DVD Review: Wicked Lake
Wicked Lake (2008)
Studio: Shriek Show
DVD Release Date: October 7, 2008
Directed By: Zach Passero
Cast: Carlee Baker, Eryn Joslyn, Eve Mauro, Marc Senter, Robin Sydney
Review By: Marc Patterson
Wicked Lake hit my radar for two reasons and two alone. The first was the promise of a sickening amount of satisfying gore. The second was four hot chicks who in a highly publicized twist, would turn out to be the true sadistic killers. Sex, sleaze, gore? Hell yeah I’m in.
The story is a classic backwoods horror tale chronicling four said girls as they head out to a remote cabin for some partying and all sorts of kinky lesbian action. Along the way they attract the attention of a couple not so friendly groups of guys. When the guys show up to harass and rape the girls they find the tables turned on them in the most horrific of ways.
The film opens with an erotically shocking moment. One of our lead girls models nude for a group of college art kids. One of the students, Caleb (Marc Senter, who personifies a twitchy and even more awkward version of ‘ol George McFly) starts having some fantasies about the girl. When he snaps back into reality class ends. He waits around to walk the girl home and we are treated to an uncomfortable few moments where he eventually tries to touch the girls breast, before having his wildest dream cut short by one of the girls roommates. Not for nothing. Following this we watch the four girls as they make love to each other in the nude for about six minutes. Wow.
Caleb returns home empty handed to his abusive brothers who are as off kilter as he is. Eventually these boys will be headed out to the woods to visit our girls as they attempt to have their weekend of au naturale pleasures. The girls, on their way to the cabin stop for fuel and have a run in with some nasty perverted rednecks, who will also come into play later in the film.
Everything culminates when Caleb and his brothers arrive at the cabin and begin their mischief. But, when the clock strikes midnight the girls apparently get some sort of unexplained witchy superpowers, that we never really see. They begin their own devious games, which primarily include dispatching of anything that swings a dick between its legs in the most nasty of ways.
Okay, so did Wicked Lake deliver on those two little items that originally drove me to watch this? I’ll tell you yes on both accounts. But that yes doesn’t come without a bit of griping. The story was great. The girls were wonderful. The sexual overtones exuded the spirit of Franco and Rollins. The cast overall fit the billing. But, the pacing was fucked and the focus of the film was off. It unsuccessfully tried to be serious, humorous, a terse drama, and a bloody gore drenched feast of a film all at once. Yet throughout it couldn’t make up its mind on what kind of film it really wanted to be. Thanks to this little identity crisis any sense of timing or tension was unfortunately lost. I could live with this because on the most superficial level this was a highly entertaining film and when the final twenty minutes kicked in we were assaulted with a copious amount of nasty carnage and violence that easily made up for any of the shifts in voice or tone, or lack of a real story.
Acting wise the cast did a fine job. Caleb, played by Marc Senter was insanely hilarious to watch. Playing this dopey kid who spends most of the film pegged to the front door, having been skewered by the girls but never killed. The fact that he remained alive throughout added these offbeat laughs that occurred whenever anyone came or went from the house. While the total opposite of his character from The Lost Senter proves that he’s one talented sonovabitch with a nice range.
The soundtrack was fuckin’ phenomenal. I’ve been a longtime fan of Ministry and the covers played out here were top notch. But when you add Ministry to the hype of a film like this you ultimately set your audience up for something completely other than what they got. It would have been nice to see some
Because of the pacing, and the flip flop on voice, I have to give this only 3 out of 5 stars, or a C+ because this could have so easily been something better, but just somehow failed to deliver with a solid story. So long as you don’t go into it looking for too much beyond a sexy bloodbath then you should find Wicked Lake to be a wicked good time. Worth the rental.
Brutal As Hell Rating: 3 ½ out of 5
