Frayed (I) (2007) User Reviews (35)

High Quality DVD rental

[lefreke01 · 5/10 · 21 October 2007]

I saw this at the Screamfest in Hollywood on October 18 2007. Finding out after viewing this movie that it was made on a shoestring budget with newcomer actors in Seattle, Washington, I have to give makers of this film some props. The setups are top notch, the lighting and visuals are on par with much of what Hollywood even puts out for horror. Some of the actors in the film showed quality also. There is a pitch perfect scene involving a character in the back of a pick-up truck. Everyone involved seemed to be into making a good movie.

All that being said, there were a lot of problems with the film. The makers said that the film didn't have a distributor yet, and I think when they do get one (and I'm sure that will be real soon) the distributor will have them trim some of the fat. and there is a good bit of fat to be trimmed. There was some unnecessary scenes of people talking to each other on cell phones, relating things we already knew.

They say they pay homage to 'Halloween'(the original); that's great and all, but there is a difference between homage and heavily borrowing...They didn't list 'Haute Tension', 'Identity', 'Silence of the Lambs' either and there was definitely some lending from those films as well.

If there was a grade for suspense alone this film would get a 9 in my book. If you come looking for a bloody/gory movie, this is not your flick. If you loved the first Halloween you will very likely dig this movie.

When I think of all the crap horror films that go straight to DVD, if I stumbled upon this flick I think I would be pleasantly surprised.

You did this to me!

[lastliberal-853-253708 · 6/10 · 2 April 2011]

I wondered just how much gore and blood this film would contain after I watched the opening where a woman gets beaten in the face with a baseball bat. Over and over and over, the hitting continued past what I would consider dead.

Is this film going to be "over the top"? No problem there. It was more suspense than actual blood and gore. It was a chase to catch an escaped mental patient before he could kill the Sheriff's daughter.

For a low budget film made with inexperienced actors, it was really good. Kept you guessing to the very end, and beyond. What really did happen?

Enjoyable, Yet Still Confusing and Derivative

[gavin6942 · 6/10 · 20 September 2009]

A sheriff's wife is murdered by his young son. Years later, that son escapes from a mental institution and goes berserk, beginning a killing spree of those who cross his path, including the family who left him behind.

There are many good aspects and many bad aspects to this film. Let's start with the good. The film quality was excellent, and I felt everything was put together very professionally, especially for a cast and crew of unknowns. This certainly has the ability to cut it as an After Dark Horrorfest film. The gore was also nicely done, with the mother's early murder being much more graphic than I expected.

But let's focus on the bad now... the things that are going to eat at me every time I think about this film. Some of these were summed up by other reviewers, so I'm glad they noticed the same things I did. First and foremost, the similarities between this film and "Halloween" and "High Tension". Especially "Halloween": a killer child who escapes from a mental institute to go after his now much older sister? Hmmmm...

The over-use of the clip showing Kurt looking at the softball photo. I understand that this plays an important part later on, but I didn't need to see it five or six times to grasp the concept. And the mask that seems like it was borrowed from the band Slipknot. Many horror movies use masks, but this was the first that made me think of Slipknot, so I have to think it wasn't an accident.

Beyond that, the plot is largely nonsense. The film has twists and turns, which is good, but probably has too many. I was particularly bothered by what seemed like a few fake endings. As always, I don't want to spoil the film, but let's just say this: the writers should have picked a story and told it, not tried to have so many stories within each other like a Russian nesting doll.

As this film is still better than many I've seen, I wouldn't say you should avoid it. Grab a friend and a few bottles of Labatt Blue and this will make for a fine evening. But don't blame me if you get frustrated or confused. I warned you.

The Beginning And The End...

[azathothpwiggins · 18 January 2022]

FRAYED is a psychological horror film with an introductory "home movie" segment that can only be described as gruesomely extreme.

This is the story of Kurt Baker, a seriously disturbed young man, and his entry into adulthood. We're taken on a whirlwind adventure filled with insanity and murder, ultimately learning the shocking truth behind Kurt's condition.

Or do we?

The ending is as surprising as it is genuinely disturbing. A unique take on a well-worn sub-genre...

Go watch High Tension instead

[SJinSeaTac · 2/10 · 15 October 2009]

Okay, so I feel obligated to warn people about this movie ONLY because there are so many "positive" reviews about this film.

