HUNTING HUMANS
Produced by Rick Ganz and Kevin Kangas
Written and Directed by Kevin Kangas
Edited by Harvey Glatman
Director of Photography - David GilAric Blue - Rick Ganz
Detective - Joe RippleHUNTING HUMANS is a movie that breaks all the rules of standard, conventional story telling. A character study, HUNTING HUMANS thrives on telling, not showing. The endless voice overs convey 95% of the narrative, negating any suspense the scenes should contain, and yet the movie still remains oddly fascinating.
The premise is genius; it's one I can't figure out why Hollywood hasn't picked up on before now - a serial killer hunting other serial killers. Aric (pronounced "Eric") Blue has been on the prowl for years and it's his story were told. He picks his pray at random and them follows them for weeks on end in order to learn their patters. As he says often, humans are creatures of habit and it's these habits that will do us all in at some point. As Aric moves in for each kill, he recites to the audience all the repetitive customs each victim goes through that led to the specific moment Aric chose to end their lives. The irony being that most are as mundane as taking out the trash every Wednesday evening or leaving the side door unlocked.
As Aric prepares to kill a movie theater projectionist, he finds the projectionist dead with a note reading "I know your patterns." With the gauntlet thrown, Aric and this new mystery killer, calling himself "Dark," begin a game of one-upmanship in an effort to outdo the other's previous murder.
The sort who prides himself on his intelligence, Aric not only plans to outdo Dark at his own game, but find and assassinate the new player before these extra murders take the spotlight away from Aric's legacy as the most vicious serial killer the world has ever know.
Often, HUNTING HUMANS comes across as something akin to HENRY: PORTRAIT OF A SERIAL KILLER, or Nick Palumbo's NUTBAG, by way of a dark Danny Devito black comedy. It's hard to tell if all the humor was intentional or not, but the majority of the voice over fails due to a lack of conviction on the part of actor/producer Rick Ganz as Aric. Moments when he's trying to force a sense of irony, or corner the one-liner market, Ganz falls flat. To his credit, Ganz is at his best when he's describing the visceral nature of each kill. With the audio slowed down to bring out the gravel in Ganz's voice, the rumbling base hangs on every word reinforcing just how much he savors each kill.
The movie is lifted from a dull quagmire of voice over-overkill thanks to the editing of Harvey Glatman who undercuts much of Aric's dull banter with random shots of the raging psychopath. Whether glimpses of past events or reflections of Aric's current psyche, the editing works to not only illustrate Aric's psychosis, but also undercuts the tedium of his rants.
The ending fails the movie completely. A final confrontation between the two killers, the men attempt to outguess and maneuver on another as if in a nightmarish chess match. HUNTING HUMANS drops its fourth wall-removed sense of self and finally opts for conventional storytelling. Constant chess moves and double-crosses quickly degenerates into a cartoon-like lampoon of the prior 70 minutes. The resolution might have worked better if the director Kangas had remained faithful to the production's unconventional manner.
While not available on the screener disc, the final release should include behind-the-scenes featurettes and commentary.
Review by Allen Richards.
Second Opinion
Aric Blue is a young, good looking man with a great job that makes him a nice chuck of change. He also has an unusual hobby. Aric hunts people. He's good. He's thorough. He profiles a person for quite some time. He gets their patterns, and according to him, everybody has patterns. Then he strikes. It's odd. He's methodical and gets a great thrill from doing what he does, but he doesn't come across as crazy. With the exception of this little quirk of his, he's as normal as you and me.
Then, one evening he finds his next target, a projectionist at a local theater, already dead. There's even a note bragging that he was beaten to the punch. Aric has finally met his match. Another serial killer who may be better than Aric ever thought he was. He's one step ahead all the time and Aric discovers that the his nemesis wants to be the only serial killer in town. That's when the stakes are raised and Aric goes after the deadliest human of all. One just like him.
Now, I watch a lot of movies. Tone can usually suck you into a film or bring up the old, seen it before wall and shut it out before it even starts. I got the wall when I started with this film. It started cheesy looking. Low budget and with a narration to boot. For some reason I kept watching and was rewarded for my efforts. The narration was almost stream of consciousness and very interesting. we were inside the brain of someone who knows that what they do is wrong, but they don't give a damn. He tells you things. Things any good serial killer should know. It's hilarious when he's forced to interact with 'normal' people. He says one thing and then gives some really funny voice over. when one of his fellow office workers tries to engage in a little suck up chatter, Aric responds like a normal person would. Then he tells us that if the guys tongue was any further up his ass the guy would be tasting colon. See what I mean? Funny.
The whole film is like that. The dialogue is witty. The narration is fantastic and the film rises above it's low budget status. Sure, you can tell it was made for little cash, but who cares? It's the story and this one has a winner. Director Kangas wrote as well as directed so hopefully he'll continue in this vein. He has a new project due out next year called FEAR OF CLOWNS. Sounds like a great title, just like HUNTING HUMANS. He is also bringing his leading man from this film, Rick Ganz, along for the ride. Rick does a great job as Rick. As a matter of fact, there is a cast list and while it's important to know that Doug is the other serial killer. Rick takes the movie away from everyone else. He manages to dominate the entire film. Part of that is that he is in every scene. A daunting task for a new actor, but even when he interacts with others on the screen, he's the one you look at. He leads the film along and is in total control. Not a bad way to start a film career.
Kangas has managed to bring life back to the slasher film with this epic pitting two psychos way before Freddy thought to take on Jason. Definitely worth a look.
Bio Info for Douglas Waltz
In the spare time afforded him between a full time job for the local phone company, Douglas is happily married with five, that's right five, children. He is a staff writer for the Print magazine Cult Cuts and does work for the webzine (www.cultcuts.net). He also publishes his own small press zine called X-Ploitation. In addition to that he's working on an annual publication of short stories from various writers called On The Night Highways. And if that wasn't enough he's about to shoot his first short film, Phone Sex, sometime this summer.