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October 02, 2005
Hellbent (2004) ***
An incisive pastiche of the tropes, gropes and gimmicks of the 1980s-style teen slaughter pic, Hellbent pricily pitched itself in advance ads as the first gay slasher film, and while other precursors could be cited, including even the bizarre William Friedkin’s Cruising (1980), Paul Etheredge-Ouzts’ directorial debut gets it right, with its Abercrombie-cute characters forced to suffer a winning mixture of tease, joke, softcore flash, sudden lurch, shriek, decapitate, bleed and die. (Etheredge-Ouzts is also good at making us like his characters before their awful fates.) West Hollywood’s packed streets during the Halloween Street Carnival offer an effective backdrop, even if they remain unnamed. The low-budget production even manages to emulate the cheap yet urgent look, particularly in night scenes, of 1980s slasher product; other, more ambitious scenes suggest a keen awareness of the movies of Dario Argento. 85m.
Posted by pride at October 2, 2005 06:48 PM
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