Just finished watching this film and I must say, the only thing more frightening than how bad this movie was, is how many people on the message boards all across the Internet seem to love it, many going so far as to say it is a wonderful tribute to The Texas Chainsaw Massacre.   What?  Sure, there are some intelligent down to Earth horror fans who realized this movie was crap, ones who seem just as appalled as me on the message boards, but for the most part all the reviews are positive, which I really don’t understand.  Can people really like movies like this, or are they somehow involved in the promotion of the movie?  I’m hoping the latter because if people really do like this movie then Hollywood is going to keep making ones like it, and it is going to get even harder to find a decent horror flick.  

The movie starts out like most: four college kids -- two guys and two girls -- on their way to

some big event out in the middle of nowhere.  Right away viewers can get a taste of what they are in for by listening to the overly enthusiastic character dialogue and by watching the clothing on the girl in the front passenger seat (I almost went back after finishing the movie to see how many time her sweatshirt opened and closed all by itself during the conversation, but then realized that I didn’t want to add to the amount of time already wasted on this garbage).  Not long into this opening the group decides to stop for a hitchhiker who we later learn

is an Iraq War veteran who, surprise surprise, is traumatized by the war and doesn’t really want to live in conventional society anymore and has pretty much thrown himself at the mercy of the wind.  From there the group stops to get gas at a station run by a broken down woman who can barely hold it together (which in understandable given her situation) who has the classic creepy daughter that tells one of the main characters she doesn’t want to get to know him because he will die soon.  She also carries around a doll hanging from a noose, which I think was supposed to seem a little frightening, but really wasn’t.  The camera crew also liked to brighten her with a strange sort of glow whenever she spoke.  Anyway, the group eventually leaves the station and takes the route given to them by the lady, one which sees them nearly running over a half naked beaten down woman, and then almost being driven off the road by some lunatics in a van who were after her.  Thankfully our Iraq War veteran is packing a pistol and scares the creeps in the van away.  Unfortunately the van did some damage to the car during one of its many sideswipes, breaking the axel, making it so the group has to abandon it and find help on foot, which, of course, brings them to the ranch where terrible things happen.  

Now, I won’t go and claim that this is the worst movie I have ever seen -- I think that belongs to Dark Fields (2006) -- but I do have to ask how something like this makes it to the video store shelf.  Actually, I don’t really have to ask that because I think I have a pretty good idea.  My guess is that by the time the producers realize how bad a movie like this is they have already spent quite a bit of money on it, so rather than scraping it into the trash like they should, they spend a little bit more designing a great, eye catching cover, one that will trick horror fans into thinking this really is the next Texas Chainsaw Massacre or whatever other genera classic they are trying to capitalize on.  By the time the horror fan knows the truth it is too late, because, let’s face it, no one ever takes back an open DVD unless it was defective, and then you just get a replacement copy.  Making the situation ever worse, the movie was probably in the New Release section so the price was hirer than a normal DVD.