Reeker

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Rating 3


Written and directed by Dave Payne

Starring Devon Gummersall, Tina Illman, Scott Whyte, Derek Richardson, Arielle Kebbel, Marcia Strassman, Michael Ironside and Eric Mabius


A bunch of college students car-pool to go to an annual party out in the desert near to Area 51. One of them, Trip (Scott Whyte), is being chased by his crazed drug dealer, Radford (Eric Mabius), something the others do not know. Trip has already made himself unpopular by playing a practical joke on Jack (Devon Gummersall), who is blind, and when the driver, Gretchen (Tina Illman, who was also one of the film’s producers), discovers he is carrying drugs she tells him to find another ride. She reluctantly agrees to drive him back to the gas station diner where they stopped earlier, only to discover the place has become mysteriously deserted, as is the motel next to it. When Tina’s car will no longer start and they are forced to stay there for the night, they are menaced by a force they cannot see, but they can certainly smell.

Everything about this film is clichéd, apart from the result. It bears some comparison to the 2006 remake of ‘The Hills Have Eyes’, although it is not as unpleasant as that film. The desert setting is effective and reminded me of the classic 1953 sci-fi film ‘It Came From Outer Space’. As soon as a lonely motel setting is introduced it is impossible not to think about ‘Psycho’. These are just three of numerous films that came to mind while I was watching.

It is derivative and it is also immensely silly. It has moments of gratuitous gore. One scene in particular, which takes place in a small wooden shack used as a lavatory, almost put me off the film altogether, largely because it veered too close to torture-porn territory, and while I got the intended comedy of the scene, I did not think it was remotely funny. In the end, though, this scene aside, there is just something very likeable about the film.

It works as a good-humoured homage to the films I have mentioned, and many others, rather than simply being derivative. The characters conform to hackneyed stereotypes, but work a good deal better than is often the case in this genre. For example, Trip might be a dumbass, but he is not actually dislikeable.

‘Reeker’ is no classic, but I rather enjoyed it. The film has an impressive and unexpected 67% fresh rating at Rotten Tomatoes, although it should be mentioned that only 12 reviews are counted, which perhaps skews the result somewhat. It was released direct to DVD in the US, following screenings at film festivals.

Its writer/directer Dave Payne made a sequel, ‘No Man’s Land: The Rise of Reeker’, in 2008.




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Cruel Intentions

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Rating 3


Directed by Roger Kumble

Written by Roger Kumble from the book Les Liaisons dangereuses by Pierre Choderlos de Laclos

Starring Ryan Phillippe, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Reese Witherspoon, Selma Blair, Joshua Jackson, Eric Mabius and Tara Reid


This is the film that good proportion of Sarah Michelle Gellar’s hardcore fanbase loves and the comparatively low box office gross can perhaps be explained in part by the fact that it was given an ‘R’ rating in America, making it largely inaccessible to a sizeable number of her fanbase at the time. Having said that, Gellar does have an erratic box office history, being best known for her lead role in the cult television series ‘Buffy the Vampire Slayer’, and the substantial success of the 2005 film ‘The Grudge’ was probably largely down to a fluke of timing.

‘Cruel Intentions’ is probably best known for the so-called lesbian kiss. I have always assumed this scene is included in the film primarily as a means to generate publicity and provide a bit of titillation. It was a very clever piece of tacky manipulation and it worked.

What do I think of the film? To be honest, I can never fully make my mind up about it. It’s a clever take on ‘Dangerous Liaisons’, although I’ve always found the final scene rather shockingly over-cooked. It’s perhaps a little bit too flashy and superficial for my liking, although I hardly fall within the demographic of its key target audience.

Gellar would subsequently be criticised by her detractors for her next project, ‘Harvard Man’, but ‘Cruel Intentions’ is undoubtedly a more ethically debatable film and I think the character she plays here is far more sexually provocative. Gellar’s performance certainly taps into her character’s loneliness and emptiness. There is a real sense that Kathryn feels she has been abandoned and is inwardly crying out for someone to genuinely love her. Although she is a dangerously manipulative sexual predator, she is also strangely childlike. Whether or not this is something that successfully comes across to many fans of the film is a moot point. Are they interested in Kathryn’s motivations for her actions or do they just enjoy watching her at her most maliciously scheming, something the film undoubtedly encourages?