Plot: Child kills mom, gets locked up in asylum for many years, later escapes when they are going to transfer him to another institution, tries to kill everyone and his sister....Halloween, right? Wrong!

MAJOR Spoilers AHEAD:

If your idea of a good time is figuring out the beginning, middle, and end of a movie, see this. From the opening scene, when the kid is sitting on the bed....when you never actually SEE him beating his mother to death, you will know who did it because NO OTHER OPTION for who could have killed her besides the FATHER are introduced. Its all too convenient of a plot device.

When you see "someone's" foot sticking out of the bushes near the asylum at the start of the movie, and THEN an hour later you are being told who's dead body it is, and THEN you have to watch another 20 minutes of BAD ACTING as the movie continues, as if the audience is absolutely clueless......all I can say is whatever.

The director's obviously thought their double-twist at the ending was good enough to make-up for BAAAAD and laughable acting throughout this film, and a complete lack of suspense since you can see the first "twist" coming a MILE AWAY. Right from when "Gary" the security guard is in the car at the beginning and the driver says, "But, there wasn't anyone out there, I saw. I saw there wasn't anyone there". Maybe because...THERE WASN'T ANYONE OUT THERE!!

And for everyone else who is thinking this looks good, the second twist reveals that it is all in the escaped son's head, that he has been lying at the edge of the road THE ENTIRE TIME, that he never killed anyone, he just "imagined" killing everyone before his pedophile cop-father kills him to silence him, later to just to head home to his real family and molest his other son....SICK.

The ending is a PRANK, a GIMMICK, to make you squirm, and also tells you that everything you just watched NEVER HAPPENED. Congratulations audience, you just wasted you time watching nothing. Now child molestation is horrific, yes, and I am sure that the directors and all of their script writers (all FIVE of them) used the "life is scarier than a slasher killer" angle when selling this movie and its "ending" to the studio who financed and distributed it, but come ON! You have to sit through all of this to find out its 1) not real 2) the pedophile father gets away with it and 3) BAAAD acting.

Watch "High Tension" instead, or again if you have already seen it. At least it moves along faster and doesn't completely cheat you in the end.

Scary, Effective Slasher

[rentboy828 · 7/10 · 25 February 2008]

I saw this film at Nevermore Film Festival in Durham, NC, and I have to admit I was impressed. There were several moments of genuine terror that are lacking in most modern slasher films. The acting is strong, and the story is compelling. The writers/directors manage to create fear without resorting to graphic murders. My one complaint is that (SPOILER) the writers tack on two twist endings, one of which has been used in nearly every recent horror film I've seen. Despite this minor misstep, I completely enjoyed this throwback to the classic slasher flicks like "Halloween."

Check out "Frayed"if it shows at a nearby film festival. If not, the producers said that they are in negotiation with a major DVD label for a 2008 release.

It took five writers to rip off ********!!!!! (Major Spoilers ahead!)

[jpuck81 · 1/10 · 14 November 2009]

I was really looking forward to this movie. I LOVE low-budget horror movies, especially when they're done well. I even appreciate low-brow horror movies that pay some kind of tribute or homage to other past films of their ilk. But after watching this, I'm just baffled how ANYONE could like this! I never take the time out to write reviews here on IMDb because I think--since everyone has different tastes--why not everyone just see it for themselves and make their own decisions? Support low-budget film-making, that's my motto. But this movie is just a travesty! I mean, come on! Did it REALLY take five screenwriters to write a movie that's deepest moments of character development are made up of farts and vagina jokes? Look, people...I DON'T buy daddy was a child molester--NOTHING in the film earlier indicates that such was ever the case. You can't just force it down our throats at the last second to twist the plot further. And worst of all, the ending may SEEM clever to those who aren't aware, but any educated genre vet will know that the twist in this film is BLATANTLY and SHAMELESSLY ripped off of Alexandre Aja's superior French masterpiece "High Tension." And once again, can I just reiterate it supposedly took five screenwriters to write this???? Seriously, filmmakers. There's still so many wonderful ideas to be had, even in this well-trodden sub-genre. Don't steal an idea and call it your own. What a convoluted mess. ALMOST as terrible as Rob Zombie's remake of "Halloween." Man, I never thought I'd say that. Sad.

