Hoboken Hollow

source: Hoboken Hollow

Moviecut—Hoboken Hollow

"Hoboken Hollow" is a disappointment. The plot: Trevor (Connery) is a war veteran trying to take life easy and hitchhiking his way to California. While hitchhiking, a trucker named Clayton (Howell) asks him for help on his ranch. Trevor agrees only if he can leave the next day. Trevor finds out very quickly that the ranch is filled with deranged lunatics who like to torture and kill their helpers. It's a good idea for a movie but it just doesn't work because the pacing is lethargic and the scares are minimal. Howell does a decent job as one of the killers, but Connery is wooden. If you're thinking "Hey, Madsen and Hopper are in it! It can't be all bad...." well, I'm sorry, you're wrong this around. Hopper is in this for about two minutes and he basically says the same line over and over: "I'll give you a lift to the next town". Madsen has it worse because once again, as in "The Covenant: Brotherhood Of Evil" he has an obviously phony mustache. 2005 was the "glued on facial hair stage" in his career. One more thing: Anthony Michael Hall was one of the producers of this mess. Odd.... "Hoboken Hollow" is a very poor flick, that you should only watch if you're a Madsen or Hopper completist (I've seen "Tycus" and "The Prophet's Game" with Dennis and "Flat Out" with Mike. I deserve a medal. Not Really.) For more insanity, please visit: comeuppancereviews.com

I don't want to say too much about this film so I don't ruin it for others but it is unlike most other horror films in the fact that it has an in-depth story line and it is shot as a sort of docu-drama. What I have noticed about many comments on many sites is that a lot of people are not following the story well. I think this is because most people go to see a horror film and do not expect it to make much sense so they do not pay attention to the details. If you miss some of the story line in this one it can really affect the outcome for you. It is not your typical no brainer, but there are some goods scenes that will make you jump or just plain disturb you. Also has a couple of good twists, I recommend this movie to anyone who likes to think or loves a little bit of gore. Also this movie is "based" on actual events, which makes it that much more unnerving.

The first thing you'll immediately notice about "Hoboken Hollow" (or at least I did) is the very, very extended cast list. The opening credits just don't stop introducing new names - among them a couple of very familiar ones like Dennis Hopper and Michael Madsen - and you promptly realize what this movie will lack are one or two actual leading characters. "Hoboken Hollow" is based on true events that probably did involve a lot of people, but perhaps writer/director Glen Stephens should have just focused on the kidnapping and torturing of hitch-hikers and homeless people instead of also wanting to narrate a dozen of redundant sub plots. The tale of the so-called "Texas Slave Ranch" basically revolved on a family of deranged hicks forcing random travelers to labor on their ranch, but the screenplay finds it absolutely necessary to throw in story lines about real-estate issues, soldiers with post-Iraq traumas and demented family relations. It also never feels as if the movie is inspired by true events. It's your average modern "torture-*" flick with a lot of disgusting scenery and villains with terrible dental hygiene, but there never is any atmosphere of suspense or genuine morbidity to detect. And, now that we're being completely blunt and honest, this film will probably not even satisfy the real gorehounds and sick puppies among us. There's a fair share of carnage and repulsiveness on display, but the sickness-factor never approaches that of other "Torture Porn" flicks like, say, "Hostel", "Saw" or "Wolf Creek". The rape sequence is quite unpleasant to behold (as rape sequences always are), but the actual torture footage is limited to shots of the victims getting poked with an electric shock device and getting dragged behind a car. Glen Stephens may perhaps be a little over-ambitious, but – especially during a handful of isolated moments - his directing skills definitely show a lot of potential and he most certainly has a talented eye for appropriate casting. The aforementioned "bigger" stars Dennis Hopper and Michael Madsen only appear in small roles, but some of the other villains are aptly cast like C. Thomas Howell as the nastily grinning Clayton and Mark Holton (who played the titular role in "Gacy") as the slightly mentally unstable Weldon. Other remarkable B-movie names in the cast include Lin Shaye ("2000 Maniacs"), Robert Carradine, Dedee Pfeiffer and Randy Spelling. "Hoboken Hollow" is an overall weak and unsatisfying movie, but it's not entirely without interest for tolerant horror fanatics.

Never has a horror film so spectacularly failed to include any of the ingredients needed to make a film scary. the tone is one of mild sarcasm, the actors seem amused to be a part of such a mess and the scriptwriter is assumably a monkey of some sort. There isn't a plot, just a bunch of toothless morons grinning at each other. Yes, there are gory bits, but just showing a severed arm or a bucket of blood isn't enough to terrify anyone these days. Oh, and don't be fooled by the presence of Michael Madsen and Dennis Hopper - they're hardly in it. Guess they just took the money and ran. Dennis Hopper is one of the greatest living actors, and yet he seems happy enough these days to plod along making ten or twenty of these straight-to-DVD obscurities each year.

