The Slaughter (2006)

Slow pace in the most part of the movie.

Simply A Masterpiece

A different way of telling a story

Blistering performances.

Dana (Jessica Ellis) and her boyfriend Tyler (Terry Erioski) own a cleaning company and they travel with his stepbrother Iggy (Zak Kilberg) to clean up an old house for the arrogant real state agent Carl (Brad Milne). They invite the promiscuous Heather (Laura Stein); her boyfriend Brandon (Travis Wood) and the pothead Razz (Billy Beck) that are their friends, to help them. They meet Carl and his secretary Alexandra (Jen Alex Gonzalez) in the house and when they clean the basement, there is a bad smell and they find a book made of flesh. Iggy translates the text and discovers that the place is a portal to an evil female demon that was summoned one hundred years ago. He also discovers that a sin would be capable to awake the She Demon (Adriana Esquivel) and the group decides to have no sex in the house. But it is too late since Heather and Brandon are alone in a bedroom. Now the She Demon is unleashed and they find that they are trapped in the house."The Slaughter" is a low-budget movie with flawed characters (Carl and Alexandra are unbearable; Brandon and Razz are douchebags); poor locations and special effects; and a screenplay that should be improved. The makeup and the camera work are good and in the end, considering the budget, this Z-movie is enjoyable and entertains. My vote is five.Title (Brazil): "O Massacre" ("The Slaughter")

Reading some of the comments on here, it looks as though people are confusing indie horror with serious films.Yes, horror can be serious, but it isn't all about that, it's about an enjoyable film that can take you away from the mundane, and The Slaughter does just that.OK, the people who have said that it didn't make sense obviously didn't get the comedy of it all, and let's face it, these are the same people watching a zombie film - not exactly a creature that makes sense.We showed this film at Horror Fest UK in 2006 and we loved it, which is why we are bringing it back to the Horror UK '28 Hours Later' horror marathon film festival.Get with it. It is about having a laugh, showing the serious horror fans that they are way too serious and just sitting down for 94 minutes of unadulterated silliness.

I'll say this, "The Slaughter" starts out great. The opening scene with a bevy of the most beautiful witches (or witch worshipers, or whatever they are) that have probably ever graced the screen this side of porn getting naked, seductively self-mutilating themselves (!!) and calling to life the demon-woman pictured on the DVD cover is up there with the phantasmagoria of Ken Russell in his prime. It's very MTV but also effective...all double exposures and reaching hands, muted, digitized images and an eerie score. I was already prepared to accept I'd gotten my $1 rental money's worth for taking a gamble on an unknown DVD with a neato cover. Had it gone on in this way I was prepared to call this the most original fear film to have come out in decades, but it couldn't keep it up.Cut to a bunch of beautiful, stupid young people "required" to be in a haunted house for one of the lamest reasons ever (they're cleaning it) and we're back on the same ol' territory as any run-of-the mill haunted house flick. The good news is that this is a dumb movie about idiotic people made by people who appear to be quite smart. The characters are oddly likable because it's clear the actors are talented and were having a ball (I particularly enjoyed the brain-fried stoner and the slutty girl). Unfortunately, the tone of the film goes from being scary-with-some-humor to out and out ridiculous and it descends into "student film" territory. I wish we were having as much fun as the people making the movie seemed to have been...either let us in on the joke or let us laugh AT you, but when people in a movie on a screen are laughing at themselves it seldom is fun for an audience.The script has some fun one-liners and fast-paced dialog, the effects, though incredibly cheap, are fun, the gore is gratuitous and gloppy and the make-up on the demon-woman is really, really nice. The actors are all beautiful and fun to watch, the attack scenes (when they come--you have to wait a good 50 minutes! Sheesh!) are satisfying. Too bad the witch just never really DOES anything, too bad there's just no plot at all and too bad we've seen most of this before a million times. The speed-monster-metal score is a nice touch, though it doesn't really suit the material that well.Oh, who am I fooling--this movie blows! It really is something only a slightly-feeble-minded 12 year old could truly enjoy, but as a dirt-cheap rental before Halloween I found it was actually amusing enough. Next!

This movie starts out as a potential cult film, then quickly proceeds to take a Kamakazi dive into suck. Every film festival that gave this movie an award should have its license revoked for incompetence. The "acting", and I used the term "acting" sarcastically, will give you a headache. A porno has better acting...and better lighting, and better story. The actors had absolutely no chemistry and were too clueless to know when they were suppose to be scared. The director/writer was probably too busy dreaming up fx gimics that haven't been used since the invention of sound. A note to any "filmmakers", if you don't have the budget to make a real horror movie, then at least do yourself a favor and make it a horror comedy. That way people can at least get a laugh out of the campy entertainment value. My roommates made me do laundry and dishes for a week, and I'm officially banned from bringing home anymore horror flicks.