Killing Brooke (2012)
Summary: Free-spirited Brooke and her
wife Chloe are celebrating their wedding when they meet Vance, a
handsome drifter. A drunken night of debauchery leads them down a
road to terror. Pursued by a vicious madman and a demented family,
Brooke is forced into a struggle for survival, one that will push her
to her limits both physically and emotionally. Brutal survivor
horror that evokes classics like I Spit On Your Grave and The Texas
Chainsaw Massacre.
Oh boy, here goes nothing. So this
starts off with a scene that chronologically takes place much later
in the movie. It introduces us to Brooke in a very vulnerable
position. Then we jump to the credits and move on to the official
start of the movie. We start with Brooke and Chloe's wedding. After
they get married, they go on their honeymoon which is apparently is
in the backwoods somewhere; because who wouldn't want to spend their
honeymoon in the backwoods. They spend their first night as a
married couple drinking and dancing in your run of the mill hole in
the wall bar. The clientele consists of them and about 6 guys who
looked like they haven't seen a woman in awhile. This made all the
more apparent at their screams of joy every time Brooke and Chloe
made out. This is where they meet Vance, who we already know at this
point likes to sleep with and then kill women. The most logical
place to go from here is a threesome; because again, I'm sure all
lesbians celebrate their first night as a married couple by inviting
a man into bed with them. The next morning Chloe is not happy about
everything that happened yet she still, unwillingly, gives Vance a
ride to the next town. When they appear to be lost, Vance makes a
comment that finally pushes Chloe over the edge and she tells him to
get out and walk. So he reaches into from seat and slices Chloe's
throat. Brooke gets out of the and runs. She runs to a house in the
middle of the woods where we meet the The Spade family. Dagget and
Darla, the husband and wife/brother and sister heads of the
household; and their dim witted brother Rory. The Spade's capture
Vance and Brooke and from there it's just a back and forth routine of
escape attempts, torture, and murder.
So there were 3 bright spots in this
movie. Alex Fandel (Brooke), Colin Allen (Vance), and Ray Hryb
(Dagget) actaully did a really good job. The script didn't really
give them much of a chance to excel but for what they had to work
with, I'd say they nailed it. Fandel was pretty convincing playing
someone who literally gets the crap beat out of her from beginning to
end. Allen, although a killer, was essentially the comic relief and
was pretty funny. Hyrb played what was probably my favorite
character, possibly because he reminded me of Bill Moseley's
character Otis Driftwood. He also had some of the most creative
insults and threats, he called Vance and Gerbil Dick and told Brooke
he was gonna cut out her uterus.
Unfortunately, despite the few things
that I liked, there were a lot more things I had problems with.
- Dina Baker (Chloe). She didn't have a huge role but she was a pretty complex character. Whenever she got worked up, she would get loud and rush her lines which led to her slurring a lot of words together making a good part of her dialogue to be unintelligible.
- Johnny Donaldson (Rory). While I'm sure the role was played fine, the character was annoying. It was explained early in the movie that his brain never finished developing. He doesn't talk, his whole dialogue is basically grunts and groans. Couple that with that fact that he spends most of the movie dawning some sort of mask, he is a blatant ripoff of Leatherface.
- Special Effects are severely lacking. I get that this isn't done by a big market studio. It's estimated budget was only about $5,000 so I wasn't expecting any state of the art effects. But when you have limited means, don't try to push the limit. Just do what is in your capability and leave it at that. 2 Characters in the movie had their throat slit and the blending on the prosthetic was horrible. You could clearly see where the prosthetic ended and the neck began. Anyone who does this kind of work should know how to blend and edge, it's not overly complicated. But if for some reason they can't get it to work, use a wide view for the shot. From 5-10 feet out, we can see the the throat was sliced but it's not zoomed in close enough to get a good view of it. But they chose to zoom in which made the application errors clear as day. Rory's death was just riddled with issues. He had this growth on his head that Vance squishes and pops which shoots a yellow puss across Rory's face. Problem is, when Vance moves his hand the growth is now flopping on Rory's head like a band aid and there is no puss or blood there. After the growth is popped, Vance jams his fingers into Rory's eyes. Originally, it wasn't great looking but it was atleast acceptable as Vance's thumbs were in the eye sockets and there was a slimy liquid all around his fingers so it distracted from the fact that nothing was actually happening. Problem is, when he it was done they zoomed back in on Rory's face and we could see that all the liquid is gone. And to depict the holes in his head, they just pained his eyes black. They could have just left the liquid in sockets, or better yet, don't show Rory again. We already knew what was happening.
- Lack of attention to detail. Minor mistakes that anyone can see and should have been noticed while shooting or editing. At one point, Brooke has a burlap sack around her head and Dagget hits her in the head ONCE with a plunger. Next time they show Brooke, the sack is covered in blood. That isn't even remotely close to what would happen. Shortly after that, Brooke is tied up in the shower and Darla runs in and slashes her with a box cutter which would be fine if it wasn't for the fact that the camera angle made it apparent that the wounds Darla was about to inflict with the cutter were already there before Darla go to Brooke. I started getting so frustrated with how apparent these things are that I started picking up the most insignificant of details and even they irritated me now. A man picks up Brooke at the end and is driving her in his truck. It is quiet. He picks up a cup and takes a sip. Except all he does is make that annoying slurping sound and then he puts the cup down and you can hear that it was empty cup. Really? Would it have been that hard to put something in that cup for him to drink? And why did that bother me so much?
I'm guessing I was bothered because
those who made this movie didn't care enough to catch/correct some of
these issues. I understand that every movie has mistakes in it, I'm
one of those guys likes to try to catch the mistakes. But I should
not be able to pick out so many mistakes on a movie that is barely
over an hour long. IF those making the movie didn't care enough to
put the attention in to make the movie, why should we as viewers want
to see it. If you're considering watching this, I would recommend
not even wasting your time.
reviewed by Bobby
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