Thursday, January 27, 2011

I Spit on Your Grave (2010)

Directed by:  Steven Monroe
Written by:  Meir Zarchi (original), Stuart Morse
Starring:  Sarah Butler, Jeff Branson, Andrew Howard


"Oh, no you didn't!"
(2010 Version)
It has been a slow few months for Splatter Films.  Winter is in full swing and good movies are hard to come by, especially good horror movies.  So instead of waiting for a good one, I just watched a few time-killers, hoping to be surprised.  One of which was I Spit on Your Grave, a remake of the 1978 version with the same name.  There was a little buzz surrounding it, since the original was very controversial for its time.  I figured I’d give it a shot, since it had an appealing poster, and an IMDb rating higher than 6 (eliminating my other viewing option, Chain Letter).  While I’m sure I made a better choice, but I’d recommend choosing ‘none of the above.’

As with most movies, I try not to read up about it too much, since plot descriptions and reviews tend to spoil the movie and ruin the experience.  From my experience, movies are almost always better with no expectations.  Unfortunately, this movie could not be saved no matter how much I knew about it.

Let me enlighten you with the lovely plot details.  We are introduced to a young lady named Jennifer Hills (Sarah Butler) who is driving to a cabin in the middle of the woods to write her next novel.  I'm not sure if they actually gave a reason why she chose this particular town to stay in, but it turned out to be a bad choice.  After wearing as many skimpy outfits as she possibly can in a few days time, the local troublemakers decide to have some fun with the lonesome city girl.  The hoodlums, led by Johnny (Jeff Branson) and dirty Sheriff Storch (Andrew Howard), harass her for a while and then end up raping her repeatedly.  Before they can kill her and get rid of the evidence, she manages to escape down the river and comes back to exact her revenge.

While the first half reminded me much of The Last House on the Left, the second half just turns into Hostel with torture porn shots coming one after the other.  Jennifer's character wasn't developed enough in the beginning to justify making her revenge plausible.  From all we know, she just likes to jog, write novels, play with her cell phone, and drink wine... but I guess she also dabbles in torture.  She single-handedly manages to turn the tables on each of the 5 people who raped her, using everything from Lye, fishing hooks, pulleys, hedge clippers, and a shotgun to replicate each rapists personality trait.  Either she's secretly a psychopath, who just let the people overpower her at first just to think they've gotten the upper hand, or she just watches too many horror movies.  Either way, I wasn't buying it.

The kills are decent, since they are semi creative and extremely painful looking.  There isn't a ton of blood in it, but enough to satisfy a few gore hounds.  The acting was decent, some parts are a little shaky, but overall not a bad job.  Andrew Howard probably did the best job playing the dirtbag Sheriff, but Sarah Butler and Jeff Branson were decent as well.  One of the actors went full retard for his part, which never bodes well, and adds little to the movie.  All in all, the production value wasn't terrible, but the editing and script were sub-par, even for a horror movie.

In conclusion, this movie is not worth seeing.  Many people will immediately be put off by the graphic rape scene(s), and the climax (no pun intended) just isn't worth sticking around for.  It is just so distractingly unbelievable that a girl like Jennifer can think of these elaborate schemes and traps, days after being physically and mentally tortured.  There are just way too many gaping plot holes in I Spit on Your Grave.  Even putting this aside, the movie just doesn't have enough substance to merit a viewing.  And for those of you wondering, there is no spitting on anyone's grave the entire film.  They couldn't even get the title right.


Total Score:  3/10
Buckets:  2/5