Hell Fest

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I'm not gonna lie, it's not really like I was expecting a whole hell of a lot from this one. But, it's Halloween time and I'm here to see Halloween-like movies through the month, so here we are. If nothing else, a good slasher movie can be a bit of creepy fun to get you in the mood for the holiday. But if I were to use a word to describe this one's overall quality, I might go with "disappointing".

We open up with the introduction of our three main characters, and the setup is fairly typical. Natalie (Amy Forsyth) is the "virgin" survivor girl type, she has a best friend named Brooke (Reign Edwards) trying like hell to hook her up with a new man, and a comic relief character named Taylor (Bex Taylor-Klaus) who is 100% obsessed with Halloween, horror, and everything dark, twisted and evil - but in a fun way.

The three of them hook up with a few guys, as they explore an annual Halloween event called Hell Fest - a travelling horror show set up for the Halloween season full of creepy actors, mazes, games and rides. We have something like that in Canada called "Halloween Haunt" at Canada's Wonderland, Ontario - I can confirm that it is indeed a good time. If you get the chance to check out anything representative of the concept of this movie, check it out, it's a good time. But I digress.

Wandering through this whole thing is some dude in a mask, stalking this group of potential on-screen victims. It pretty much just goes typical slasher horror from there, and there's not much else to be expected. But I have to say that what bothered me about the movie was the fact that we're at this travelling horror show full of all sorts of neat stuff that could be used as an improvised murder weapon, but we don't REALLY get much of that. I think the one time it happens (which I guess is debatable) it's PAINFULLY obvious what's gonna happen, right down to the visual gag to be. I can almost guarantee that any reader going through this who has seen the movie knows precisely the kill I'm talking about.

I'm not entirely sure what else there is to say about it. It has a few plus sides, like teasing the audience as to who the real killer is, hiding it inside a horror show where things are supposed to look terrifying, and an... interesting ending, to say the least. It was the kind of ending that kinda just brought up more questions, but at the same time, it feels like that's what it's supposed to do. So check it out for yourself, but I wouldn't expect much more than you see in the trailer. It's fun for Halloween, but not much of a memorable experience beyond that.

3/5

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