The indie slasher flick, Hatchet, got some crazy hype when it was making the film festival circuit and the teaser trailer certainly helped build that hype. I was eager to see it but then when the DVD showed up at Wal-Mart, I just shrugged my shoulders and kept on shoppin'. Then the lukewarm fan reviews started rolling in and I really put this one on the back burner. The other night, as I was going through my Netflix queue, I saw that Hatchet was available to watch online. I figured, "What the hell, let's do this!"
First thing I noticed was that stingy old Netflix only had the R-rated version. Sigh. What the fuck, dudes? I decided to just deal with it and if I really loved the flick, I'd pick up the dang unrated version somewhere. Anyway, to make a long story short (too late), Hatchet falls somewhere between the hype and the lukewarm reviews. I liked all of the characters, the gore (even in its trimmed form), the fast pace, and the swamp setting. I don't think that Victor Crowley (played by Kane Hodder) will become the next horror icon or anything but he certainly is an impressive baddie. So I say walk but don't run to check this one out.
I liked it, too. Have seen it twice and it's good enough to enjoy. Slasher/killing fun, nothing more, nothing less.
ReplyDeleteI watched this movie instantly at Netflix, too, and reviewed it on my blog. Although I went in with low expectations, I was quite pleasantly surprised with it. I'm looking forward to the impending sequel more and more.
ReplyDelete--J/Metro
I just watched this yesterday and thought I'd take a look if you wrote about it. And I pretty much agree. The practical FX are much appreciated (and awesome), but other than that I couldn't get into it. The characters are ok, but way too one-dimensional, and I hated the killer. He looked laughable. Only worse was the 'comedy.' If you want to bring comedy to a horror film (or any other genre) it really has to be very good for the mix to work. And it certainly didn't here. It's a nice idea by folks who obvioulsy love the genre, and there are many worse low-budgets affairs, but I found Hatchet only mildly entertaining.
ReplyDelete-MLP