- Directed by Harley Wallen
- Written by Bret Miller
- Stars Jamie Bernadette, Angelina Daniella Cama, Harley Wallen, Kaiti Wallen
- Run Time: 1 Hour, 37 Minutes
- Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l3ZZu7V79zo
Spoiler-Free Judgment Zone
The character actors in this one really make the movie. It’s got a good story that moves a little slow in places but gets the job done and has a nice climax. All in all, it was an entertaining indie.
Synopsis
A woman runs through a field at night. She flags down a truck on the road, and the driver kills her. Credits roll.
Lucas and Sarah Vanderbilt drive with goth daughter Cassie along for the ride. They stop at a diner. “Give me a waffle or something; whatever won’t give me e coli,” Cassie moans to the waitress. It’s not the most comfortable family trip. Cassie misses breaking beer bottles with her friend Tina. They arrive in Hadley Lake, Michigan, where Lucas is from. They’re staying at his brother’s house, but they soon find they have no cell service in the little town.
Sarah is Cassie’s new stepmother, and there’s a lot of friction between the two. Lucas reminds Sarah that Cassie’s doctor says it’s a big change for her, so they have to go easy. That evening, Cassie steals their car. Lucas wants to call the sheriff, but Sarah talks him out of it.
Cassie goes to the local bar, where a somewhat ominous old bartender named Louie says she’s too young to be there, but her ID says 21. A guy introduces himself, and she pulls a knife on him. She meets Tucker and Anna, who immediately noticed that Cassie’s not from around here. Cassie talks about urban exploring and haunted cemeteries; is there someplace they can go explore? Anna mentions the old McKinley house. Bad things happened there, and a weird brother and sister live there.
There’s a whole wall of missing persons, and some people think they all wound up in that house. Tucker thinks it might be safer if they all went. They slip open a window and go inside. There are lights inside, so why they don’t assume there’s someone in there is hard to imagine. They go down into the basement, and they really hate the smell down there. They find a camera that is full of torture and execution porn. They have been killing the missing people down there!
May and Clete McKinley return home. Anna and Tucker go back out the window, but Cassie is stuck inside. Cassie finds a bedroom with a decomposing body in the bed. May McKinley shoots Tucker in the arm, but they all get into the car and speed away. May says she has “marked them.” The sun comes up, and Cassie wants to call the police, but Tucker says no, the whole town could be in on it.
Cassie goes back to her parents’ house, and dad’s mad because there’s a bullet hole in the back window of the car. Lucas calls the sheriff to talk about the bullet hole. The sheriff tells Lucas to get a gun; “There are some tough types up here,” he warns. Cassie calls her friend Tina and tells her what happened last night. Lucas goes to town and buys a gun.
May and Clete talk about the break-in. She recognizes Tucker, and they say they’re gonna do something about that. Anna soon gets a call from Tucker, and he doesn’t sound good at all. He apologizes. She goes outside, and the McKinleys get her too. They both wake up chained to the wall in the basement. Clete wants to know who the other girl was, and Tucker eventually tells him. Clete and May are worried about their cousin Vinnie coming for them.
Cassie and Sarah argue, and Cassie runs off into the woods. Being from the city, she immediately gets lost. Clete and May are out there following her. Sarah confronts Lucas about the gun; she wants that thing out of their cabin.
Cassie flashes back to her time in Detroit with Tina. The cops almost caught her vandalizing the school, but then she stole the police car, and that didn’t go so well. Back in the present, the sheriff talks to Cassie about the other night; Tucker and Anna have gone missing. He gives her his card.
Cassie goes home to find Sarah beaten and tied to a chair. Clete grabs Cassie from behind. Meanwhile, May is outside playing William Tell with Lucas and an apple. Cassie tells Sarah what she found in the McKinley house. Cassie manages to call the sheriff and tells him they need help.
May and Clete argue about Lucas. Clete wants to get rid of him, but May says it’s not fair – he always gets the girls. It’s time that she had a man to use. May wins, and Lucas loses. Oh boy, does he lose. Outside, the sheriff arrives and has a conversation with Clete. “Remember what we talked about? No city folk!” Turns out, the sheriff is their cousin Vinnie, who is completely in on it. They argue, and May shoots the sheriff just before the sheriff shoots Clete. The sheriff doesn’t survive Clete and his ax.
When May goes inside, there’s a fight. May stabs Lucas and Sarah, but Cassie shoots May and runs away. Sarah is down, but they use Lucas as a living hostage. Clete cooks and eats some of the sheriff while Cassie backtracks and kills May. Cassie comes out of the woods and kills Clete.
Cassie and Lucas head home and find that Sarah isn’t dead. The three leave town at the first opportunity.
Commentary
May and Clete are fun villains. There’s definitely a bit of “Texas Chainsaw Massacre” and “Wrong Turn” mixed into their DNA.
Harley Wallen as Lucas has no idea how to deal with his daughter, and his new wife Sarah seems really uncomfortable in her new role as a stepmother – they both sell it well. Cassie seems a bit too old to play a sixteen-year-old, but that’s a small thing. Mason Heidger, who plays Tucker, really needs to be cast as Obi-wan Kenobi, since he’s nearly a clone of Ewan MacGregor.
The story itself is well done; the cinematography and sound design are decent, but it all feels a bit stretched out; cutting about ten minutes somewhere would have pepped things up nicely. Horror Guy Kevin says it needed more Mel.
It was a little slow, but everything came together in the end. We liked it!