Hatchet (Unrated Director's Cut)

What's good about this? The gore is fantastic. The problem with this movie is that it is such a throwback to the 80's, it belongs there. If this film was released 20 years ago, I have no doubt that it would now be referred to as a classic. In 2007, though, this film feels too much like 'we've seen it all before.' The humor soon dries up, the best lines having been used within the first 20 minutes, and we are left with some groan worthy dialogue, which far out ways the few funny lines that are in the rest of the film. And once we've seen one bloody murder, there are no surprises, as all the murders are pretty much the same but very gory.

Crowley himself is shown in his full glory pretty much the first time we meet him, and I couldn't help but feel that if he had been kept in the shadows a bit more he would have been a little scarier. As it is he looks like he has walked off of the set of 'Wrong Turn', a far more imaginative horror movie.

At the same time this film pays homage too many horror classics like many have stated on this site and the ending is a blatant rip off of one of these. I won't say which one, because I don't want to ruin what little surprises this film has.

Yes, I know this isn't supposed to be an intellectually challenging movie, but it is supposed to be fun. Joel Moore is an unlikely leading man and he just isn't the hero type. The rest of the cast aren't given a lot to do, and a couple of the ladies (including Mercedes McNab of 'Angel' fame) are there with no other purpose than to show their female parts and scream to the point you wish they would stop and get on with the film.

Overall there are enough jumps and laughs to keep it going for its extremely short run time (85 mins), but If you are a die hard horror fan, then you will have seen most horrors and will find the nostalgic feel of 'Hatchet' enjoyable, which it is in a mindless way. As for me, I just found the film a bit disappointing but the kills made up most of my grade.

Let's face it the one thing us horror fans look forward to is the actual 'gore' as one would put it. Hatchet
was the first and only movie other than JAWS that when I saw it made me say: I want this film. The storyline
is a bit shaky BUT the characters are done perfectly in accordance to typical horror movie personalities. You got the cool guy whose scared out of wits, the pretty girl who is actually a strong character, you have the dumb blonde who is actually realistically stupid compared to girls her age nowadays, the 'hero' who is an optimistic nerd, the bitch who goes after the blonde constantly, the sleezeball who doesn't really do anything, and the happy go lucky characters who dump their good natures and start screaming at everybody. The atmosphere of the movie is perfect. This movie is actually realistic when it comes to parts.

!!SPOILER ALERT!!
It's a crappy tour boat ride that no one really knows about going off into the swamp that's not advertised
and stuff goes down. The tour guide doesn't really know what he's doing. Right there even down in the parts
of the acting if you went on this boat for example would you expect anything less? Some would call it bad acting
but remember the 'funny parts' when the tour boat guy doesn't not what he's doing I find it adds to the movie as
appose to actually ruining it.

!!!SPOILER ENDED!!!

This type of movie is rare in this day and age. Low budget horror films are buried underneath the crap that's
spewed out today. The quality of horror films today has gone down so much it's ridiculous. Today I feel like I'm
watching a porno movie because there's usually just as much boobs and nudity in them. Hatchet was made in this same
era but it keep the nudity to a minimum. Add this one to your library and def check it out.

A cast of unknowns, a swampy abandoned bayou, a ruined house, buckets of gore, and a deformed backwater psycho. Classic horror, in other words.

And you have to admit, "Hatchet" never pretends to be anything it's not -- a horror movie in the classic slasher vein, with lots of blood and dismemberment. Adam Green doesn't do anything we haven't seen before, but he does it with such gleeful enjoyment. And gloriously satirical dialogue ("Your nipples are dumb!").

A bunch of guys are at Mardi Gras, enjoying the beer, beads and breasts. Ben (Joel Moore) is depressed about a recent breakup, so he decides to drag his pal Marcus (Deon Richmond) on a haunted boat trip. Since the main guides no longer do night tours, Ben and Marcus end up on a tiny boat with two dumb tourists, two softcore porn actresses, their "producer," and a mystery girl with a gun.

But then the newbie guide accidentally runs them into a rock, and they run afoul of gaters. And then Marybeth (Tamara Feldman) reveals the horrifying truth -- she's there to find her brother and father, who vanished in this same swamp. Supposedly it's haunted by the ghost of Victor Crowley, a horribly deformed boy who was accidentally killed by his father during a fire.

Of course, nobody buys this until a grotesque creature comes jumping out of the old Crowley house and hacks up the tourists with a hatchet. Terrified, the people go running through the woods, with Victor hot in pursuit -- and their only hope of escape is to get back to New Orleans. But how can they escape someone who cannot be killed?

Again, this has all been done before -- think "Halloween" meets "Friday the 13th," with dashes of other horror classics thrown in there. But you know, that's good -- Green is just trying to make a funny, gory, entertaining horror movie without pretensions. And no, the black guy and the slut are not the first ones to die (just for your info).

The first half of the movie is basically buildup and murky bayou atmosphere. Then Victor starts dismembering people, and from then on it's all about people running around shrieking, and getting killed off one by one. That would be a bit boring after awhile, but Green keeps it interesting by throwing in a few twists -- and the last scene will make you hide under your bed.

Along the way, we have ripped-off heads, chainsaw murders, buckets of gore, and lots of gruesome deaths shown in bloody detail. But to keep things from ever getting too serious, there's some bleak comedy (including Marcus' gradual fall from a tree). Most of it comes from the feuding porn girls ("Are you sure the number is 911?"), but there are some priceless lines from other characters ("He fell into the water... hit his head... and... SUED ME FOR NEGLIGENCE! That C***SUCKER!").

All the actors do nice solid jobs in their roles -- Moore is a likable nice guy who inexplicably keeps his head in a crisis, and Richmond is fun as the guy who REALLY didn't want to go on this. Feldman really rules the story as the feisty, grim love interest, but all the actors are good -- and Mercedes McNab and Joleigh Fioreavanti are a riot.

As for the bad guy? Well, Kane Hodder (aka Jason Vorhees) makes a wonderfully grotesque slasher villain, looking like an orc with a hunchback. Given his backstory, you'd feel sorry for the guy if he weren't trying to carve everyone into lunch meat. And note to horror geeks -- keep an eye out for Tony Todd/Candyman, playing a very POed "Reverend Zombie."

"Hatchet" is all unpretentious gore and dismemberment -- and hilarious love note to classic slasher horror. Funny, crazy, and not terribly complex.