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Massawyrm says THE BURROWERS is the one of the best American made horror films is quite some time!!
Hola all. Massawyrm here.
Some movies are just a hard sell, some ideas so fresh that we try to liken them to other films in order to understand them and then simply don’t want to give it a chance based upon our own comparison. Thus was the case of many of us this week with the stunning surprise of The Burrowers. It’s a horror western. About a group of riders being stalked by monsters that dwell underground. Until now, Horror Westerns simply haven’t really worked. And the premise sounds an awful lot like Tremors with horses instead of pickup trucks. But that’s not what this is. On the contrary, this is the best American horror film in quite some time and has easily become my second favorite film of the festival.
I first had the pleasure to write about writer/director JT Petty 7 years ago when he sent me a copy of his debut feature
>Soft For Digging
for my long defunct Indie Indie column. One of the first films I had the pleasure to write up, that film blew my doors off with its fresh, visual storytelling style. Running at just 74 minutes, Petty told the entire story with only three lines of spoken dialog – without ever boring the audience. A fascinating, gritty film about a man wrestling with his own sanity, Petty proved he had the mettle to tell slow, methodical, carefully woven stories about characters, not gimmicks. Which leads us to his new film, a much more mainstream film than Soft For Digging.
First and foremost this film is a western. It’s the story of four guys who come together to search for a family they believe to have been kidnapped by Native Americans. But as we learn from the very first scene, or, you know, the theatrical poster, that is far from the case. And while these men bear down on what they believe to be the location of the missing Stewart family, in turn something is bearing down on them. And that something is NOTHING like tremors.
The monsters here are quite original, with several dark, macabre twists to them that make their feeding habits far grislier than what we are normally accustomed to in modern horror. This is a real, honest to god monster movie – not a film about racking up a body count, but rather one exploring the mythology of a new and unique breed of villain. All the while, the film unfolds as a classic western tale. The dialog is razor sharp, with memorable lines spilling out at regular intervals, carefully crafting a bad ass bunch of hombres. Clancy Brown spearheads the coolness factor here as the elder ass kicker and seasoned veteran teaching our young hero the ways of the untamed wild. And every time he opens his mouth it is pure gold.
Meanwhile, the film is a harsh commentary on the rape of the old west and just how quickly things changed once we set our minds to civilizing it. JT Petty crafts a series of interesting characters and milks a wonderful amount of drama out of them while serving up some genuinely creepy scenes and exquisite, gut-wrenching moments. This film is just so damned smart, despite its initial appearance in blurb form. It is a fantastic film about unraveling a new mythology rather than simply borrowing from one. I cannot recommend this film enough. It has become my second favorite film of the festival (behind Let the Right One In) and is in my opinion probably the best American made horror film produced in the last several years. Original, well crafted and fun despite its heavy tone, The Burrowers is top shelf horror entertainment made by one of the finest, emerging horror talents in the business. Lion’s Gate has this and should be putting it out shortly, so keep your eyes open for it.
Until next time friends, smoke ‘em if ya got ‘em.
Massawyrm
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Would be awfully crowded if we were all living on the east coast!
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I rather liked this.
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Cant wait for this bitch!
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They really shafted Midnight Meat Train, which was a solid little horror flick even while they push the hell out of dreck like Saw V. This movie sounds good but knowing Lions Gate they'll release it in a handful of theaters and then dump it onto DVD four months later. "Train" was in bargain theaters for about a week and only by sheer luck did I manage to catch a showing. I have little faith that this film will be playing anywhere within a 50 mile radius when it's released.
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Sold. There can be only one.
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Sep 24, 2008 9:03:59 AM CDT
so its like tremors 4 but with good acting and production values
by bouncy x
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Come on, even a vague description...
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Jesus, is nothing sacred anymore.
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Jesus, is nothing sacred anymore.
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Man, that movie was BAD. Of all the flicks I've seen at FF so far - Wicked Lake is THE one to avoid, and will probably be the benchmark film for me to compare shitty DTV releases to in the future.
Sorry, makers of Wicked Lake, but your shady DV videography, and dreadfully horrible actors forced me to walk out of a free movie for the first time, ever. It was not that the film was disturbing - I don't mind disturbing. It was the fact that the vid was CRAP.
