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Satan's Playground |
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The Bruno
family is going on a camping trip, but when
they get a flat tire in the woods of New Jersey,
they're force to go look for help. They find a nearby
house where a nice old lady, called Mrs. Leeds, lives
with two of her children. But it seems as if something
else lives in these woods as well... What is this
mysterious entity flapping around in the sky above
them? And why is Mrs. Leeds acting so strange? The
family is just about to discover that not everything
is as it seems around here.
I've got to be honest with you. I'm not a fan of Dante
Tomaselli, not at all. I think that his movies feel
like the result of bad acid trips where nothing makes
sense and everything is way too surreal. And while
Satan's Playground may start out like your averagely
entertaining mainstream horror flick, Dante just can't
seem to resist the temptation and heads down the same
old LSD path once again.
For those of you who think that this is a movie about
the Jersey Devil - you're wrong, we don't even get to
see the jersey devil in this movie. Instead, Satan's
Playground tells the story of the jersey devil's family.
I actually thought that this was a quite neat and
original approach to the story but unfortunately, it
probably worked better on paper than it did on film.
The movie revolves around the Bruno family, a generally
dislikeable family of five, including one baby and a
handicapped boy. When they get a flat tire in the middle
of the New Jersey woods, they ask an old lady in a
nearby house for help. This nice old lady turns out
to be anything but nice and, together with two of her
children, tortures and kills the family members one
by one. Meanwhile, an unknown entity is flapping around
in the sky outside the house - could it be the jersey
devil? Well I guess we'll never know since we never
get to see the damn thing. Talk about an anticlimax.
Now, I'm not even going to go into how illogical this
movie is. Just like with Horror and Desecration, most
of it doesn't make any sense at all (come on, like
anyone would actually believe that an old woman in a
run-down old shed in the middle of the forest would
have a phone? not very likely). I do however have some
positive things to say about this movie as well. The
cinematography is very nice and the colours are playful
and nice to look at. And also, Felissa Rose gives us
an incredible performance, something which I did not
expect. She basically carried this movie.
Unfortunately it takes more than good acting and nice
colours to make a horror movie and Dante just doesn't
seem to care a whole lot about what people think. He
does his thing and some people end up loving it and
other people, like me, just don't get it. Satan's
Playground is as messy and incoherent as a bad nightmare,
it all seems to make sense while you're asleep, but
when you wake up, you realize that it was all nonsense.
Mr. Tomaselli is improving though and this is his best
movie to date so if you're a fan of his previous
movies, I definitely think you should check this one out.
A groovy slashed throat is all we really get here, but
that was one hell of a throat slashing.
While the music is competently made, it doesn't really
serve its purpose. It felt as if whoever was responsible
for the soundtrack was so busy showing off his talents
that he forgot about what the music was intended to do;
add suspense to the movie.
Dante Tomaselli is slowly improving but I really wish
that he could make at least one movie that made sense.
This is not a horror movie for the mainstream audience
and I'm definitely not a fan of Tomaselli's works. This
is his best to date however so if you like his style,
check this one out.
Review By: AnthroFred
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