Director: Adam Newman
Year: 2025
Country: USA
Alternate Titles: N/A
Genre: Creature Feature Slasher
Plot:
Heading out with her friends, a woman arrives in a small town to begin their get-together with each other but are soon confronted by a malevolent creature that has connections to a special curse placed on the town by the founders decades ago and must try to stop it from claiming them.
Review:
This was a fairly solid if somewhat underwhelming effort. Among the better elements present with this one is the generally likable setup that manages to bring about some intriguing elements. The general setup of the creature representing a town-wide curse on the specific bloodline and returning to wreak havoc in the area offers up a solid enough starting point as this one brings about the concept of a devastating creature with a solid backstory. The connection to the town and the means of resurrecting it features some chilling aspects about the lengths the town will go to keep it satiated as it soon grows into a seeming conspiracy involving the elders luring the group together to be killed off by the creature and the means they’ll go to save everyone else which all give this one a rather intriguing setup.
As a result, the scenes of the creature on the loose rampaging through the town are generally quite fun. The inherently unconventional nature of its appearance, looking like a grotesque, deformed humanoid with exaggerated features and inhuman proportions offers a lot to like with several solid stalking scenes featured here. From the first major scene stalking the friends around the woods to the local arcade where it continues the assault to the scenes in the creature’s cave lair where everything comes together and gets revealed, there are some immensely fun scenes here of the creature coming about to viciously slaughter others as the rapid ferocity and carnage on display are quite fun. That even includes the highlight massacre at the hockey rink where the town has gathered which is equally filled with action and carnage, making for a solid effort overall.
There are some problems with this one holding it back. The main issue here is the generally rushed nature of the storyline making this one seemingly jump into everything without much context. Dropping us into the couples going on the trip who are already at the site in the woods and setting up camp, laughing and joking with each other, and heading off into the other group who are staying at the cabin nearby with their own issues and rivalries which get spelled out here with very little context of what’s going on. In some cases, the backstory about the town and its history with the creature is given by someone who we don’t know their name yet so it comes off immensely awkward trying to figure out what’s going on. As well as some generally obvious cheesy low-budget moments, these bring it down.
Overview: ***.5/5
An intriguing enough if slightly flawed genre effort, there’s a lot to like here and not too many genuine flaws which help to make everything quite fun for the most part. Those with an interest in this style of genre fare or are fans of the creative crew will have the most to like here while most others out there might want to heed caution.
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