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HARDCORE POISONED EYES
Written, Edited, and Directed by Sal Ciavarello
Produced by Anthony Fariello
Directory of Photography - Huy TruongAngelique - Christine Gallo
Sarah - Wendy Allyn
Ellie - Jessica HesterI didn't think it possible for a modern release to deliver the ass-kicking intensity of those landmark horror films from the '70s. I was wrong. Goddamn, was I wrong!
HARDCORE POISONED EYES is far from perfect, just like those flicks from the '70. There's some camera work is amateurish and sloppy, just like THE HILLS HAVE EYES. There's some dialogue that is ridiculous and forced, just like I SPIT ON YOUR GRAVE. The main characters are as three dimensional as week old road kill on the I-70 expressway, just like in HALLOWEEN. And every bit of the piss-in-your-pants intensity comes straight from THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE.
Director Sal Ciavarello did his homework. It's not the zit-free teen idols that will put asses in the seats 20 years from now. It's not the movies that are so damn blood-drenched that the red stuff oozes out your speakers that keeps people talking. It's the movies that put the audience through the emotional wringer and leave them breathless at the end, too shaken up to realize they've made a mess in their pants. It's movies that are so raw in their execution, erupting at their core with post-adolescent sociological rage, that leaves the viewers worn out and violated, ready to go home, take a shower, and wash off their emotions.
The 70's were a time when filmmakers just wanted to scare the shit out of people. That all Sal Ciavarello wants to do, scare you. He wants you to know the fear audiences in the '70 felt when they saw LAST HOUSE ON THE LEFT for the first time at the local Grindhouse.
Don't get me wrong, HARDCORE POISONED EYES isn't the second coming of Wes Craven or John Carpenter, but you can definitely see where they paved the way for Ciavarello to make his film.
Three tweenty-something girlfriends go to a cabin for the weekend. The cabin belongs to the dead grandfather of one of the girls, Angelique. It turns out that the grandfather was murdered by some Satanists hell-bent on bringing back the Anti-Christ through some modern technology mumbo-jumbo. All of that's besides the point. The girls piss off the Satanists and the big meanies come looking for some action.
What makes this movie work is how it plays on the unseen. I have friends who are still afraid to drive past Burkettsville after dark due to that damn Witch which never received one minute of screen time. How often did you see the Witches in SUSPIRA, huh? It's not so much what you show, but what you don't show that forces the audience to reach deepdown and fill in the holes with their own personal fears. You see people talk about the violence that went on in films like PULP FICTION and THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE, but how much violence is really shown onscreen? How much blood do you actually see spilt? The viewer fills in the gaps and takes away with them what they want.
That's what HARDCORE POISONED EYES is about, scaring the piss out of you. It's about you scaring yourself. It's about fear, cold and primal. It's about showing the audience what true horror filmmaking is all about.