Naked Lesbian Witches making out and smoking weed could not save this. And that's saying something.
Even though I knew it wasn't supposed to be very good - nothing could prepare me for the corn filled turd that was Wicked Lake... and you can use that quote on the poster.
Masa - didn't you do a QA with the director of Wicked Lake afterwards? Sorry - I didn't stick around for it. Did he appologise? -
. . . IMDB lists actors playing Burrower#1, Burrower#2, etc... Are they humanoid, Massa? Creepy crawly monsters are intriguing me WAY more.
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Gotta agree with Rando on that one. It's the worst thing I've seen, and I wonder why it ever got allowed in the festival at all. I'm supposed to see Burrowers today, but a new secret screening has shown up. What to do? What to do?
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I always thought that was a great western/horror flick. Wish they would release it again.
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...is up on Bloody Disgusting.com. Looks good. Kinda reminds me of a retro "Pitch Black", which is a good thing.
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is it DTV as was once speculated, or is it theatrical? The greatest thing would be if we could see Jack Brooks, this and Trick R Treat on dvd by Halloween. Any chances of that?
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A slow, somewhat lyrical western with some great monster tension, and a cool climax.
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Oh..., it's a "u", not an "o".... bummer, I'd actually love to see The Borrowers as a horror movie (forgetting the fact that the last filmic bastardization was pretty much a horror in and of itself... horrible, anyway).
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... The Valley of Gwangi". Cowboys vs. a T-Rex... how can you go wrong? Or hell, if the Jonah Hex thing ever gets out of production hell, give it the tone of Tim Truman's horror-centric version from the 90's. Old West Horror is okay, but please, all you die-hard Brownshirts (there are a few still shambling around, believe it or not)... "space westerns" are pretty f***in' stoopid!
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Seems like they had some really good movies this year. Basically, it's a lot of the same things they had in the midnight madness program at the Toronto festival. Does Fantastic Fest also have director appearances and Q&As and all that good stuff. Or is it just a bunch of horror geeks watching movies? Other than the Wrestler, I was pretty disappointed in TIFF this year and may come to Fantastic Fest next year instead.
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http://tinyurl.com/3vvdn4
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Let's not forget how hard they snubbed Midnight Meat Train and how Disaster Movie is in every major theater in the United States. Fuck that, you will never be able to see The Burrowers in your local theater, just wait for its home video release. Goddamn.
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SOLD!
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thank you Michael Gross
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Tougher to do on the cheap though--unless your Hammer.
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that get released for a week in October, then come out next spring on video??
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It still tickles me that this great "hardass" ("MEDIC!!"), voices Mr. Krabs on Spongebob...
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...and the music was great too.
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I love this actor. I watched Extreme Prejudice the other day again (which I last saw when I was a teenager), and he was really good in it (actually the entire cast in that movie was really good). But still, he now moved this up to "see in theater" versus rent. Granted, he probably dies really early, but whatever - at least the flick sounds good, too.
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Cool Whip!
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The people as "burrowers" judging from the trailer, comes from the concept of them being 'inhabited'. The girl who was 'buried alive' and then does something at the campfire later is not human anymore. Not completely. But are they tiny, small, 'things' a la The Thing that in totale overtake a host, or are they larger such as Alien, only small when they're incubating? I think I'll check this one out.
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In my all-time top twenty. Small, perfectly-formed, achieves all its objectives. Shame its sequels are all such total arse.
Horror westerns, eh? (Rubs chin.) Could you make a case that the (superb) Near Dark is a horror western of sorts...? -
...is a total dude.
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Had posted this in the wrong talkback last night have just having seen the film:
This and the surprisingly excellent Alien Raiders. The Burrowers (or The Burrs as the characters like to call them) is an excellent movie. However, I'd be weary of anyone saying this movie eschews from any standard horror conventions. The loud cues and boo scares (complete with at least 3 "gotchya" false scares) abound. It just does these things very well and with a bit of class that a lot of movies lack. When you have the confidence Petty obviously has (and displayed in Mimic 3 as well - that was a sequel that rocked completely out of nowhere!), you can get away with making a mature, SERIOUS horror film like this. Bravo.
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