If they only avoided this...

[dravenvox · 7/10 · 16 June 2009]

The film was above average. I chose to mark this comment as "spoiled," though my beef with this occurs in the first 10 minutes of the film, so I don't really consider anything herein spoiled considering it reveals almost nothing at all.

The plot was pretty solid, though slow paced. Decent acting and script. Believable characters always make for a good time. But...

The DID diagnosis in the first 10 minutes killed the rest of the movie. And the subsequent 80 minutes was a long time to wait for a reveal. As soon as that was brought up the bells and whistles were screeching at a deafening level. The film would have been much more effective with a looser/lamer diagnosis. If he was disturbed or confused or withdrawn I would have been slightly more thrown off as to whether my guesses were correct or not. But, as it stands, the film became more of a waiting game than a truly engrossing horror flick.

That being said, the first and last 10 minutes of the film are real asskickers. Both are sudden, shocking, and what I found to be rather unexpected. The middle 80 are slow, but entertaining and deliver some really good moments.

Just don't telegraph the ending at the beginning. It's a real letdown and very distracting to what would otherwise be an exceptionally enjoyable and immersing movie-watching experience.

But it was a pretty sweet ride nonetheless.

Tries to be far too clever for it's own good.

[poolandrews · 3/10 · 19 August 2010]

Frayed is set in a small town near Washington called Yellow Glenn where teenager Sara Baker (Alena Dashiell) & her friend Veronica (Tascha Smith-Floe) head out into the woods to meet up with their boyfriends & party the night away. Meanwhile Sara's father Sheriff Pat Baker (Tony Doupe) has to face up to the fact that his homicidal son Kurt is being transfered from the local mental institution to a larger one in the city, however Baker receives a call that Kurt has escaped & one security guard is dead with another one missing. The local police under Sheriff Baker begin a search but soon find a trail of dead bodies that lead them to Sheriff Baker's house where his wife & daughter are being paid a visit by his killer son...

Co-written, co-produced & directed by the duo of Norbert Caoili who is also credited with the music & editing & Rob Portman who himself also gets a stunt double credit(!) this horror thriller starts out like a Halloween (1978) clone but quickly turns into a mess of ideas that never come together. The script tries to be far too clever & offers up lots of silly twists which range from predictable (the security guard not being who he claimed, I mean that foot in the bushes at the hospital grounds had to belong to someone, right?) to mildly effective (the twist about who really killed Kurt's mother was reasonable but even then though the motivation behind it was baffling, OK sure the guy is a paedophile but Kurt's mother never actually saw anything so why kill her? Why not lie? What made him think Kurt would say he had been raped by his own father yet not mention the small matter his own father murdered his mother in front of him?) to the absolutely ridiculous (the end totally pulls the rug from under the audience's feet & basically says the crap you have just sat through for almost two hours was completely made up by some nutter & none of it meant anything as it didn't actually happen & was made up) & with several of these ever increasingly annoying twists coming during the last ten minutes it becomes quite frustrating to watch & put everything together in a coherent way. The other big problem with Frayed is the pacing, at one hour & fifty minutes long it drags badly & not enough happens. The script tries to juggle teen parent problems, the relationship between the Sheriff & his new wife, the search for Kurt & a security guards wandering around looking like his dazed. None of it is very engaging & as I said it's just far too slow & uneventful.

There really isn't much in the way of horror here, the body count is low & apart from Kurt's mother getting her head bashed in at the start all the kills are off-screen. Ouch. Forget about any decent blood or gore as there isn't any & there's no nudity either. The comparison's between Frayed & Halloween are there to see, a boy murdering a family member, the boy put away in a mental institute, the boy escaping & heading home to pay his old family a visit & murder a few people along the way. While Frayed ultimately goes in a different direction the two films are similar but while Halloween is a classic Frayed definitely isn't & never will be.The opening sequence shot through the point of view of a camcorder is quite effective but it's shame about the rest of the film I suppose.

Filmed in Washington the IMDb says Frayed was shot in 2005 but not screened publicly until 2007 & not released on DVD until 2009. The acting is average, no-one stood out for me as being particularly good or bad.

