Fallen Angels (2007)

Fallen Angels falls under the category of the worst type of horror films – one that starts with a great premise but squanders its potential in the execution. Fallen Angels had plenty of promise, but it is riddled with bad story writing and poor pacing, which leads to a very dull movie.

An old and foreboding prison is slated for demolition to make way for a shopping mall, but construction is halted when a secret sub-chamber containing the remains of many long-dead children is discovered. A special forensic team from the FBI is called in to investigate the bodies and perhaps find their killer. Meanwhile, a local teen is found dead while another girl is missing. The investigative team finds that strange murders have plagued the small town for 150 years. They soon discover that seven demons, or fallen angels, each representing the 7 Deadly Sins, hold dominion over that particular town and are responsible for the town’s gruesome and grisly deaths. Can the FBI team, along with the mother of the missing girl, stop the killings?

Like mentioned before, the premise for Fallen Angels sounded very promising, but unfortunately its execution made for a very dull horror film. Not even the familiar faces of Michael Berryman (The Hills Have Eyes), Bill Moseley (The Devil’s Rejects), Kevin McCarthy (Invasion of the Body Snatchers), Kane Hodder, Reggie Bannister (Phantasm), Ruth Buzzi or David Hess (Last House on the Left) in lead to cameo roles could help this floundering flick.

The film starts off weakly by not laying some kind of groundwork for what we are about to witness. The characters and story are not introduced clearly enough, which starts the film off on the wrong foot. The narrative is disjointed, confusing and leaves the viewer bored instead of intrigued. Things go downhill from there with unnecessary characters, too many plot points and not enough time spent on the real mystery at hand.

I will say that it is refreshing to see something other than the usual hack ‘n’ slash flick, but the story (written by Jeff Thomas, who also directs) is just poorly crafted. I did enjoy how the religion aspect was presented and how it really gives viewers something to think about. The ending of the film will be a let down for most genre fans, though I enjoyed its exploration of faith and religion. Still, it seems an easy and far too tidy way of wrapping things up. The rest of the script just seemed convoluted and cluttered. There are a few glimmers of greatness, but unfortunately it is too dull to really sparkle.

The wonderfully creepy setting of the film also felt misused to me. The prison where the film was shot is the supposedly haunted Mansfield State Reformatory in Ohio, which is spooky without the benefit of set dressing. Its cobwebbed cells and long, dark hallways make the Reformatory a very foreboding place. Yet, in Fallen Angels the prison setting doesn’t come alive as much as I’d hoped. The atmosphere just doesn’t drip dread like in other haunted institution flicks such as the spooky Session 9.

The acting was not bad for a low budget film. I especially enjoyed seeing Bill Moseley in the role of a crime scene investigator. Genre fans out there will be disappointed if they expect to see much of anyone else of note, though. Hodder, Bannister and Hess are in blink-and-you’ll-miss-’em cameos, while Berryman, McCarthy and Buzzi are relegated to one scene each. The rest of the actors, including reality “star” Adrianne Curry, Star Trek: The Next Generation actor Michael Dorn, Daniel Zacapa and Farah White, do a decent job as well.

The special FX, done by Bob Keen (who has worked on makeup and special FX for Hellraiser, Candyman, Isolation and Dog Soldiers), are very well done. The demons do look a bit silly at times and don’t seem to really fit their 7 Deadly Sins alter egos. Besides that, the gore looks great! There is one terrifically terrifying teeth pulling scene and a few inventive kills, but those didn’t make up for the lackluster storyline. I was expecting to see more of the seven demons and learn more about them, but they were never properly introduced or given much screen time. The story behind the seven demons isn’t even explored that much. Instead we focus on far too many investigators tramping around the prison looking for answers. Besides these unnecessary characters, we also have the mother (played by Farah White) searching for her missing daughter. She doesn’t add anything except dead weight to an already precariously overburdened storyline.

Despite a few moments that seemingly shine in Fallen Angels, all that sparkles is not gold. If you are searching for a creepy horror flick of the demon persuasion, Fallen Angels is unfortunately not your best pick. It is a poorly written, lackluster and dull. Despite claims that it has an intelligent, solid story, the only intelligent thing about this film is that they cast a bunch of genre favorites so that eager horror fans like you and me would be tricked into dumping our money in this poorly executed film.

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Hatchet (2007)

“Old School American Horror.” This was the tagline as well as the promise of Hatchet, the little indie horror film that could. When rejected by a major studio for not being “a remake, a sequel or a Japanese one,” director Adam Green took that rejection and turned it into the movie’s selling point. After the glut of PG-13, remakes and sequels that clogged the movie market, horror fans were hungry for a return to their 80’s roots. They wanted an original, brutal slasher film that wasn’t a remake or a sequel and that was fun, complete with copious amount of blood and boobs.

