I saw the term "Z-grade" get tossed around a bit while I was reading up on Night Feeders. And I suppose that means a typical B-movie story, made independently, coupled with a low budget and probably not made with the most seasoned crew/actors. I don't think the "Z" label is inherently a bad thing. Sure, any film can be painful if it's not well done (and I think it may be more *likely* to be painful the deeper you go into the alphabet), but just like any style/genre/whatever, there are good ones and bad ones. And I thought Night Feeders was one of the good ones. Once you get past the really poor CGI (which is charming in a Birdemic sort of way, but not quite as bad), it's a fun, decently-paced piece of indie monster-horror.
Night Feeders is your pretty basic "locals run afoul of killer aliens story." Like many an alien-monster movie before it, this one starts with a meteor crashing to earth. Bringing it into the 2000's, you get a shitty CGI meteor, instead of a shitty miniature or a shitty matte painting. You don't see it land, but you can infer that there were some man-eating monsters aboard. Their first victims are a couple of hapless fisherman whose boat gets capsized, and it's pretty well done. Nothing too fancy, just panicky people on the surface of the lake, while the water beneath them goes red. Cheap, but effective. Some local farmers have reported missing livestock - they assume hunters are tearing down their fences and letting the animals escape, but we're hip to some sort of alien shenanigans.
We meet our main characters as they go out in the woods on a hunting trip. They are four friends, all from North Carolina (where this was filmed), and I would assume they would self-identify as rednecks. It's pretty subtle in three of them, but one reaches Larry the Cable Guy levels of redneckery. While they are out in the woods, they first run afoul of a mutilated deer, then a mutilated person - and then, once they're good and frightened, they catch a glimpse of one of the alien monsters. The good news? The monsters can be relatively easily dispatched by their guns (it was a hunting trip, luckily) and they have an aversion to light. (Hence, Night Feeders.) The Bad News? They are really vicious little beasts (about 4 feet tall?) with super sharp teeth, and there are a shit-ton of them. Our friends must escape the campsite and find shelter... will they avoid being eaten and see the sunlight again? Tune in to find out!
The main thing I dug about Night Feeders was the characters. They were pretty well-written and enjoyable to spend time with, and there are some genuine laughs in writer-director Jet Eller's script. They name check Jurassic Park a couple of times - normally I hate it when movies name check other better movies, but this is like a kid at a playground baseball diamond pretending to be in the Major Leagues. There is just no comparison. But Jurassic Park is probably *the* formative movie of my childhood (and my then blossoming movie nerdom), so I dug that Eller not only referenced it, but probably took some cues from it too. As anyone making a monster movie should. You get characters people actually give a shit about (and take the time to develop them) and keep the monsters out of sight for a while. Plus, the aliens in this film are probably most comparable (in theory - *not* in execution) to the raptors in Jurassic Park - they hunt in packs and are relatively small, but still very deadly.
While the tone of Night Feeders is mostly lighthearted, it's still played pretty straight. There are no "OMG/winking at the camera"-type moments, and you even get a few scenes of serious grieving/drama. The acting isn't great - no surprise, since this seems like the type of film where the cast is filled more with people the director knows, rather than professional actors. Although it looks like a couple of them have moved on to pretty big things (Lincoln!), so that's cool. So while it's hard to get too invested in the dramatic aspects of it, it's nice that it isn't played off as some goofy monster-comedy like a lot of indie-horror flicks. It's nice to feel like there is actually something at stake for these characters.
But like I said, you have to prepare yourself for some bad CGI monsters. They are kept pretty well obscured for a lot of the film, but once you see them they are hardly impressive. They are the kind of cheap CGI that you might see on a late 90's screen saver. It's the sort of deal where there is just one or two different animations, and they just use them again and again. So when you see them in a pack, it looks like there are duplicates. But oddly, I think it works here. I read a review that summed it up perfectly, saying the movie had "regional charm." And that is an apt description - it looks and feels like a small, locally made film, and the effects are just what you would expect from that sort of thing. So while the aliens would look pretty bad anywhere else, they fit into the world of Night Feeders nicely.
Now, I admit to watching this very late at night and probably under the influence. But even in an altered state, I think you still know if something you are watching sucks or not. And while this is not for everybody (if you aren't accustomed to indie-horror you probably won't make it past the first 10 minutes), I found it quite charming and enjoyable. If you're into that sort of thing.
I would recommend this film.
No comments:
Post a Comment