown sparsely and thus becomes even scarier. (Dillon told me that the monster make-up and look improved as filming progressed, so it could be those few excellent glimpses we get were late in filmed late in the shoot. Whatever the case, the creature looks great, better than those featured even in films you may come across during "the most dangerous night of television" on your favorite cable channel. If the look of the creature improved as the film unfolded, then it ended up in such an excellent place and was otherwise so artfully filmed that the we'd never have known it wasn't perfected before filming began.)

In fact, everything in this film is so well done that you'd never know the film was shot in over a mere two weeks, with some of the cast being available only part of the time because of other commitments, severe weather impacting the shoot, and many of the people involved in the production wearing many different hats both in front and behind the camera. It's a film that has the look and feel of a movie shot over a much longer period, and for a whole lot more money than the good people from Biscuits and Gravy Productions had access to. It's a film that shows what a talented group of dedicated creators who know their craft can come up with.

Why is it called 'Day of the Ax'?

Day of the Ax (2005)
Starring: Dustin Ardine, Janet Robbins, and Suzi Lorraine
Director: Ryan Cavalline
Rating: Two of Ten Stars

When a pair of psychotic brothers aren't killing travelers, they're abducting young women and forcing them to have babies. (I think.)


"Day of the Ax" is a dull, sloppily plotted slasher flick with bad gore effects. The actors are all decent enough, but the script they are working with was so bad that I'm sure even Ed Wood Jr. would have been declined to work with it.

Skip it. It's not worth your time. But if you decide to check it out, can you explain to me why the movie is called "Day of the Ax" when the killers prefer using hammers?

'House of Wax' has little in common with classics that share the same title

House of Wax (2005)
Starring: Elisha Cuthbert, Chad Michael Murray, Brian Van Holt, and Paris Hilton
Director: Jaume Collet-Serra
Rating: Six of Ten Stars

A group of teenaged friends get lost and then stranded in an isolated stretch of back country. Seeking help in a nearby town, they come upon a wax museum far more remarkable than it even appears at first... and the fact the whole building that houses it is made of wax is pretty damn remarkable. Naturally, there's a crazed killer or two lurking among the exhibits.


"House of Wax" is scary in the way one of those Halloween haunted houses that spring up in neighborhoods, amusement parks, and empty warehouses this time of year is scary. It's also a film that requires a similar level of suspension of disbelief and willingness to play along. While it does contain some genuinely creepy moments, its very premise is so far fetched and ludicrous that even the most "game" viewer will find himself shaking his head at times. The acting is what you'd expect in a film like this, and the director and casting folks need to be congratulated for putting the best actors in in the movie in the leads.

For slasher-movie fans, there are a couple of nice kills--including that of Paris Hilton's character--but limited gore. For fans of absurd, there's the climactic encounters between siblings--our protagonists good girl Carly (Cuthbert) and her rebel-without-a-cause-but-with-a-criminal-record brother Nick (Murray) versus the crazed twin brothers who are masters of the House of Wax (both played by Holt)--in a most unusual environment, and they build to a thrilling finale to the film. For fans of horror movies in general, there are some good scares and a handful of wild set pieces that make the movie worth your time.

'Cold Storage' is a film that deserves a wider audience

Cold Storage (2007)
Starring: Nick Searcy, Joelle Carter, Matt Keeslar, Brett Gentile, Jeffrey Pillars, and Terry Loughlin
Director: Tony Elwood
Rating: Eight of Ten Stars

Clive (Searcy), a mentally disturbed mountain man, meets the girl of his dreams and commits to spending the rest of his life with her. Unfortunately, she's already dead, having suffered a fatal injury in a car accident near Clive's isolated shack. However, he isn't the sort of guy to let a little thing like decomposition get in the way of happiness. Nor will he allow anyone else to get between him and his true love, especially the living who might come looking for her, such as her strong-willed sister (Carter) and her looking-to-reconcile ex-boyfriend (Keeslar).

"Cold Storage" is a top-notch horror flick that gets just about everything right. It features a great script that refrains from giving into genre cliches so so it remains exciting and its developments unexpected remain unexpected up the very last moment. Made for just a few hundred thousand dollars, it's a film that puts movies made with budgets measured in multiple millions to shame.

