Reeker DVD

...say the arrival of the Reeker DVD gave me some pleasure, but were my expectations of the movie achieved?


A car moves through the desert inside are a family on the way to some far off destination, inside are a mother and father their son and a dog. The mother and son are playing travelling games while the father sleeps in the back of the car. In a moment of distraction the mother ploughs the car into a deer killing it instantly. ...
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The Reeker has a plot that is unusual (but not original), and that has the potential to be something amazing. However the poor production values, appalling cast decisions, and often hysterical special effects all make The Reeker quite literally a stinker.

In my decapitation of the Reeker I'll begin with Tina Payne or Tina Illman as she is otherwise known, her character is supposed to be South African and whether she ... more

I never knew I was so influential over Hollywood, if you think you have seen me write this review before, your not wrong. I wrote most of this review two months ago, and I confess I was quite cutting about the movie. So much so that Fox/Pathe have contacted Ciao regarding the statements I made and the impact it would have on the sales figures on the UK. As a result I am re-listing this review minus some of the comments I made; as requested by Ciao. However I stand by my comments and re-iterate that the movie itself is dire in the worst form. Not helped by the terrible acting, and incestuous relationships of the movies production crew.

If you watch television over the past two or three week you cannot help but see a trailer for Reeker. The 19 second trailer promises you "the ride of your life" and that "you have never seen anything like it". Needless to say the arrival of the Reeker DVD gave me some pleasure, but were my expectations of the movie achieved?

A car moves through the desert inside are a family on the way to some far off destination, inside are a mother and father their son and a dog. The mother and son are playing travelling games while the father sleeps in the back of the car. In a moment of distraction the mother ploughs the car into a deer killing it instantly. The car swerves uncontrollably into the ditch at the side of the road. All get out of the car unscathed; in fact the only one to suffer was the poor deer. As normality returns the family hear there dog attacking something in a bush, the father walks behind the same bush. To the horror of the mother and child the dog comes crawling out from the bush, unfortunately only half the dog is left, what's left is in short a big bloody mess. As the mother screams she backs into her husband, he too is slightly disassembled. As the camera slowly moves away you see bodies being dragged away from the car, by something!

Five teenagers are heading across the desert to Area 51 for a party, one of them with the dubious nickname of Trip has a secret, he has stolen a large container of Ecstasy from the University nutcase. Once Gretchen gets wind of this stash she issues Trip an ultimatum he can dump the drugs or get out. Trip decides that he would sooner get out as the drugs are worth a considerable amount of money. Because nobody is able to get a phone signal however the others persuade Gretchen to take Trip back to the gas station they passed some miles back, reluctantly Gretchen agrees. Before they have time to leave however the group encounters a tremor, which they believe to be associated with either Area 51 or an earthquake.

Before arriving back at the gas station they notice a car turned over on its side, rather than stop they decide to report it to the police on arrival at the gas station. On arrival they discover the gas station, hotel and diner are all completely deserted. Everyone has gone, disappeared like some sort of disaster has occurred.

One of the girls called Cookie discovers a Bible that has got a variety of disturbing scrawling on it. They also discover that all the phones are dead, the televisions are not working and that an MP3 player continuously plays the death march. As if that's not bad enough the roads are completely empty, but Gretchen's friend Jack whom is blind can smell something quite disgusting.

Cast

Devon Gummersall .... Jack
Tina Payne .... Gretchen
Derek Richardson .... Nelson
Tina Illman .... Gretchen
Scott Whyte .... Trip
Arielle Kebbel .... Cookie
Michael Ironside .... Henry
Eric Mabius .... Radford
Marcia Strassman .... Rose
David Hadinger .... The Reeker

The Reeker has a plot that is unusual (but not original), and that has the potential to be something amazing. However the poor production values, appalling cast decisions, and often hysterical special effects all make The Reeker quite literally a stinker.

In my decapitation of the Reeker I'll begin with Tina Payne or Tina Illman as she is otherwise known, her character is supposed to be South African and whether she is or not I cannot comment upon, however for an actress if this is the case her accent is the worst I have ever heard in my life. Top this off with a haircut that resembles a scarecrow and this woman actually fills you with more dread than the movie itself. It just so happens that Tina is also the producer of the movie which may explain her casting. But the most annoying thing for me is that Gretchen's character is clearly (in respect of looks) older than the rest of her companions, and she just looks out of place. To add insult to injury she her character keeps pointing out issues of age and how much she likes to party almost as if the crew and the rest of the cast are fully aware she looks much older than the rest of the group.
This leads me on to Scott Whyte whom plays Trip, and at this point as if the character and actress behind Gretchen were not enough we get this foul offering. Him bumbles his lines and is series need of re-shoots for most of his time on screen. He seems like a stage actor who needs to shout every line. A quick look through Whyte's CV shows that his work has been based mainly in television and that every show he has appeared in has been axed, I cannot pretend to be surprised. His timing is well out of the other characters, and it seems the Director was well aware of this as he consistently places him in independent shots.

Micheal Ironside on the other hand somewhat of a horror stalwart is best known for his roles in V and Scanners. Here Ironside in his four minutes on screen delivers a far more substantial presence than the rest of the combined cast. Its sad however to see how badly Ironside has aged of late, and its not make up. Even with poor health Ironside puts in a fantastic performance that will undoubtedly redeem the movie of the rest of its flaws.

The plot itself is OK, but poorly delivered. They spend too much time creating a certain sort of build up, the lines the character's use seem bad and poorly written. Language is used that I have not heard since the early 80's and I don't mean swearing, more terminology. I have this theory that the five main cast most of which double up in other roles used to gather at each others houses as a child watching classic 80's horrors, and from then on decided it would be a "neat" idea to make a movie. I know what your thinking, maybe the movie is a low budget movie, but this is not the case in fact it had a bigger budget than similar movies (in style) Hostel and Jeepers Creepers. And when you look what is delivered comparatively you have to ask where the money went because it certainly was not in the film.

The special effects are quite good and bad at the same time, internal organs etc are pretty impressive to look at, BUT a major part of the story dictates that limbs and other body parts are removed. This is clearly done with computers erasing the said parts of the body and replacing them with relevant background. The worst example of this takes place at the halfway point of the movie; Trip finds an old trucker in a bin and pulls him out to discover that the waist down is missing from the trucker. The actor obviously used his feet to help him to movie away from the bin; this is then removed by computer trickery. But the guy as a result kind of levitates in the air, and it looks just ridiculous. This whole effect is not consistent throughout the movie, because when you see the dog at the begining the effects used there are very realistic.

The creature of the Reeker itself is basically a gas based being, and reeks is a word that I would use to sum up this entire film. With the exception of the basic storyline there is not one redeeming feature about this movie, it's so bad that it makes early 80's B movies look fantastic. The Reeker is definitely one to avoid.

IMPORTANT NOTE!

The DVD did have some special features; however they appear to have been removed from the disc. Maybe this was a result if a rather abrasive review of them by myself ;o) the features which were by far the worst special features I have ever seen on a DVD!

The DVD is due for UK release on 13th of November! 

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