It has, in the past, been noted that she is playing against type in ‘Cruel Intentions’, meaning that she is playing a character quite unlike Buffy. And yet there were tribulations to secure the ‘Buffy the Vampire Slayer’ role. The producers, so it has been said, had some qualms about Joss Whedon’s plans to hire her, arguing, amongst other things, that he would be casting her ‘against type’ because of her three-year role in the daytime soap opera ‘All My Children’; the scheming and malicious Kendall Hart.

‘Cruel Intentions’ received very disparate reviews. Some critics thought it utterly reprehensible and calculatingly tacky. Terry Lawson, writing in the Detroit Free Press, described it as “vile and vacuous.” John R McEwen of The Republican makes clear that his intense dislike of Gellar in ‘Simply Irresistible’ was no one-off (and maybe suggests that his antipathy has deeper roots than a simple criticism of her acting skills).

“I thought Gellar was bad in Simply Irresistible, but watching her make pastries is infinitely more enjoyable than squirming through her attempt at evil refinement. Apart from spreading her legs and opening her blouse, her portrayal of Kathryn contains nothing that is remotely impressive… The performances by Witherspoon and Blair are not terrible, but they can’t save the film from Gellar.”

Once again, though, the respected veteran film critic Roger Ebert was much more amenable to both the film and Gellar’s performance.

“The movie is at its best in the scenes between Gellar and Phillippe, who develop a convincing emotional charge, and whose wickedness seems to work as a sexual stimulant. There’s one scene where she persuades him, emotionally and physically, to do what she wants, and we are reminded that slow, subtle eroticism is after all possible in the movies - even though recently it has been replaced by callisthenics. Gellar is effective as a bright girl who knows exactly how to use her act as a tramp, and Phillippe seems cold and detached enough to make it interesting when he finally gets skewered by the arrow of true love. The best parts of the movie allow us to see how good it might all have been with a little more care...”
Roger Ebert: Chicago Sun Times



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Voodoo Moon

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Rating 2½


Written and directed by Kevin VanHook

Starring Eric Mabius, Charisma Carpenter, Rik Young, Jeffrey Combs, Dee Wallace and Geoffrey Lewis


Kevin VanHook, the writer, editor, producer and director of this zero-budget Sci-Fi Channel horror film, is a visual effects supervisor who has worked on films like ‘Miss Congeniality’ and ‘I Robot’. He is also a comic book artist and writer – I believe he wrote for the ‘Flash Gordon’ comic strip between 1992 and 1996.

‘Voodoo Moon’, released in 2005, stars Eric Mabius and Charisma Carpenter. Mabius is now best known for his role as Daniel Meade in ‘Ugly Betty’. Dee Wallace, famous from ‘ET’ and ‘The Howling’, is also amongst the cast and there is an appearance by Geoffrey Lewis – the father of Juliette Lewis and a one-time mainstay of various Clint Eastwood films.

It’s all about good versus evil, told with a hotch-potch stew of witchcraft, voodoo, religion and ancient prophecies. Think of a mix of ‘The Prophecy’ (without the Christopher Walken / Viggo Mortensen Smackdown) and ‘Supernatural’ you’re in the right ballpark.

The production values are on the cheap side, the script isn’t going to win any awards, and the acting leaves something to be desired at times. I’m not sure why the female nudity was necessary, apart from the obvious pandering to teenage male fantasies, but that aside it’s silly harmless fun that doesn’t try for the highbrow approach to these things. In other words, it doesn’t get caught in the trap of taking itself too seriously - something that snared ‘The Reaping’, as one example.

Mabius and Carpenter play brother and sister and get the vibe just right, although there is no real sense at all of the traumatic events of their childhood or of the world-ending threat they now face.

Charisma Carpenter is a likeable actor and this isn’t one of her “tiny bikini” roles (see ‘Charmed’ and ‘Veronica Mars’). Eric Mabius seems to be going for a mixture of Michael Hutchings, ‘The Crow’ and Spike from ‘Buffy the Vampire Slayer’. The evil they face comes in the form of a character played by Rik Young, an English actor who not only looks like Orlando Bloom’s twin brother, but also seems to have adopted an exact copy of his acting style, which is very weird.

It’s cheap and cheerful fun, but instantly forgettable.



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