Thursday, March 22, 2018

Massacre In The Woods.

1 minute into the movie and 3 men already get their necks slit by an escaped psycho. Oh, how cruel life can be.

Manuel (Julio Bracho) and his friends head out to his father’s cabin for the weekend to celebrate his birthday. As Manuel & friends settle in the cabin, he remembers his father being completely awful to him, his mom & his sister. Despite the awful memories, Manuel tries to enjoy his birthday weekend, but then he gets a really bad temper when he remembers of those old times, so that of course causes a ruckus. The local forest ranger (Miguel Angel Rodriguez) finds an abandoned car near Manuel’s cabin and inside the car is the razor that the escaped psycho from the opening scene had used. Clearly the maniac is on the loose in the woods and not far from the young people! You know what that means!

It’s been a while since I’ve watched a Mexican slasher and does Masacre En El Bosque (aka "Massacre In The Woods") deliver the expectations? It pretty much does. It’s simple and gets to the point. A lot of character development too surprisingly. Clearly the filmmakers were taking this movie serious and actually went through with what the movie is supposed to be about. It’s not exactly a scary movie, but the movie does build up plenty of suspense & mystery.

While we’re aware a psycho is on the loose, there is however something much more going on in those damn woods. We meet an unseen & tattered woman in the beginning of the movie being abused and fed like an animal by an unseen person. It’s a bizarre scene for sure and quite intriguing and clearly this is leading up to something great. The kills in the movie were surprisingly decent & quite brutal since we get to see people’s necks slit, an axe to the head, someone beaten hard with shovels and of course some knife stabs to the face. Blood splattering happens of course. Quite a lot of blood too I must say.

The more I think about Masacre En El Bosque, the more I really like it. It's a nice little slasher gem that doesn’t bore and it is entertaining from beginning to end. Interesting characters, interesting plot and great setting. A must watch for slasher fans.