Hey, everyone. "Moriarty" here with some Rumblings From The Lab.
I feel bad about Mr. Beaks going to suffer through this one, since I was the one that told him there might be some hope for it. Anton Sirius was enthusiastic when he visited the set last year, Rob Schmidt made a film called SATURN that I liked quite a bit, and then there’s the whole Dushku factor going for it, but... well... I’ll let Beaks explain the pain, since he is the one who suffered it first-hand...
WRONG TURN – Test Screening (w. & d. Satan)
I’m not ashamed to admit it; when I spotted Eliza Dushku’s name on a screening pass foisted on me by one of the NRG worker bees, it was as if I’d found a golden ticket in my Wonka Bar. No matter that, in the years since her star-making turns (*I* say she’s a star, damn it!) as Faith on BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER and Missy Pantone in the National Film Registry bound BRING IT ON, I’ve had to endure cinematic abortions like THE NEW GUY and SOUL SURVIVORS just to gaze upon her heavenly body (or, as an impartial observer might say, “leer” at the screen like a mangy, malnourished mutt ogling 5 lbs. of ground chuck left unattended on the kitchen counter). No, irrespective of these past disappointments, I thought that this time my Eliza had found herself a vehicle worthy of her skill. So what if it’s about hideously disfigured, homicidal hillbillies stalking victims in deepest darkest Appalachia? That more or less recaps BRIEF ENCOUNTER, and that’s a bona fide classic! Besides, just look at the promising collection of hot young stars – including MAY’s Jeremy Sisto, GHOST SHIP’s Desmond Harrington and ON THE LINE’s Emmanuelle Chriqi – drawn to this modest production. By god, this motherfucker’s stinking with prestige! At best, this could be serious competition for Eli Roth’s CABIN FEVER as the best “Spam in a Cabin” flick of 2003 (all praise due to the inimitable Joe Bob Briggs for coining that term). At worst, the girls might get naked, and Stan Winston Studios should, once again, conjure up some gruesome f/x.
I don’t know... maybe next time I shouldn’t tell myself that the screenwriter of SPAWN and ECKS VS. SEVER is due for a winner. Perhaps, when I know full well that a film’s director is responsible for one of this decade’s worst motion pictures – CRIME AND PUNISHMENT IN SUBURBIA – I shouldn’t listen to that same blithely imbecilic voice inside my head that once convinced me Colt .45 was a gentleman’s malt liquor. In any event, that’s between me and my own infamous bad judgment. For now, I’m here to warn you of a $10 million crime against cinema, humanity and, most importantly, Eliza Dushku called WRONG TURN.
Starting off with a poorly staged sequence wherein a couple of mountain climbers are massacred by some savage creatures that go unglimpsed in the shopworn JAWS tradition, WRONG TURN then jumps into a SE7EN-ish credit sequence that goes to annoyingly stylish lengths to vaguely impart, through various newspaper headlines, the legend of some sinister Appalachian folk monster that has claimed the lives of various hikers and outdoorsmen. So far, so routine. The film’s conceptual invention ends several minutes later when our protagonist, played by the possibly talented Mr. Harrington, is introduced speeding his way to Raleigh for a very important meeting, only to be halted by a massive chemical spill that has tied up traffic for miles. Rather than call ahead and inform the waiting party that he has been inconveniently, if understandably, delayed, he impulsively heads off into the wilderness in search of a back-road shortcut. Little does he know, he’s just made... an illegal u-turn.
After a narratively useless encounter with a toothless yokel who returns at the end of the film to provide the punch line for a half-hearted joke that was lazily set up in the first place, our hero speeds cavalierly into the woods where he rear-ends an SUV belonging to a group of twentysomething campers (i.e. the rest of the hot, young actors, including Our Miss Dushku). Turns out, their car was already put out of commission, thanks to a strip of barb-wire mysteriously spread out across the road. Being far removed from the nearest cell phone signal, the gang is forced to split up. Thus, the four most visible stars with the best agents – Dushku, Harrington, Sisto and Chriqi – double back on foot to the nearest gas station, leaving the two less fortunate thespians to their doom.
This is where the film really started to piss me off. For what seems like an eternity, the director crosscuts between the two parties, awkwardly segueing from banal character development to ham-fisted suspense building. The former is especially, *piercingly* aggravating; punctuating the aimless ambling of our four main characters with dialogue nowhere near as witty or disarming as clearly intended, the filmmakers, through their depiction of the ennui of the privileged youth, manage an unintended, bizarrely brain dead homage to L’AVVENTURA. Only they accomplish in five minutes, what Antonioni could not over two-and-a-half hours: they make you hate the characters. By the time they get around to having shit jump out of the bushes, you’re already rooting for the as-yet unseen hilljacks to kill ‘em all a thousand ways to MOTHER’S DAY.
This would be fine if the mutant hillbillies possessed even a tenth of the menace or character of the murderous clan from THE HILLS HAVE EYES. There’s a hint of this early on when we get our first full view of the trio stalking the kids, but despite the “legend” alluded to in the opening credits, they remain undeveloped and devoid of any discernable characteristics. This is especially true of the two taller monsters, who I couldn’t tell apart most of the time. Only the little guy, with his yowling and giggling, sticks in memory. As the inaugural theatrical release from Stan Winston Productions, such unremarkable creature design has to be regarded as an outright failure.
Since this was a work print, there were some rough, unfinished f/x – most notably in the film’s primary “set piece” that hilariously turns our heroes into a dexterous, steel-ribbed band of tree-hopping Johnny Weissmullers – but their eventual completion isn’t likely to significantly improve the quality of this abomination. If anything, I was most disappointed that there weren’t more practical f/x; when compared to the shamelessly gory likes of CABIN FEVER, FINAL DESTINATION 2 and MAY, WRONG TURN is resoundingly tame in the blood-‘n-guts department. Only one death, an unexpected arrow through the eye, elicited a substantial verbal reaction from the audience. The rest – a few sawed limbs, one disappointingly bloodless decapitation, and a skull crushing – pales in comparison to the new breed of splatter flicks.
Oh, and to answer that all-important question, I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but there is no nudity.
Ultimately, WRONG TURN most unforgivable sin is its misuse of Eliza Dushku. Truly, there can be no greater crime than a fine young thang squandered on sub-par entertainments; ergo, by besmirching the good name of our fair Eliza, I hold Rob Schmidt and Alan B. McElroy in contempt of cinema, and hereby sentence them to... well, just about what they’re doing now. Only next time, I’m seeing to it that they get no better than Nicole Bass.
Faithfully submitted,
Mr. Beaks
Nicole Bass? Dude, that’s just cruel...
"Moriarty" out.