Frayed is a horror thriller that rips-off Halloween but then tries to go in it's own directions with a few film destroying twists which range from predictable to just plain horrible. I didn't like it, it's neither a slasher nor a thriller despite wanting to be both & ultimately doesn't satisfy as either.

Confusing

[dbborroughs · 3/10 · 5 September 2009]

Son of a sheriff who bludgeoned his mother to death, an event caught on videotape, is sent to a mental hospital. Years later he comes home and the killings continue.

Only loosely similar to Halloween this is an odd little film that doesn't make a heck of a lot of sense. Certainly it doesn't have enough material to cover its almost two hour running time. I kept looking at my watch while this was running. The story jumps around between now, then and inside the mind and memories of the various characters to the point that its not always clear as to who is who and what is what. For some people this makes it scary for me it just makes it confusing. I'm not a fan. Other than the opening moments where we see the mother being beaten to death I don't think this really has any scares or tension.

I'd take a pass.

Great horror movie that goes beyond the genre

[bcady · 9/10 · 31 August 2009]

I watched the movie over the weekend with a group of my daughters' friends (about a dozen kids all in high school). It was great to watch a horror movie that I enjoyed and they did too.

The film really is a thinking person's horror movie, and I really appreciated the fact that they didn't dumb it down or insult the intelligence of the audience at any point in the film. There are very few movies where I really respect how the filmmakers treat the audience, and this is one of them where I do. Frayed pays homage to some of the earlier slasher movies, but never appears to be copying them. There are some of the standard scary movie ingredients, but the plot goes way beyond what you expect from a horror movie. The filmmakers were able to take a favorite genre of their own, and make something really creative.

The other thing that really impressed me was the production quality of the film especially when considering the budget constraints of making it. In particular, the special effects were amazingly well done. The thing that most impressed me about the digital effects was the fact that I didn't know most of them were digital effects. After the movie I watched the very brief overview of the special effects and was surprised by some of the things that were done on the computer rather than on the set. This was very well done and I believe the special effects guys deserve huge kudos (and an award for one specific scene) for their accomplishment.

The best endorsement I can give the movie is that I want to watch it again. I know I missed clues and I want to see the movie at least one more time to see what I catch that went over my head the first time. In addition, everyone knows how impatient high school aged kids are, and they not only enjoyed watching the movie, but they watched it again that evening because they all really wanted to see it over again that night.

As for the very violent scene that occurs early in the movie, yes it is uncomfortable to watch. I believe the team earned an award for that one, but they probably won't get one since it is in a small independent movie. The scene is very difficult to watch or even think back to, which is why I recommend watching the bonus feature on that section of the movie. Watching the character/victim in the make up for the final stage jokingly saying "I'm ready for my close up" helped ease the discomfort that the filmmakers were trying (successfully) to make everyone feel.

I recommend watching it with a few friends so you can bat around ideas after the movie. That really helps everyone figure out what actually happens. Frayed goes way beyond a standard slasher movie genre with a tight complex plot, great cinematography, good acting, and remarkable visual effects to deliver a great horror movie.

If the same team makes another movie (which I hope they do), I can't wait to see it.

I was a frayed that I wouldn't like it, but it turned out to be OK (EXCEPT the ending)

[movieman_kev · 7/10 · 2 September 2009]

On Sara's birthday, her homicidal brother Kurt beats their mom to death with a baseball bat and is sent to a mental institution. 13 years later, he escapes and plans to hunt his sister down, who just happens to be camping in the woods with her friends. Sara & Kurt's father, who's also the small town's sheriff is also after his deranged son in this low-budget horror/thriller.

One would be excused for thinking that this was some lame Halloween clone after watching the first ten minutes or so. The truth is while this film DOES share quite a bit with that aforementioned film, this movie is perfectly capable of standing on it's own to feet. The acting, while never Oscar-caliber (not that i would expect that) is still fairly well done. And I found that the film kept my interest throughout. At almost two hours, it DOES wear thin and drag a bit (the editor could have cut 15 minutes or so off). I've seen much worse movies in this genre. This is good enough for a rent at the least.

