Anthologies in cinema have been around for a long time. The Twilight Zone, Tales from the Darkside and my personal favorite Tales from the Crypt are just a few of many that have come up over the years. Recently, anthology films have had a resurgence and have worked quite well in horror. The V/H/S and ABC’s of Death series come to mind. A director of the former, David Bruckner is at it again. This time he takes us on a drive down a desolate and dangerous highway in Southbound.
The synopsis from IMDB is as follows:
Five interlocking tales of terror follow the fates of a group of weary travelers who confront their worst nightmares – and darkest secrets – over one long night on a desolate stretch of desert highway.
The synopsis does little to persuade the viewer to watch I think. But I can give you a few reasons why you should check this film out. First, it feels fresh. The stories, as unoriginal as they appear to be, are scripted very well. I was tense the entire film. The ideas in the stories were tweaked just enough to drive home the true originality of the film. Second, the interweaving stories. The film was shot so smoothly that the stories truly melded cohesively. Where one story would end, say by a character walking out of a room they would pass another character walking into that same room. Then their story would begin. There was no true stopping point in between stories. Just creative camera shots blending everything together. Which I thought was really cool.
Lastly, it was just a unique, creative and fun experience. Well, fun to Horror Fans at least. There’s nothing fun about it this movie to the casual viewer. But I was entertained throughout. All the stories were great and the acting was actually pretty good. Some really good gore bits, that will keep the gorehounds happy. This film also has some of the more original kills to come out this year.
As evidence, below here’s a winged grim reaper fatality:
This film was a very pleasant surprise. All the pieces worked well together for a hellish and horrible experience. As I said above, I really liked this film. My favorite story was ‘The Accident’ for its brutal creativity and the main character’s honest and almost honorable portrayal. As some of you have probably surmised from the logo atop, this flick doesn’t go down any stretch of highway we mortals have driven on. You have to go deep. You have to go down. You have to go…. Southbound.
IMDB: 6.0/10 (too low)
ZombiSurvivor: 7.5/10
Still not convinced? Well, TRAILER TIME!
As Always, thanks for reading and remember to STAY SCARED!
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-ZombiSurvivor
