Ally's Review: Hatchet

This week’s choice was Hatchet, a film I hadn’t heard of before Clarky picked it. Let’s get it out of the way early – this is not a very good film. I guess it’s meant to be a nod to some of the great bogeymen of horror (which probably explains the cameos of the actors who played Freddy, Jason and the Candyman) and I am all for films to tip their hats in this way... but only if it works.

We’ve so far reviewed two of the Friday 13^th sequels and to most people these are not very good films either. In so many ways Hatchet is the 21^st Century equivalent of these movies, it’s equally silly, full of bad acting, violence, eye candy... and yet it’s just not very enjoyable. So what’s the difference? Maybe it just works better when you look at a film from an earlier decade, and you can enjoy the elements that make it feel so dated. Whatever the reason, this film just doesn’t feel like a patch on the films it was trying to pay homage to.

The characters are all annoying (but not in an endearing way). The guy from Grandma’s boy is not suitable for a lead role, and I have no idea what Freddy Rumsen from Mad Men is doing in this movie... surely some sort of horrible mistake on his part? It’s kind of set up as a mix of horror and comedy, but it’s not particularly scary or funny.

What about the bogeyman Victor Crowley? He’s actually okay. His story is pure Jason Vorhees. I thought some of his moments were actually pretty good and I definitely jumped once too. The creativity of his kills has to be admired (where did he get the electric sander from?!) I would definitely say that his character was the best thing about the film.

Overall though, this film just wasn’t good. It’s always an indictment at Horror Club if we start talking over a film, and that happened early on. I swear that we’ve actually watched some properly great movies at Horror Club over the years, we’ve just not reviewed many of them yet! Please bear with us, we’ll sort that out soon.

Incredibly, I read that there is actually a Hatchet 2 out there... which is difficult to fathom. Was there really a demand for the sequel? I guess if Adam Green really is trying to pay homage to Friday 13^th we can expect Hatchet 8: Crowley takes Atlanta in 2017.

Probably best to avoid this one. It’s nice to tip your hat to 80’s slasher movies, but you’re better off just watching the originals.