Eye Candy: Alena Dashiell gets topless

My Grade: C+

Lionsgate DVD Extras: Commentary by Writer/Directors Norbert Caoili & Rob Portmann and writer/producer Kurt Svennungsen; 13 & a half minute Making of the film; 5 minutes on how they did the 'head bash' scene; 5 minutes on the post-production; an ad for Break.com; a trailer for this movie; and trailers for "the Last Resort", "Dead Wood", "Necessary Evil" & "Cravings"

The only thing FRAYED here, is the story, plot, actors, etc, more like twister the movie

[thepeoples_champion · 1/10 · 8 October 2012]

A twist, in a twist, in a twist, in a twist, in a twist, with a side of twist, BY THE WAY, its all made up and in the person head anyway, so there is really no point to watching this festering pot of rubbish to begin with. A typical clown killer, nice good job for originality writers. I respected the part where the mother gets killed with the bat, i pretty much felt that exact pain the entire way through the movie. "This movie had so much potential" No it didn't. The plot. Where can I even start? It was crapped out in 2 minutes, basically they just said "hey for our lack of good plot or plot at all, lets throw in 10 twists and stack them on top of each other for extra value" Lets make the lead character that is with the victims, the killer the whole time! thatll get em! "wait bob your forgetting that he cant be the killer,because how is he going to be in the front seat of the car when the driver is killed from the killer in the back seat?" Shut up. I don't know if you heard but there's this new age thing called a twist that you probubly don't know a thing about. All in all, it was pretty laughable at the end watching every twist unfold in about 2 minutes, thats why this movie got a 1 and its lucky for that.

They should allow negative integer ratings for this one

[WillWorkForAn86 · 1/10 · 12 September 2009]

(Already posted this in the forums but thought I'd copy and paste as a review as well)

This movie is junk, pure and simple.

Oh and how many times did the directors (lol TWO of them!) need to rerun that footage of Kurt looking at that baseball photograph? I stopped counting after 5 and hit FF.

At first I was surprised that this screenplay took five people to *beep* it up, but then I figured out that with the entirely unnecessary pedophile WINS ending that this movie was clearly conceived by NAMBLA committee. Or Josef Fritzl phoned this one in from prison

This movie is disturbing if you are offended by lack of talent across the board, (this movie even seems slowed down, I had to watch it at 1.5x speed to give it any semblance of pacing) pedantic acting (lol), and unnecessary pedophilia. A must see if you are a father who is secretly sexually abusing your children!

In closing, this movie sucks harder than a convicted molester outside of protective custody.

This movie was so boring!!

[gossipcom-1 · 2/10 · 30 September 2009]

Ah this movie sounded good but it was so boring. I mean this dude is him and not him and he kills only certain people and he stares at a picture. Then he takes someone else personality. It would have been better had he just had been him and killed as him. But he was killing as him and he wasn't and it was just boring. A little weird. It was just boring. The action was OK but not great. This movie would have been better had the person who who cause all of this had been killed but he got away with it. He did the worst thing he could do to a little boy. I would give this movie 2 stars watch the shortcut instead. Now that movie rocks!!

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[blackshooter-63065 · 1/10 · 26 April 2020]

Very weak. Badly implemented. The strange person that runs around doesn't scare me. I turned it off. Totally ridiculous (Looks like a children's movie not like horror). xD Stay away from this movie. You haven't missed anything. > 1/10 *

Stunning opening scene, and then many twists and turns.. Great horror film

[Indyrod · 8/10 · 1 October 2009]

This 2007 horror film, has one of the most amazing and gruesome openings of any movie I've seen for awhile. In camera, a Mother is attacked by a killer with a baseball bat, and in pretty good closeup, her head smashed all to hell, in an extremely gory bloody pulp of a mess. I love movies that get off to such a good start. The suspected killer is her own 5 year old Son that has flipped his lid, and after 13 years is being transferred to a psychiatric hospital, when he escapes. Ah you say, HALLOWEEN.... Not hardly, although some reviews have had trouble trying to review this movie without giving away all the twists and turns right into the end credits. Yes, the now 18 year old crazy did escape, and teenagers are dying, when the movie shows a security guard from the hospital being chased by a crazed killer. Other reviewers have been a little more bold, and said, it's a cross between Halloween and Haute Tension. I tend to agree, that "Frayed" has a lot more in common with "Haute Tension" than just about anything else I can think of, and even that comparison is rather remote. Which brings us to the fact, that the story is pretty original, even though you could say homages are paid slightly. This is a damn good horror film, and you do not know what exactly is going on, until even more reveals are exposed as the end credits start to roll. For gorehounds, even though the most graphic almost sickening scene happens right at the beginning, there is still plenty of good old kills to keep the blood flowing. I give this very very high marks as one of the best horror films in the past few years, and an absolutely superb screenplay. After the movie is over, all I wanted to do was watch it again and listen to the commentary. I ran out of time, but that is on the agenda very soon. Don't miss this one, it deserves every horror fans attention.

