Once upon a time, I came across the moronic black comedy of the amateur Emon Hardiman “Vampires-Catholic”, which I deservedly lowered below the board. However, Hardiman did not disappear from the world of direct-to-video, but continued to shoot, made connections, improved, and then 5 years later he shot the slasher Pig Cut, which also has a lot of black humor, mainly in conversations, and which is difficult to call amateur, although he had a budget of only $ 3,000 (!). However, the lack of money (among the producers of the same poor student Chris Watson, the author of "Zombigeddon") did not prevent to invite the famous actress Ruby LaRoca to the main female role, as well as the cult actor from the Sam Raimi troupe Dan Hicks, who voices the robot here (!). If you ask where it came from, I will tell you: it was designed by one of the heroes, and it looks very funny, being collected from improvised funds. This robot is sexually anxious, rude and cynical - in general, worthy of the company of a bunch of overexcited students who decided to relax in nature, where by accident the pig cutter - a healthy child in a pig mask, killing literally everything that comes to hand.
What's even more amazing is that there are special effects, and they're not bad at all. The murders are bloody and are shown not after the fact, as befits budget-free films, but in all their glory, and the quality of the effects is clearly above average. And in general, I must say, if I did not give you a number, you would never think that the film was made literally on pure enthusiasm. Yes, there is a cheap figure and camera work is at a very low level, so sometimes it seems that they were removed from their hands, but the film has a very good thrash script, constantly presenting very good jokes (albeit diluted with stupid toilet humor). Also for the film, a good song is specially recorded, which plays against the background of the opening credits, to demonstrate documentary footage of the pig slaughter. And the role of a reporter reporting the bloody truth about the murders in the woods is played by Ford Austin - director (The Curse of Lizzie Borden (2006), Damer v. Gacy (2010), an actor who starred in both mainstream and microbudget films. Add to this that the level of production is much higher than the average amateur level, so you can only marvel at being given - as a director is not just talentless, but frankly poorly filmed, where during the editing did not remove the footage with a plague cat, playing with wires from the cinema equipment, and the frame constantly gets someone's paws and hears a shameful laugh (the sound was written directly on the set, and not in the studio, as professionals do) "Vampirsh Catholic" has evolved into the author of the "Pig cat, playing with wires from the average, because you do not know how to cover the sky for a long time, you know how to shoot a low one who knows how to look at the sky. The action, by the way, takes place in the 1980s, during the heyday of slashers as a subgenre of horror. Although the author mostly refers to and parody the cult of the 1970s “Texas Chainsaw Massacre”, sometimes even allowing paraphrases.
What else is worth noting - there is a lot of eroticism (albeit sometimes heroes, including again a robot (!), and manage to have sex in underwear), and the actors play not at the amateur level, albeit not too well (there are still microbudgets where the acting game is higher, at least in the same "Sweatshop production"). Ruby LaRoca, however, does not undress, although in other films she was not shy, showing her tattooed body in all its glory.
There is no atmosphere here, but there is good dynamics and in general the action is not monotonous, as we are used to in amateur films. Take at least the same murders, each of which is different from the other, and they are also executed with humor. The director only begins the massacre not gradually, but massively and quickly, but already towards the end (after the prologue, you will have to wait for almost an hour), but the long period does not seem boring at all, because the bulk of the jokes are concentrated here. Eamon Hardiman could not resist even appearing in “Pigs” as an actor, in the funny role of one of the sellers in the store, urging the youth to go to the possession of the maniac.
Summing up, it is worth saying that “Pig Cut” albeit unprofessional from a cinematic point of view, but shot with a soul and considerable humor slasher, which does not want to criticize much, because 89 minutes fly quite quickly, and you may even want to see the continuation (and there are already two of them, and one in 3D (!). I personally wanted to, and therefore I sincerely (albeit slightly overstated) give this almost budget-free slasher 7 points. We should watch Zombie Babies, the next comedy (and again almost budget-free) horror by Emon Hardiman, featuring the same actors.
7 out of 10