More killing and less talking PLEASE!
The Killing of Jacob Marr (2010)
Directed By: Brad Rego
The Prologue
Have you ever came across a film that everyone you know seemed to really like but you just couldn’t get that into it? That movie for me in the year of 2011 seems to be, The Killing of Jacob Marr. A slasher of sorts, it’s an indie film that when there is blood, it’s really good. But ultimately I feel the majority of the film is spent just watching some friends talk, talk, talk, and talk some more. Now, I’ve always been a fan of witty dialogue in films, but for the most part this wasn’t what I’d call witty. But instead of me airing out my beef before the official part of this review begins allow me to at least say I was a fan of the films look. You can also tell the director was trying. But ultimately, I just wasn’t happy with the end results.
The Movie
Yeeears ago, Jacob finds some odd object while he’s supposed to be chopping wood. Looking like some sorta odd moon rock, the power this thing holds is never really covered but whatever it was it causes Jacob to snap. You see that night Jacobs uses that very same axe he was chopping wood with and he chops us his Mommy and Daddy. What the fall out of that is we never really know, but we flash forward years ahead and now a group of friends want to rent that very same house out for the weekend. If I have to tell you what comes next then obviously you’ve never seen a horror movie before in your life.
What you get here with this film, to put it short, is a film that needs a few things corrected. First off, I think this movie is far far too long. A good horror film of this nature needs to be an hour and a half or less. This one runs way passed that time and it needs to be cut down greatly. It’s like an hour and twenty minutes of talking and just about 15 minutes of real action. I know a lot of people I know seem to think the dialogue was soo well written that it makes up for all that, but I just don’t feel that’s the case. I really don’t need to spend large amounts of time hearing office talk, just chop someone up again already!!
Now giving the devil it’s due, this film does gore really well when it picks to do so. The few moments in this thing that things do get bloody was the few moments of this film where I really found myself being entertained. Body parts are torn off, blood splashes (and looks cool on the snowy setting), necks are cut, and it’s a lot of fun to see on the screen. But with all the dragging and talking it’s just not enough in those few moments to save this one. I really went into this one thinking I’d get a little more than QT-lite dialogue, I wanted some horror to go along with it. And it’s in that when we just don’t get enough to warrant anything really worthy of your time, well, besides the brief gore.
But the dragging out of this film wasn’t the only thing wrong with it unfortunately. The characters we have aren’t really anything besides douchebags. And when they do start dropping the wrong ones drop at the wrong times and thus kill anymore interest you might have in finishing the film. It kills the subplots in a rather underwhelming fashion. And if you were hanging on watching through all the talking it rewards you by taking out anyone who is a little bit interesting before it takes the rather bland(er) characters. When you top that all off with a very dull and predictable ending, you really are just left with a movie that only has a few gory moments in it worth seeing.
The Conclusion
I can tell the director was trying and I can respect that. I can tell that at parts he was going for something a little different than the norm and I can appreciate that. But the sad thing is, that for me at least, it didn’t work..at all. Too long, too bland, and too dull to justify my approval and recommendation to all of you. There’s some nice gore, that’s a very good part about it. But, there’s just nothing else here besides that.
The Rating (4.5/10)
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