Dir - Cameron Cairnes/Colin Cairnes
Overall: MEH
Brothers Cameron and Colin Cairnes' 100 Bloody Acres is ultimately a comedy that is just not that funny. It is another movie where the parody elements are wholly intentional, (in this case involving city folk encountering scary rednecks), but the relationship between captors and prisoners is haphazardly blurred to such an extent that it just seems stupid when it is supposed to be earnest. Some of the film's most outrageous, "wtf" scenes are indeed chuckle-worthy, but everywhere else, the film does not really pull it off when it comes to humorous hi-jinks. The scenario is appropriately ridiculous and grows increasingly so, but the film rides the line of not going full tilt where it actually would have benefited from doing such a thing. This is ironic in that one of the arcs that more than one protagonist undergoes is just that; to stop thinking and just "go for it". The movie does not take its own advice in this regard and when the Cairnes are trying to convey hilarity in their preposterous set up through dialog, very little unfortunately sticks.
Dir - Jen Soska/Silvia Soska
Overall: MEH
The writer/director team of Jen and Silvia Soska teamed up with Katharine Isabelle, (Ginger Fitzgerald in the Ginger Snaps franchise), in the bloody, gross-out, feminist empowering American Mary, a film that has a couple of admiring traits but is a bit messy in other areas. From a visual standpoint, the Soska sisters have produced a rather striking work with vivid, red set designs and a slew of fascinatingly disturbed looking characters, many of whom are actually body modification enthusiasts. For a film about victimized women utilizing surgical brilliance to become intimidating, desensitized revenge monsters, the movie oddly does not go too far over the top. There is a black comedy tone here that is wholly purposeful, but it is played close to the chest, which is fortunate in that the audience will not find themselves laughing AT the film, but WITH it as intended. At the same token though, the plot is a bit vague with some unfocused themes and character development that is regularly glossed over. The ending is also unsatisfying and gives off the impression that maybe the Soska's could not figure out how to wrap everything up during the writing phase, which again seems in large part due to some clumsy script details they formulated along the way. Fairly though, it is not a complete loss and is certainly weird enough to give it a gander.
Dir - Paul Hyett
Overall: WOOF
Fitting both uncomfortably and perfectly in the "torture porn" camp, Paul Hyett's debut The Seasoning House has hardly a single frame in it that is not miserably vile and depressing. "Why are there movies like this in the first place?" is a very logical question to ask. Now is the film overtly exploiting sadism in a popcorn horror fashion? No it is not. What it is doing though is tackling on such a disheartening subject matter, (sex slave abducting), that it is not even the least bit endurable to watch let alone even mildly entertaining for curiosity or artistic sakee. Only very few if any filmmakers in history can have such an incredibly uncomfortable premise such as the one here and pull it off in such a way as to merit its existence. Whatever Hyett here was trying to do in order to make it compelling, it just abysmally falls flat. Throughout the experience, you are most likely to debate why you are watching such unpleasantness at all. To add to all of this, even if you can simply stomach a bunch of helpless girls get raped, murdered, and have their families killed in front of them, the rest of the minimal, "cat and mouse" chase plot is insultingly stupid. Well-overused details that borrow twists all the way back to The Texas Chainsaw Massacre are here, just to make the film fail even as an interesting genre exercise.
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