I watched this movie with my cousins when I visited England recently and was expecting your typical "based-on-a-true-story" horror film. While it delivered the goods on that front and seemed to please the kids, the more I thought about it, the more it bothered me. It turns out - when I ran it by my parents - that I must vaguely remember the "actual events" from back in the eighties when the creeps that did this stuff -- a lot of it at least -- went to trial. When I went looking around on the internet (I think I searched for "Texas slave ranch" or something like that) I found some articles in the New York Times archive and the movie seemed to be accurate in a lot of ways. Who knows why the idiots didn't gang up on their captors and run away? Or why they didn't turn their axes and chain saws on the slave drivers? I guess each person probably had their own reason for being there. After that I got to thinking about why we average working stiffs let the corporations and police push us around. We'd take 'em easy if you based it on our sheer numbers yet we continue to play the game by their rules. I think it's mostly because it's easier to go with the flow than to deal with what might happen if you buck the system. Most of us don't want to be the one who dies to make an example to the rest. So the metaphor is the Broderick's are the governments and corporations that exploit us and the drifters are us! Heck, it made me want to see it again to test my theory but it's not released here yet.

This movie looked to be a good proper horror/slasher especially with the cast it had lined up but the big names that they have in big letters across the top of the DVD but they have such small roles and Michael Madsen's role is not necessary at all especially when he looks like an extra in 70's * flick. The thing that surprises me most about this film is at any giving time there is usually only three people on the ranch two blokes and a hideously ugly women (Mammy and Daddy obviously cousin or siblings) but they have five slaves now with those odds I'd reckon the slaves could take on their captors. But the main problem with this film is the characters talk about what happens to them if they step out of line but you don't see any of it actually happening I'm not to sure if anyone told the director but you need to see that if you want it to be a slasher film and you don't care what happens to any of them either you kinda want them to get sliced and diced. The main method of torture they use is a cattle prod, What ever happened to over sized knives, meat cleavers, hatchets or chainsaws! This film starts of well you kinda of get a Texas chainsaw massacre feel to it but after 10 mins that feeling passes and you are left bewildered. I can not believe Hopper and Madsen lent their reputations to this flick they must of lost a whopper of a bet to do this film. Hoboken Hollow is a dire film with dire acting even worse script. Anyone who claims this to be a good flick is just trying to trick other people into wasting an hour and half of their lives.

I chose this movie on a damp bank holiday weekend when funds were low and there was nothing on TV. The video shop had very few options, and to cut a long story short - I've had a thing for Michael Madson ever since Thelma and Louise, and even Kill Bill 2 (at a push). Not only was he barely in it, he looked fat!!! "Never mind," I thought, "this is meant to be really scary and should be good," snuggling up to my boyfriend and turning the lights down low. By the end of the film, my boyfriend was barely speaking to me, half furious, half bemused he stuttered, "I can't believe you brought that DVD in to our house". This really, really is an awful film, the writing is so bad the "scary" bits are hilarious, so poorly acted that the "moving" bits are, again, hilarious. The characters are far-fetched and the plot is ridiculous. The Dennis Hopper good cop/bad cop thread is predictable and boring, the bad characters are like pantomime villains (a woman with five warts on her face?!), the good characters are so dull, boring and naive for getting themselves in to the situation they are in leaves you tempted to track them down and torture them yourself... the rape scene was the only part of the film I found difficult to watch - and that is merely because rape in itself is a disgusting act that makes most people uneasy, and not that I was moved by the crude/ludicrous representation of such abuse by lame acting and the vision of ol' five warts lingering in the door way licking her lips... it was borderline insulting. At the end I didn't care what happened, I just really didn't care. Incidentally, I also chose March of the Penguins on the same trip to the video shop.... How an unsuspecting an unpaid penguin can give off more screen presence and charisma is beyond me.

The comment during the credits that the film was 'inspired by true events' sets the scene for a truly dreadful piece of schlock that is more a pastiche of slashers such as Texas Chainsaw Massacre and The Hills Have Eyes, than it is likely to have anything to do with any real and tragic events. The voice-over is wooden and unnecessary, highlighting the writer/director's lack of confidence in his ability to carry the story via the characters. Considering the quality of the dialogue, IMHO his lack of confidence is well founded, albeit it's his first outing as a director. Reasonable (and in some cases quality) actors struggle vainly with execrable passages - the tone is set early on in the dialogue between C Thomas Howell and Randy Spelling with their first van-load of transients. As both chew grimly on their lines and giggle inanely they seem more like naughty schoolboys who might slip a frog into Harry Potter's bunk than the seriously deranged, or dehumanised, monsters they attempt to portray. How Dennis Hopper and Michael Madsen got involved in this piece is beyond understanding...and Hopper in particularly does seem to spend his few scenes looking embarrassed for all concerned. If Glen Stephens goes on to direct further features, this viewer can only hope that he learnt plenty from his mistakes on this one.