The unsinkable (it is rightfully famous for its longevity) studio "Troma" has a list of truly fascinating low-budget creations. They are distinguished by brightness, originality, surprise, courage, protest against predictable cinema, and unique amateur charm. This Mick Cribben film is one of these films, a studio of independent works with an undisguised emphasis on direct cheapness.
Why does the movie stand out among others?
For the courage to sculpt your product in the hooligan key of the created plot. The initial plot is not new and secondary. Judge for yourself: in a provincial American one-storey town comes a familiar family with a father, mother and a small daughter, where he will live. Soon, the locals will be touched by a terrible fate - in the forests lives a semi-wild mischievous tribe of children, which played without the supervision of adults in a special fun... cruelly kill with garden and kitchen equipment all the people you meet! This is what the story is based on. And even for the late 80s similar films came out a lot, especially on hearing the majority of the screen adaptation of Stephen King (Stephen King) “Children of the Corn” with numerous sequels. Actually, the director exactly steps on the recognizable rails of someone else's idea, only eliminating mysticism, simply creating children laughing small monsters, not familiar with the principles of morality or remorse. For them it is only a game: lure into a death trap, swing a sharp braid, throw stones, or simply cut the throat.
But wait, it is no coincidence that the film can be classified as a bold representative of thrash. Its creator at one point as if snapping his fingers, and the narrative is turned upside down. This tipping point will be the turn, when grown-up frightened residents at once think ... to declare an uncompromising war on children playing killers! And the viewer literally falls off the chair, seeing the play on the worn-out clichés of the plot, where in the most frank manner savouring every provocative frame of young children cruelly destroy the brutal parents. Here you need to pay tribute to the people responsible for makeup and prop, which allowed juicy soak young actors in red syrup and give memorable slightly naive shots of murders of the “flowers of life”. For a picture with such a low budget, this component is executed at a decent level.
Thus, it turns out that such a plot zigzag is very difficult to find anywhere else. Director Mick Cribben gave a memorable sample of such an independent product that can surprise even the experienced viewer of all kinds of thrash. However, it is quite clear that, unfortunately, the tape is unfamiliar to most fans of the original “movie junk” because of the bearish service to be simultaneously something bright, but incredibly provocative, not allowing frequent demonstration on television screens. But it was worth it, and all the shots of the one-sided skirmish of adults with children who played, will be a demonstration of the primary super-task of thrash: to make a movie that will not hold any rental studio with any imposed frame or meter. With the exception of the hooligan "Troma" - the savior of many non-standard works, devoid of clear budget injections, but with more than a desire to create a unique and unusual.
Of course, the film is not ideal in the artistic facet: amateur actors, naive cinematography (director part-time) with frequent direct hits on the very faces, a predictable investigation of the sheriff’s mystery with an obvious clue, simple monosyllabic dialogues, barely holding back children’s laughter in moments of their screen deaths, anecdotal (on the scale of “big cinema”) visualization, and a long beginning. For simplicity in general, I would characterize the work - in the best traditions of the patronage of Lloyd Kaufman (Lloyd Kaufman), by the way, who, out of frequent habit, will again hold an introductory acquaintance before the show in an unchanged bow tie and microphone, providing the prologue with some interesting moments and his funny jokes.
As a result, you can advise to view this sharp opus about a straightforward bloody solution to the problem of fathers and children not in favor of the latter, but not all in a row, but only collectors of thrash with experience, not afraid of a low budget. I think that the gourmets of “bad cinema” will not get a certain pleasure from such an ambiguous production will be difficult.
6 out of 10