The good folks at horroryearbook were nice enough to send me a copy of “Storm Warning” to review. Normally I don’t write negative reviews because I don’t like to waste my time writing about a movie I didn’t enjoy. This puts me in a tough place, because I thought “Storm Warning” was just that - a big waste of time.
Director Jamie Blanks has a history of promising, yet less than stellar horror efforts including “Valentine” and “Urban Legend.” I thought both of those modern slasher flicks had their good points about them, but ultimately failed to deliver the goods. “Valentine” was highly edited to earn an R rating and stole it’s climax entirely from the far superior “Alone In The Dark.” “Urban Legend” was more of a collection of admittedly cool set pieces than anything resembling a worthwhile flick, and the killer’s identity was nothing but a lame attempt at humor. Blanks returns to the horror genre with “Storm Warning” - a straight to video dvd release from Dimension Extreme and yet again falls pretty far from the mark.
“Storm Warning” is a tepid rehash of the time honored “rape and revenge” sub genre. Dimension attempts to market this as EXTREME horror and it even features a blurb from the mongoloids at bloody-disgusting calling it “a great thrill ride loaded with scares and loads of gore.” Bad writing is pretty EXTREME, I guess. Sadly, I didn’t get much of a thrill out out of this ride.
The plot centers around a rich couple that get lost while sailing and wind up on a small island inhabited by a maniacal rapist, bestiality enthusiast, and pot farmer named Poppy and his two dimwitted demented sons. Seeking shelter from a storm, the couple stumble upon Poppy’s pot farm and soon regret it. The dvd cover synopsis claims the couple is “brutally beaten and sexually enslaved,” but this is a gross exaggeration. That would have been been much better viewing than the tedium I had to endure here, listening to the three hillbillies threatening to rape the chick for an hour. Listening, not watching.
There are two types of “R&R” movies - the ones that have the guts to actually feature graphic rape on camera with nudity, and the weaker ones that simply threaten to rape the characters over and over again, humiliate them instead, and maybe show an attempted rape where the participants and victims are clothed. About half way through this flick I decided to myself “they are not going to rape this chick, or even get her naked.” Sadly, I was right.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m no rape junkie. I just think if you want to throw down and present this type of material, and promote it as EXTREME - you need to go all the way. No pulling punches. This flick repeatedly attempts to shock, but it bored me to tears. There was a nice attempt to piss off animal lovers with a scene where the heroine is forced to kill a baby animal. Too bad Blanks doesn’t have the balls to show it on camera. He cuts away, even with a fucking puppet! The gore effect of the bleeding animal puppet aftermath is laughable. This is a pathetic failed attempt at being hardcore. Watch “Cannibal Holocaust” if you want to see some convincing rape and animal slaughter.
“Storm Warning” is a lame, tiresome effort only briefly punctuated with impressive splatter. A flick with a body count of three can hardly be described as having “loads of gore.” There is one really nasty death scene with hooks ripping a dude apart, but I liked it better the first time I saw it in “Hellraiser.” There’s a even a death via air boat that made me briefly wake up and wonder if I was watching “Police Academy: Assignment Miami Beach.” The highlight of this flick was the part where the chick sticks a broken bottle full of nails up her snizz and then walks and runs around like normal for the rest of the movie while waiting to get raped. I thought that was hilarious.
The abundant splatter towards the end of the film might make this an enjoyable flick for some but I just couldn’t get into it. This plays out like a “Wolf Creek” knock off with a little more payoff at the end. “Storm Warning” is not Brain Hammer approved and should have been called “Shit Warning” instead.
KEEP THE BLOOD FLOWING!!!
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