Movie Marathon: 'Wrong Turn 5'
The previous film managed to entertain by being to darn silly that we were dazzled. We laughed all the way through the terrible performances, weirdly shifting tone and all round stupidity. This next one is by the same director, so we're in.
Movie: Wrong Turn 5: Bloodlines
Released: 2012
Director: Declan O'Brien
Cast: Doug Bradley, Camilla Arfwedson, Simon Ginty, Roxanne McKee, Paul Luebke, Oliver Hoare, Kyle Redmond, Amy Lennox, Duncan Wisbey
Plot: We return to Greenbrier County, West Virginia, which is in the midst of a Mountain Man Music Festival. Since leaving the sanatorium, the Hillicker Brothers have teamed up with serial killer Maynard Odets to wreck havok.
Review: Oh dear, this isn't looking good. Everything looks cheaper and more rushed than ever. The prologue kill involves a news reporting jogging through the woods wearing a Kill Bill style yellow jump suit. This set-up gives us a chance to meet Maynard Odets, played by Pinhead himself Doug Bradley, a serial killer who teaches the cannibals the importance of covering their tracks and helps them lure in victims.
The movie starts proper with our gang of young folk, introduced via sex scene as usual, stumble into a trap but put up enough fight to hold out until the sherif arrives. Maynard Odets is taken to the lock-up, prompting are gang of mutants to invade the town to rescue him. Not that we know much about him, or have any investment in his role. The setting of the town is an odd choice, especially as they didn't have a convincing town set to make use of. At the beginning we get an exposition dump that the Mountain Man Music Festival is bigger than Coachella, but this huge event must take place off screen because we never see it.
Introducing an arch-villain with the ability to speak changes the tone up significantly. Over the course of the series the cannibals have become more and more cartoonish. First they developed some kind of super strength, then the ability to rig up elaborate traps involving bard wire, then they became unkillable by being dropped into a prequel. There's not much left of the characters we met in the first outing, so instead we have this well spoken, gaslighting, crafty murderer is calling the shots. Doug Bradley is plenty fun in the role, but it detracts from the premise of the series.
With the mountain men being reduced to gore movie gremlins while their mentor is waxing lyrical in a prison cell, there's little fun to be had here. The kills are becoming elaborate and silly, but there's no investment in the characters.
We fear that the Wrong Turn series peaked with number four...and that's only because it was terrible. This one left me a bit bored.
Rating: THREE out of TEN