Bad, bad, bad

[richieblac · 3/10 · 6 January 2012]

We're lead to believe that a single freak with a screwdriver can scare away and/or overpower multiple people at a time. Please. At one point, FOUR people are deathly afraid of this guy - again, armed with only a screwdriver - as he lurks around outside of the house. Absolutely absurd.

I could write a better screenplay in a single night while drunk.

The number of high reviews are obviously staged by friends of the crew or the crew themselves. This film follows a cliché formula from mediocre 80's B-movies. For a film beyond the 90's, that's really, really, really bad. And the twist at the end just make it worse, leaving plot holes wide open that any half-decent writer would've seen coming miles away.

3/10 for decent production value, a somewhat cool villain, and the totally shocking opening - which was the only good part of the film.

Impressively Gripping

[jerzybird · 8/10 · 29 August 2009]

This is the first time that I have seen fit to leave a comment.

I was completely unaware of this movie's existence, and usually I'm pretty good at knowing what is coming out. Out of boredom, I watched it On Demand and was stunned. It's definitely not your average slasher film - instead, it is a psychological thriller that leaves you picking your brain for hours.

I truly recommend this for anyone looking for something raising the slasher-fic bar. I was only looking for the general entertainment and was more than pleasantly surprised.

Please, take my word for it. You'll be intrigued...

Great film!

[melapoo · 8/10 · 25 February 2008]

I saw this movie at the Nevermore Festival in Durham, NC on Feb 24th.

I had originally planned to skip this film because I had read that it was a "re-telling of Halloween" and I was never a fan of the original, but this film became the buzz of the festival. Everyone I talked to said that this was the film to see, and I am very glad that I changed my mind and saw it.

Although there are certain qualities similar to Halloween, it is a completely different story and much more suspenseful. I found the movie to be similar to "High Tension" and "Stay," with all the bells and whistles of a great horror film.

If you get the opportunity to see this film don't let is pass you by. You won't be disappointed.

A Must See For Any Horror Fan!!!

[doakleyj · 9/10 · 24 February 2008]

I went to the Nevermore Film Festival in Durham, NC (Daniel & Emily, Norb if your reading this), because of course I have a love for horror films. As I was browsing through the films for the Nevermore Festival, trying to pick which ones I thought I should see. I watched the trailer for Frayed, and knew it was one that I had to see. I was expecting a nice little low budget horror film, and got something completely different. Frayed is honestly one of the best horror films I've seen in a long time.

Frayed is a dream come true for horror fans, they don't lie when they say their is most brutally scene ever depicted on film, there's not a lot of scenes in horror movies that I find hard to watch, but that one was one of the hardest and gut wrenching scenes I have ever seen.

Frayed has a lot of similarities with Halloween, but believe me overall they are nothing alike. The ending was literally jaw-dropping, I expected a twist ending, but nothing like what I got. If this movie comes to a theater/festival or when it comes on DVD I highly highly recommend it.

The movie is done on a low-budget, but honestly it looks like it came from Hollywood with a much larger budget. It's impressive what the filmmakers have done with the film, and it really deserves to get released into theaters as a mainstream movie. I look forward to seeing more movies from this group, I really believe if they keep coming out with stuff like this they could be up there with horror icons like John Carpenter and Wes Craven...etc...

Good luck guys

Close to becoming a classic.

[jhpstrydom · 8/10 · 10 February 2010]

A town sheriff's mentally ill sun murders his mother and he is sent away to an insane asylum, years later he escapes and starts to wreak havoc in the community.