In answer to those fans’ prayers comes Hatchet, a film that has been completed for two years but has only now been picked up by Anchor Bay and given a theatrical run. Director Adam Green himself says that he has been on the road promoting the film for a straight 17 months. It’s obvious that the film is a labor of love for all involved and it is inspiring to see how much dedication and hard work went into getting this movie made and released.

I had the pleasure of seeing it opening night, September 7th, in Hollywood along with most of the cast and crew and I’m pleased to report that Hatchet is exactly what it promised, “Old School American Horror,” and buckets of fun (along with buckets of blood ‘n’ boobs!).

To get over a recent breakup, Ben (Joel David Moore) is dragged to Mardi Gras by his buddy Marcus (Deon Richmond). Not being interested in all the boobs and booze, Ben convinces Marcus to go on a haunted swamp tour instead of partying. They are joined by two questionable “actresses” Misty (Mercedes McNab) and Jenna (Joleigh Fioreavanti) and questionable “producer,” Shapiro (Joel Murray), an older couple (Richard Riehle and Patrika Darbo) and a mysterious local named Marybeth (Tamara Feldman). When their lingually-challenged guide (Parry Shen) crashes their boat onto a rock, they must abandon ship and head into the Lousiana swamp. Marybeth tells them how she is there to search for her missing father (Robert Englund) and brother (Joshua Leonard) and the legend of Victor Crowley. The specific area they are in belongs to Victor Crowley (Kane Hodder), a horribly disfigured monster of a man who cannot rest after what happened to him years ago. Can the group survive the hatchet-wielding madman and make it out of the swamp alive?

Hatchet was great fun to watch in a sold-out theater with the cast and crew present. The crowd went absolutely wild at many parts of the movie, clapping, screaming and laughing together. THIS is how a fun, slasher movie should be seen. This is how I imagine watching Friday the 13th or Nightmare on Elm Street in theaters must have been in the 80’s. Not only are we treated to some amazing deaths (courtesy of special FX maestro John Carl Buechler) and impressive arterial sprays, but the script is peppered with jokes (both funny and corny) that keep the film firmly planted in “fun” territory, where nothing should be taken too seriously.

The death scenes are the most impressive thing about the film, featuring lots of blood and grue. The MPAA came down hard on this independent film, so it has been trimmed, but the full, over-the-top brutality will be on display for the DVD release of the film. Still, even with some scenes being trimmed, the film’s gore will not disappoint. Director Adam Green and director of photography Will Barratt did a wonderful job with each scene, especially the death scenes that feature no cut-aways and gruesome sprays of blood. Some of my favorite gore scenes include a guy getting repeatedly chopped at with a hatchet, a woman getting her face ripped in half when Victor Crowley pulls apart her jaws, a woman getting her lower jaw cut off with a power saw (correction: it was a belt sander; sorry, my knowledge of tools is limited at best!) and the many dismemberments. If gore is what you’re looking for, you’ll most certainly find it here.

Guys will be delighted to find that the film is saturated (especially in the first half hour or so) with boobs. It feels more like Porky’s or Girls Gone Wild (or Bayou Beavers as producer Shapiro calls the softcore film he’s making) than horror, but once the blood starts flowing (which does take a while) it doesn’t stop. I’m not a big fan of mixing sex and scares (I’ve got my own pair of boobs, thank you very much), but here it’s just sticking to the well-defined slasher formula.

It sticks so well to the formula, in fact, that it brings along all the problems and baggage that 70′s and 80′s slashers have. I don’t believe it was ever Adam Green’s (who also wrote the script) intention to fix the flaws, instead his focus was on faithfully recreating the feel of our much-beloved but seriously flawed slasher flicks. Hatchet has annoying characters (why are all the girls written as annoying, stupid, hysterical and/or slutty?), silly dialogue (some of it is truly insipid and Green should stick to directing) and ludicrous plot holes (ah, yes, I understand they want to make a sequel, hence the convenient plot holes,…but weren’t they against that in the first place?). Hatchet has ALL these flaws and more, but that, my friends, is the POINT of the movie, and kind of its endearment. In its homage to the fun and brainless horror films of the 70’s and 80’s, it has decided to poke a little fun at what inspired it. Which is why, it really DOES deserve to be called “Old School American Horror.” It plays it straight and features both the flaws and the strengths of the genre.

Hatchet is a step forward for the horror genre and will hopefully open the door for more independent horror films. It may not be original and there are far better independent horror films out there, but it stays faithful and true to its claims of “Old School American Horror,” flaws and all.

Hatchet is a fun film, one that’ll make you reminisce about all the crappy movies that came out in the 80’s and make you love it for doing so. It is a straightforward slasher film whose focus is building up the body count as opposed to building up the suspense, but for horror geeks like myself that love a brainless, FUN horror movie that ISN’T a remake or a sequel once in a while, it’s a treat.

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