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Crazy Eights (2006)
Wasted Potential Throughout
Directed By: James K. Jones
Starring: Dina Meyer, Traci Lords, George Newbern, & Frank Whaley
MPAA Rating: “R” (for violence, disturbing images, and language)
Starring: Dina Meyer, Traci Lords, George Newbern, & Frank Whaley
MPAA Rating: “R” (for violence, disturbing images, and language)
I cannot remember the last time a movie has made me this angry, not because of how bad it is necessarily but because of how good it should have been. It takes an intriguing concept, a solid cast, and a genuinely creepy atmosphere and flushes it down the toilet with a dreary pace, a dumb conclusion, and thoroughly lackluster thrills. Everything falls apart within the first thirty minutes and we, the very unfortunate audience, are merely watching the same jump scare over and over, waiting haplessly for an ending that does nothing to improve on anything we have just watched. Crazy Eights, released as part of the After Dark Horrorfest, lives up to the festival’s history of showing substandard films that no one wants to release and that no one wants to see.
After the death of a childhood friend, six adults, who have been close since their younger years, reunite for his funeral. Upon arrival at his home, they find a box which contains a map, directing them to the location of a time capsule they hid years earlier. When they find and open the time capsule, however, they find the decomposed body of a young girl hidden beneath all of their toys. Deciding to abandon the body (never a good idea in these kinds of movies), they happen upon an old, condemned house and, when one of them breaks his leg, they seek help down a darkened tunnel in the basement. This tunnel will not lead to safety, however...it will lead to an abandoned hospital, a place where they will all face unbearable secrets from their pasts as they begin to die one-by-one.
I am a huge fan of Dina Meyer and this is the second film from her that I reviewed for the purposes of this blog. Unfortunately, much like with Bats, she again proves to be a good actress trapped in crap and, this time, she is joined by Traci Lords, the porn-star-turned-actress, and Frank Whaley, an underappreciated actor in his own right. It’s infuriating to watch such a well-assembled and talented cast deliver solid performances in a movie that is continuously playing against them. Whenever it seems as though their performances alone may be able to save the movie from complete atrociousness, a ghastly hand grabs them, we cut to a shot of a door, and hear terrified screams from within. It’s just so humiliating to watch them flounder around, giving their bests for a film that is not worth the effort. Here is a movie that is dressed up like a good horror movie and yet written like one of Traci Lords’ porn tapes.
Crazy Eights abuses the privilege of being able to bang a loud noise out in order to terrify the audience because there is never a source to any of these sounds. For example, a character is looking eerily at the body of the young girl, a loud noise sounds for no apparent reason, and he quickly hurries away. Why? What was that sound? We may never know. The entire film is just a series of plot devices that are never explained and that never really make any sense. We can only wonder how a character could stumble down stairs and yet his entire leg would be mangled beyond belief, skinned ripped off and everything. What kind of stairs are they? Nothing makes any sense, but I am going to be slightly generous with my star rating simply because, even if the rest of the film is terrible, the cast is competent and well-selected.
After the death of a childhood friend, six adults, who have been close since their younger years, reunite for his funeral. Upon arrival at his home, they find a box which contains a map, directing them to the location of a time capsule they hid years earlier. When they find and open the time capsule, however, they find the decomposed body of a young girl hidden beneath all of their toys. Deciding to abandon the body (never a good idea in these kinds of movies), they happen upon an old, condemned house and, when one of them breaks his leg, they seek help down a darkened tunnel in the basement. This tunnel will not lead to safety, however...it will lead to an abandoned hospital, a place where they will all face unbearable secrets from their pasts as they begin to die one-by-one.
I am a huge fan of Dina Meyer and this is the second film from her that I reviewed for the purposes of this blog. Unfortunately, much like with Bats, she again proves to be a good actress trapped in crap and, this time, she is joined by Traci Lords, the porn-star-turned-actress, and Frank Whaley, an underappreciated actor in his own right. It’s infuriating to watch such a well-assembled and talented cast deliver solid performances in a movie that is continuously playing against them. Whenever it seems as though their performances alone may be able to save the movie from complete atrociousness, a ghastly hand grabs them, we cut to a shot of a door, and hear terrified screams from within. It’s just so humiliating to watch them flounder around, giving their bests for a film that is not worth the effort. Here is a movie that is dressed up like a good horror movie and yet written like one of Traci Lords’ porn tapes.
Crazy Eights abuses the privilege of being able to bang a loud noise out in order to terrify the audience because there is never a source to any of these sounds. For example, a character is looking eerily at the body of the young girl, a loud noise sounds for no apparent reason, and he quickly hurries away. Why? What was that sound? We may never know. The entire film is just a series of plot devices that are never explained and that never really make any sense. We can only wonder how a character could stumble down stairs and yet his entire leg would be mangled beyond belief, skinned ripped off and everything. What kind of stairs are they? Nothing makes any sense, but I am going to be slightly generous with my star rating simply because, even if the rest of the film is terrible, the cast is competent and well-selected.
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