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Released by: Sub Rosa Studios
Released on: 10/07/2003
Director: Jeremy Wallace
Cast: Jason Christ, Julie Farrar, Joseph Palermo, Trudy Bequette, Emily Haack, Chris Gregga, Doc Brown
Year: 2003
The Movie:
Six young friends get together and head out of town to the remote community of Old Mines for a river rafting trip to take place along the river that flows through the area. Once they arrive though, they find that what should be a pleasant little community isn't pleasant at all and that the residents there are a wee bit more reclusive than most, even by small town standards. This becomes even more evident when the local police ask them to get out of town.
They get on with their boat trip anyway, but by then it's too late and they come to know that the town is holding a sinister secret in the form of a hillbilly killing machine known only as 'the boy.' Big as a bear and twice as mean, 'the boy' begins hunting them down in the woods and along the river and killing them off one by one. But some of the campers aren't going down that easy, or at least, not without a fight. And how does the mayor of Old Mines fit into all of this?
Have we seen all this before? Yep. Many times. The Undertow makes no apologies about wearing its influences blatantly on its sleeve. It mixes up elements of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Deliverance, The Hills Have Eyes and other backwoods horror classics and actually does a pretty good job of capturing the gritty, bleak feeling that made those movies so effective.
And what it lacks in originality it makes up for in gore! Heads are crushed, limbs are severed, and the monstrosity that is 'the boy' basically rips these poor bastards in pieces before he's finished with them. All of this is, of course, shown in close up detail and the camera never shies away from showing you everything. Luckily, the effects, while not perfect, do hold up pretty well and are reasonably convincing for such a low budget affair.
Much noise has been made as of late about returning to the favored flavor of 'seventies horror,' especially since the release of Rob Zombie's House Of 1,000 Corpses more or less split horror movie fandom down the middle. And while The Undertow does play in a similar vein to those films most often associated with that era, it doesn't take the approach so literally as to set itself in that decade or reference it constantly, which makes it easier to take seriously.
Anyway, yes, it is a really low budget movie and no it's not without its flaws, but the camerawork (for a shot on video production) and acting are above average for this type of film, the gore set pieces work really well, and the story, while not original, is fast paced and exciting which makes The Undertow worth checking out. Jeremy Wallace, who also helmed The Christmas Season Massacre, shows quite a bit of potential with this effort and might be someone to keep an eye out for in the future.
Video/Audio/Extras:
The fullframe presentation on this DVD is a pretty solid effort. Compression artifacts don't really make themselves noticed at all and for a shot on video movie, the colors are nice and strong and not at all washed out like they usually are when using this medium.
The Dolby Digital 2.0 track makes nice use of the front sound stage without and real problems to report on. Hiss is only present in one or two minor instances and for the most part this is a pretty clear and well-balanced soundscape that we're treated to here.
One thing I really like about Sub Rosa's DVD efforts is that more often than not they put quite a few supplements on the disc in addition to the feature. They're not always the best quality, but at least they rarely put out a barebones release. The Undertow has a nice mix of features, some of which are actually interesting. A stills gallery features a nice selection of production photos, and a few select trailers can also be found in the menus on the disc, for The Undertow and for other Sub Rosa releases.
The main extras though are a blooper reel, which is funny to watch once, a few deleted scenes, and a nice making of featurette that shows us what it was like on set and behind the scenes during the making of the film.
The Final Word:
If you can look past the low budget and the shot on video look and feel of the film, The Undertow is worth checking out. Sub Rosa's DVD is pretty decent and the movie has a nice, wide mean streak running through it. For more details, check out the Sub Rosa Website.