Jaimie Alexander is a young woman trying to escape problems in her personal life, whose car breaks down in a small town in the American Midwest called Hope (ugh!). Seems the townsfolk are all a bit wary of outsiders, but she manages to make fast friends with another outsider, nosy reporter Hudson Leick, who is doing an exposé on a supposed town legend concerning a hellfire-and-damnation preacher (Nick Chinlund) who was fond of human sacrifices to appease the gods so they don’t ruin the town’s crops, and apparently the town is still haunted by his spectre. Needless to say Alexander finds herself in mortal danger soon enough, seemingly by a killer scarecrow. Alexander assumes it’s a guy in a mask, but who? Chloe Grace Moretz plays a young girl whom Alexander meets along the way, and Brian McNamara is the local sheriff who is one of the few helpful citizens in town.
“Rest Stop” star Jamie Alexander is the lead in yet another horror film, and this David Benullo (who also scripted) flick isn’t any better. It’s well-shot (nice scenery and cool low-angle shots reminiscent of “Psycho”) and has decent acting (Chinlund is spot-on as a fire-and-brimstone preacher gone to seed, and Ethan Phillips is well-cast as a pathetic, slimy priest too) but that’s about all. The plot resembles “The Wicker Man” (the original at any rate), to the point of being very close to a rip-off. The comparison isn’t favourable, as the film is transparent from moment one, and thus it plays out early with nowhere to go.
It has moments, and a terrific piece of music played over the opening credits by composer Neal Acree, a sort of mixture between Danny Elfman and Charles Bernstein. I particularly liked that Alexander’s character was smart enough to call a spade a bloody shovel and realise that the scarecrow menacing her was clearly just a guy in a costume, not some boogeyman supernatural force. This saves us from the ‘heroine trying to convince everyone she’s not crazy’ thing that is beyond a cliché. Unfortunately, looking at the scarecrow in question it appears to the audience that it IS just a guy in a mask, there’s something noticeably amateurish about the actor’s physical performance in the role that just stood out like a sore thumb. Kudos, though for that crow attack with better CGI than I would’ve expected for a low-budget. The shaky-cam for once actually helps here.
Whilst Alexander is better than usual (and more likeable than she was in “Rest Stop”) and evil-eyed Chinlund is excellent but underused, the best performance probably comes from McNamara as the local sheriff. Little Chloe Grace Moretz went on to bigger and better things in the next few years, and hopefully learned how to cry more convincingly on screen than she does here. “Xena” fans should note that Calisto herself, Hudson Leick makes a rare appearance here as a reporter, and is quite mannered in a rather expository role. She does look to have aged incredibly well, though.
OVERALL SUMMARY
It’s not awful, but certainly unoriginal and like a lot of horror movies these days, the back-story is the best thing in the damn film.
