The Pumpkin Karver (2006)

I love this movie so much

Powerful

Don't listen to the negative reviews

Actress is magnificent and exudes a hypnotic screen presence in this affecting drama.

Jonathan (Michael Zara) has nothing better to do on Halloween night than carve pumpkins. Alec (David J. Wright) is Lyn's (Amy Weber) douche-bag boyfriend who puts on a mask and scares Lyn. Jonathan, believing she is actually being attacked kills her boyfriend. A year later they go to a Halloween party out in a field with a bunch of Lyn's friends, none of which we get to know other than by their 2006 costumes.Jonathan is having flash backs and sees weird things associated with Alec in his pumpkin mask. There is an old creepy pumpkin carver (Terrence Evans) who mentions other carvers. Jonathan gets kicked around by a steroid pumped ex-boyfriend of a girl, who his sister is attempting to fix him up with (nice going sis).The characters have some colorful moments, but they are far from funny. The lack of character build up and suspects turns this who-dun-it slasher film into a lame 2 star attempt.F-bomb, near sex, no nudity in spite of what the rating box tells you.

Spoilers ahead people so stop right here if you're worried about them.Now with that out of the way I'll make this brief, is this a good movie? Well no not really but it is well acted compared to most B movies and it has promise. The crazy rampage guy from Crocodile plays another crazy old guy and is the highlight of this film, he even tries to force some plot into this thing.Like I said above it had promise, it's slow to the finish and some of the characters are annoying but it still had some promise. The big problem and I mean big is the ending. I'm sorry but either someone wrote themselves into a corner or had a very bad idea from the start. I'm still not 100% sure who the killer was, was it all in Jonathan's head? Well that would've made sense, that would've made the old man's part more logical and hell it would've made the entire movie more powerful; especially when the love interest dies.Yet sadly no from what I can tell it wasn't in his head, well not really. No I'm sad to report that the killer was in fact the bald idiot who got himself killed in the first 10 minutes. That's right the dead idiot boyfriend escapes hell and takes over the leads body, and hold on here, it's not even in the cool Nightmare on Elm Street 2 kind of way. The ending ruins a otherwise decent movie and build up.

Jonathan(Michael)is tormented by the tragic death at his hands, when he accidentally murdered his sister's boyfriend, thinking he was protecting her from a real killer during a really stupid prank gone awry. Lynn(Amy Weber) decides it might be best if they packed up and headed for a Halloween party in the boonies..the country farm plantation town of Carver for some much needed fun away from the horror of the past. Jonathan is receiving frightening supernatural threats from the person he killed and several teenagers are dying at the hands of a psycho in a warped pumpkin mask with a carving blade. Is the killer actually Lynn's dead boyfriend, who might've received a passage from hell to torment Jonathan? Could the killer actually be nutty, belligerent farmer Ben(Terrence Evans)who owns the plantation and has the unique ability to carve pumpkins skillfully?The kind of cheap slasher horror crap you expect with added moronic premise of a possible fiend from hell manifesting himself through Jonathan. The characters are the annoying boozer types you expect..it's too bad not enough them meet their doom. Cheap horror effects do not help matters. Amy Weber provides some much needed eye candy, quite well built in her tight jeans and smallish shirt. Minka Kelly as Jonathan's love interest Tammy provides a worthy heroine to root for. Not much to recommend about this one, except the setting provides old farm houses, steel sheds & silos for the killer to roam and hide. Unusual for this type of slasher flick..no nudity to speak of. Not as many death sequences either, and most of those are unsuccessfully lame or off-camera. Terrence Evans is quite over-the-top as farmer Ben, always ranting and raving like a loony regarding everyone's lack of the ability to carve..not to mention the jargon he spits about Jonathan's evil taking over. There are actually kids in this film named Bonedaddy and Spinner..so if that doesn't inform you what kind of movie awaits nothing will.

The Pumpkin Karver is great Halloween fun. Robert Mann wrote and directed this film and does a superb job. It has suspense, good acting, and an interesting story line which holds you on the edge of your seat. I rented this film 3 times and just had a lot of fun inviting people over to watch it. We took turns trying to figure out who got killed next. Terrence Evans is in it and is really creepy as an old carver. If you want a have a really fun Halloween night, rent this movie. It also will make you laugh at the way some of the people get killed. It is very different than any other horror film.Phil Hern's camera work is first rate. It has a painting like quality to the photography.