Director: Andrew Jones
Year: 2014
Country: United Kingdom
Alternate Titles: Theatre of Fear
Genre: Slasher
Plot:
Working together at a traveling carnival, a murderous family tries to get by in life by doing whatever devious activity will allow them to remain together, and when this alerts a dangerous hunter to their whereabouts seeks revenge on the family and must rely on those tactics to stay together.
Review:
This was enjoyable enough for what it was. One of the better aspects of this one is the somewhat cliched setup that manages to still provide enough to know about the group going on. The first half spends quite a lot of time going through the various members of the group and their different relationships, with the controlling father trying to keep his family together, the ventriloquist son stuck in his head about the supposedly alive puppet insulting him, the clown son dealing with the trauma of his condition, the youngest son being a constant screw-up that needs reprimanding all the time, and the daughter living the golden life as the perfect child. Knowing who they are and what they’re about lets this part come together so that their murderous antics come off with a sense of disgust due to the humanizing efforts done to get them there beforehand.
Those scenes involving their murderous antics come off incredibly well here which has some solid aspects at play. Knowing the daily are insane psychopaths who will resort to murder the first chance they get whenever someone wrongs them which they get away with due to the roving nature of the carnival, this sets up their freewheeling ability to strike out against the ruthless talent agent, the disgraceful boyfriend, and the woman he was dating that feature some better-than-expected moments as it ties into established storylines quite well. The second half, turning into a solid enough version of a retribution feature that allows for the hunter to come upon the family leading to some brutal moments offering some additional gore and brutality in what’s going on as everything leads to some likable features here.
There isn’t much to hold it down but there are some slight factors present. The main drawback featured here is the sluggish and slow-going pace that takes things way too slow for this kind of feature. The whole family-based setup that takes an in-depth look at how the group operates is filled with cliches about the nature of what’s going on between everyone which makes it all feel quite repetitive from every psychotic carnival family in the genre so even if this section has a lot to like with setting up their behavior there’s not a lot here that provides much in the way of interest. The sluggish quality of what’s going on here takes a while to sort out and get something happening to bump up the excitement, which might not be a factor for all out there who want a faster-moving genre effort. As well, the low budget being on display does serve as a factor to get over which is quite prominent and could be a factor here which are all enough to bring it down.
Overview: ***/5
A rather solid genre effort that does have a few factors against it, this one comes together quite well for what it is as there are some slight issues present that bring it down enough to leave it where it is currently. Those that enjoy this type of genre fare or are curious about it will have the most to like with this one while most others should heed caution about it.
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