Ah yes, my very first "official" post and very first movie review.  Well, I shouldn’t say first, I’ve done alot of mini-reviews as posts on message boards, but this is my first time as an actual "reviewer".  I should start off by saying that I like to keep things simple when I review.  Plot overview, DVD review, and my final thoughts should do the trick.  I can’t wait to look back on this months from now just to see if I’ve improved at all.  Anyway, here we go:

I first heard of this movie in August of 2006.  I was at a horror convention (nerdy, I know) in Cherry Hill, New Jersey (Monstermania, for those keeping track).  Prior to one of the seminars they had, they screened a few trailers, and Hatchet was one of them.  It promised a "Return to the slasher genre", and boasted it was "Old school American horror".  For people such as myself that are pretty much sick of modern day PG-13 horror shitfests, this seemed like a breath of fresh air.  The audience at the seminar was treated with a blood soaked trailer, and an introduction of quite possibly the newest franchise slasher villian, Victor Crowley.  Not surprisingly the crowd ate it up and even had them play the trailer twice.  Needless to say, alot of folks were buzzing about this Hatchet movie and were hoping that it would give the horror (and slasher) genre a much needed shot in the arm.

The Plot:

A group of young guys are down in New Orleans looking for some fun, when one of them (Ben) decides that titties and beer are a bit too overwhelming for him.  Ben convinces Marcus, another one of his buddies, to go to off on a few side streets and see if they can find some fun there.  Eventually they wind up on a make-shift swamp tour with two softcore porn actresses and the guy recording them, an older couple, a quiet girl, and a careless tour guide looking to make a buck.  Their boat winds up breaking down in the middle of the swamp, however this is no ordinary swamp.  This swamp is the home of Victor Crowley, a local legend and a deformed madman.  The folks on the tour start getting picked off by Crowley and the last remaining few are forced to fight for their lives.  Throw in some cameos from Robert "Freddy Krueger" Englund and Tony "Candyman" Todd and have the main villain played by Kane "Jason" Hodder and you’ve got a horror movie, but with some comedy thrown in. Pretty straight forward right?

The DVD:

•  Image
  • Unsurprisingly, Anchor Bay did a great job with this low budget film in the video department.  Presented in widescreen 1.78:1  8 out of 10

• Sound
  • A nice Dolby 5.1 soundtrack.  Nothing stands out as jaw dropping, but I can’t complain.  8 out of 10

• Extras
  • I actually enjoyed the Behind the Scenes features alot more than I thought I would.  8.5 out of 10

The Bottom Line:

After a year and a half of hype, does Hatchet live up to expectations?  I’d say yes, but not in a "return to old school horror" kind of way.  The humor was actually pretty effective, and the gore was top notch.  However, it didn’t resemble anything anything from the 80’s slasher genre craze, and was post-2000 horror all the way.  Not that thats a bad thing really, because there have been SOME gems in horror in the past few years.  With that being said, I give Hatchet:

8 out of 10

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