This is a movie that could easily have been yet another slasher movie about cityfolk meeting hicks in the backwoods who when they aren't breeding with their sisters are killing strangers who happen along. Thankfully, director and co-screenwriter Tony Elwood created a far better film than that. In fact, he used the rural setting of the film as a means to make it even more suspenseful by playing against the typical Hollywood image of anything outside Chicago, Los Angeles, or New York City.

Most of the film's action takes place in or near a small North Carolina mountain town called Rainerspoint. While there are some decidedly freaky people living on the town's outskirts, the town itself is inhabited by normal, typical Americans and it is like any other small town you might visit anywhere in the country. The sheriff--played by Jeffrey Pillars--comes across as bigoted, lazy and a bit incompetent, but that's more out of the fact that he has very little to do with his days than outright malice, and his attitude and behavior is countered by a couple of the shopkeepers we meet during the course of the film. In general, the people of Rainerspoint aren't a bunch of toothless freaks just waiting to pounce on anyone who happens by... they welcome the tourists and it's clear that if anyone was aware of what was going on out at Clive's shack, they would have been horrified and taken action far sooner than they did. No one here is trying to cover anything up, but, like most Americans, they tend to mind their own business and assume the best about their neighbors.

By making Rainerspoint a typical small town inhabited mostly by friendly people, Elwood makes the creep factor (and ultimately the horror factor) of the happenings at Clive's shack that much more frightening and intense. The weirdness of Clive isn't diluted by surrounding him with equally weird and scary neighbors--with one exception... and that neighbor is probably worse than Clive. Elwood further deploys set and lighting design to contrast the normality and the town with Clive's private world in the forest; the scenes in the town are all in clean, brightly lit places and the sun always seems to be shining on the street, but Clive's place is full of filth, deep and dark shadows and it always seems to be overcast or raining. It's a powerful approach, and it's one that shows that productions and scripts developed with thought and care will deliver powerful experiences no matter what the budget.

"Cold Storage" is as good as it is because of the great care that has been taken in creating it. During filming, it's clear that Elwood understood what to show and what not to show in order to build suspense, and it's equally plain that a good deal of post-production work took place. For countless reasons, post-production is where the mistakes that cause many low-budget films not to reach their full potential, mostly because the filmmakers cut corners. Oftentimes, it's the color correction process or the sound design/re-recording that drags a movie down. In the case here, viewers treated to big-budget post-production quality on a small-budget film. And it shows.

The film also gains much of its strength from its script. I've already talked about the intelligent portrayal of Rainerspoint, but the quality of the script also shines through in the way the story unfolds at a perfect pace. Although we know full well that the two main characters, Cathy and Daric, won't find Cathy's sister alive, the gradual revelation of exactly how insane Clive truly is ensures that the viewers will be on the edge of their seats when the inevitable confrontation with Clive happens; it's an encounter where we know someone will end up dead, and it will probably be one or both of our heroes.

Speaking of heroes... this is another area where the film excels. It features a cast of very talented actors who take the excellent material provided to them in the script and bring it fully to life.

Nick Searcy gives a spectacular performance as the deranged Clive that makes the viewers feel sympathy for the character even as he repulses and terrifies us. It's a performance that displays both acting and scripting of a caliber that is all-too-rarely seen in films.

Joelle Carter is also noteworthy as Cathy, who portrays a stubborn, confident woman deeply concerned for her sister. It's a part where she easily could have come across as bitchy, but she never does. Similarly, her character comes across so clearly that when she does something very, very stupid toward the end of the movie, it seems perfectly natural for her to do so, instead of an example of Stupid Character Syndrome (where a character's brain stops working because the plot needs him or her to do something so the story can continue).


"Cold Storage" isn't perfect--it DOES have one example of pure Stupid Character Syndrome [although, maybe not, because the character being boneheaded and putting himself in danger because of it doesn't seem very swift to begin with] but this is small flaw is heavily outweighed by the superior quality of everything else in the film.

From the script, through the set design, the lighting, the acting, the cinematography, the special effects, and the musical score are all of a quality that puts to shame any number of horror flicks that have appeared in the theaters in recent years. The only thriller and horror movie fans who will be disappointed by this film are those who are into the "torture porn" genre or who feel that if there aren't any boobs on screen it's not worth their time. Everyone else will love it!

"Cold Storage" is, sadly, still looking for a distributor, so it may be a while before you'll have a chance to see it. I sincerely hope that someone has the good taste to snatch up this film, because it's head and shoulders above most modern horror films.





To read more about the film, visit the office website by clicking here.