Of course the storyline is a lot more fleshed out than what I've summed up, like there is actually a reason why the child is mentally sick but I'm not going to spoil it, because this film is actually worth seeing for any horror fan, its probably one of the more unconventional horror films I've seen because with other slasher horror films I can actually predict who will die and who will live, with FRAYED I was way off the entire time and that was probably the first time that's happened to me in years and the array of plot twist at the end drove me nuts because that's when the film really took hold.

The suspense is kept surprisingly high thanks to the relatively casual pace of the film which helps to keep the viewer hooked and allow for some well done character development.

Note, I did say it was close to becoming a classic but there is only one flaw that keeps it from actually being a classic, its not 100% original despite having a great plot, if you look carefully you'll notice it seems to borrow from older films Like HALLOWEEN (1978) but en light of that I'd put it along with LAID TO REST as one of the more competently made slashers in a while.

Movie Review

[wpope2 · 10/10 · 2 July 2009]

I found this film online through a random search of genre specific movies. I was immediately attracted based on the brief "outline" I found on a movie view website.

I watched this movie and was delighted that this little know gem was out there.

The director and especially the editor did such an amazing job of providing seamless plot twists and turns. The "THRILL" factor was bar none! The theme of this film may not become evident until the very end, however, the course of the film is brilliant.

I highly recommend this movie for any and all that enjoy, horror, thrill, slash and suspense criminal styled movies. This film has it all and it is held together through the eyes of one very courageous character.

Blackout...

[Foreverisacastironmess123 · 8/10 · 18 May 2015]

Worst dad ever! With watching a seemingly never-ending stream of lacklustre Hollywood excuses for horror movies and even more so with the independently-made lower budget ones like this, a person can occasionally get a little jaded and bored with the whole thing and develop a "seen it all before" kind of attitude. But this I admit it really did surprise me, I was soon completely hooked and drawn in by a grim story that I found both twisting and very twisted, it was a poor doomed man's nightmare wrapped in a horror story that was heart-wrenching and not even close to anything hopeful, and I really got a kick out of its complexity, it got my grisly gears turning and it had me guessing and wondering practically right up until the end. The entire movie has an intensely dark and eerie feel, the atmosphere is foreboding and mysterious, and it has a lot of doom and tension running through the story, it also provides an ending that certainly leaves a haunting memory. And the main true human villain is to me far more vile and monstrous than any creature of fantasy. I was engrossed, and I really enthusiastically loved this the first time I watched it, and I wholeheartedly gave it a roaring ten! It's come down a bit on the quality tier since then, but I still find it a great picture and one of the best independent horror flicks that I've ever seen. I'm glad that I'm alive and that there are still newer horror movies like this that I haven't seen yet. It begins with a scene that's a real visceral kick to the teeth. They couldn't have pushed the violence of that scene any further if they'd tried, it just has to be one of the most startlingly brutal openings to a film ever done. And as the strange story unfolded I went through several theories in my head regarding the nature of what was really happening. I couldn't take it at face value because you can easily just tell that there's something very unnatural about the tone, and that there's some manner of twist coming. I had thought that it might all turn out to be a kind of dream, but I dismissed that one because I really thought it would be revealed that the guy was just being crazy and that there wasn't any phantasmal clown stalking him and that he was the murderer.. But no though, it was the psych-ward escapee's "Frayed" unconscious delusion, he never made it any further than a little way out onto the highway where he was soon found and shot in cold blood by his own father, who looks down on him as he dies in silent mockery of his pitiful effort for revenge till the bitter end... Evil, horror, and despair is the victor in this story, and my only real complaint is how the bad guy wins so completely.. Pah! There's been many-a-time when I've quite dug the dark magnificence of a bad horror movie ending done right, but this just felt so unfair and wrong. That poor guy, his whole life stolen away by his father, a man who ruthlessly butchered his wife when she was about to learn about the sick sexual abuse he was putting the boy through, and who was able to place the blame on his son because it was all caught on camera - or so you think! And that closing scene is frightening in ways way beyond this movie. Evil heartless bastard, he's just destroyed one son and now he's doing it once more with another child and starting the cycle of horror all over again... The look he gives as he closes the door with the horrible cold black eyes is truly disturbing and scary stuff. To some, it may fall pretty short..but screw them! I like it and I say that at the very least it's worth watching. It's a movie that proves that a good intriguing story will overcome any budgetary limitations. Give it a go, don't be a stranger now!!