Cabin
Fever
The ads
for Cabin Fever quote Peter Jackson as saying, "Horror
fans have been waiting for years for a movie like Cabin
Fever." One can't argue with that statement; one can also
say "Identity has lots
of plot twists," but that doesn't really say much.
One might
recall that the last time this kind of celebrity review strategy
was used was with Cameron and Raimi's quotes on the awful
Frailty. This isn't to
say Cabin Fever is bad, and indeed horror fans have
been clamoring for a film like it for years, but it isn't
the second coming it's billed to be.
The story
puts five recent college graduates in the woods where strange
things are afoot. Karen (Jordan Ladd) is the good girl whom
Paul (Rider Strong) has a pant load of rigid for. Marcy (Cerina
Vincent) and Jeff (Joey Kern) are a couple of superficial
fuckbunnies, and Bert (James DeBello) is a borderline psychopath
with an IQ slightly below his BAC. Some of the assorted threats
include an X-Games reject with a vicious dog, rednecks with
a vicious idiot child, and a hobo with a viscous secret.
To explain
much more plotwise for a picture like this is just beefing
one in the elevator. It'll make me smirk a little, but no
one's gonna enjoy even the simplest ride. Director Eli Roth
caused quite a stir at the 2002 Toronto International Film
Festival with this flick and a bidding war ensued. Lion's
Gate may have been caught up in the hype when they dropped
a whole lotta krill on it and they are looking to buy it back
with a bigger ad budget than the first Bud Bowl. Again, not
to say the picture is bad, it's just not worth all the hoopla
that it's stirred up.
Roth starts
with a creepy title sequence with the screen slowly scabbing
over, hopefully signaling the return of gore to American genre
filmmaking. Some of the photography is incredible, and more
than a few shots echo Jarmusch's visionary Dead Man
with one truly great moment when a spear actually becomes
part of the forest of odd looking trees. Roth also does Hitchcock
proud with a sequence featuring a glass of water in the role
of the proverbial bomb under the seat.
The gore
comes as some of the grisliest stomach-churning effects we've
seen on the big screen in a long time. The two stand-out gore
pieces are some vile handprints and a shaving sequence that
could inadvertently usher in a lack of grooming trend that
would be felt everywhere in the country except Berkeley.
If you're
stoked for everything I've mentioned so far, close your browser
now, and head for the theater, because this is something that
must either be seen with a riled up opening weekend crowd
or at home during inclement weather. The rest of you won't
go even if I promised free hot dogs and balloons, so I don't
feel bad telling you that you aren't missing much.
The stand-out
performer is Joey Kern, who pounds out his second pearls before
swine turn after this year's Grind. Like they say,
"This kid is going places."
The rest
of the cast ranges from weak to bad. Rider Strong never gets
out of sitcom gear and although the others in the core gang
throw themselves into it, they just don't have the chops to
pull it off.
At least
the leading cast tries to ground their roles in a slightly
heightened reality. The supporting cast couldn't be more over
the top without armwrestling Sly. The two lowlights are the
local oddity (Robert Harris) who is a lock for the lead in
the upcoming Off-Off Broadway hit "Denver Pyle: Fat, Aging
Theater Queen" and Roth himself as a Ben Stiller character
that was thankfully left out of the 1998 VMAs.
 While
there are a few strong sequences, the script as a whole is
an unfocused mess because it lacks any real antagonist. From
Romero's zombie pictures, we know that the true threat is
ourselves, not what is outside, and Roth certainly plays that
tune well.
When everything
is self-contained, our quintet stranded and strained, it overcomes
and even enhances the cast, but then a whole lot of outside
threads get mixed in. Most of these plots wander into our
camp and some even wander back to try to patch up the plot
problems. With such interesting material, one shouldn't have
to resort to pissed off tertiary characters chasing our leads
through the brush. The tension is lost as the focus gets scattered.
Roth has
proclaimed that Cabin Fever is an attempt to return
to the salad days of horror exploitation pictures. For this
he is to be commended; hell, for this he should be knighted,
the intention alone is better than anything Sir Elton has
inflicted on us.
The problem
comes with the execution. While neither Night of the Living
Dead nor Last
House on the Left is a polished gem, they both have
the good sense to keep a small picture small. They are compact,
sleek little scripts working with an economy of characters
to match their budgets. Had the cast of characters been pared
down to seven, with two of those kept to the fringes of the
story, this material had the potential to do more damage to
the rural vacation industry than Deliverance -and to
cause a nationwide spike in antibacterial soap sales.
There's
a good time to be had by genre fans, and even the potential
to convert and culture a few who think that The Sixth Sense
is the scariest movie ever made. The concern is that the newcomers
to the genre won't realize it can be so much more. For those
of you who see this, and it tickles your gristle bone in a
way you didn't know necrotizing flesh could, run out and get
to know George Romero, Tobe Hooper, and Dario Argento.
In the
end, Cabin Fever does more right than wrong and it
might even resuscitate the small horror flick and start to
spell the end of the super-horror films of the mainstream.
Rating:
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