Treevenge (2008)

Instant Favorite.

Great Film overall

Good movie but grossly overrated

what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.

The festive film begins with a bunch of chlorophyll-thirsty manic lumberjacks, slashing and cutting their way into a neighbourhood of firs. Small children, parents and grandparents are violently torn from their roots. We see and listen all of this from the tree's perspective, we are watching from their eyes (?) and listening from their ears (??). Another proof that plants have feelings. You could say that "Treevenge" is based on true events. Every year just before Christmas, a genocide happens in every Christian country of the world. Millions of firs are been viciously mutilated on the altar of profit. This year things will be different though. On Christmas Eve a miracle will happen, the vengeful spirit of Christmas will possess the homes of Christian families, and in particular their Christmas trees. On Christmas day, when children gather under the balls (the Christmas balls) to open their presents, the trees will also give them a present, a slow, painful and above all funny death. The firs will get their hardwood revenge on literally everyone in the most festive way! What the trees have been through at the beginning of the film, the humans will at the end of it. Buckets of blood, dark humour, practical effects and a soundtrack straight from the 80's, including the opening theme from Cannibal Holocaust! Blast from the past.For a more detailed review of this check out my blog videogasp.blogspot.com

"Treevenge" is a 16-minute movie from 7 years ago written and directed by Jason Eisener. His most famous work so far is probably "Hobo with a Shotgun" starring Rutger Hauer. This one here is among his earlier works and as you may have guessed from the title, it is a (Christmas) tree revenge movie. It is basically what you would expect as such, nothing more nothing less. The bad thing is that this one runs for 14 minutes only without credits and it takes 10.5 minutes of introduction until the trees finally take revenge. Not acceptable in my opinion. 4 minutes introduction, 4 minutes gore would have been perfectly appropriate. The way it is here, you are already half asleep when this film finally gains real steam. When it does, it's good, but with all the boredom of the first minutes, I cannot recommend it to anybody except serious horror movie fans. thumbs down.

Sit back, relax, and enjoy Treevenge for all its bloody goodness. It's a "they fight back" saga that one hasn't really seen before, unless perhaps one is so well versed in Troma knowledge that they could dig up an example and look like the smarty-pants of the room. But for the moment, I can't think of another example of photosynthetic comeuppance aside from this, where trees cut in the forest are cut down for Christmas, and fight back against their 'owners'. It's got subtitled tree dialog. It's got dumb-s*** humans in the sticks and trailer parks and homes. It's got so much blood you'd think that the blood coordinator from Dead-Alive stopped by to pitch in on the fun. And it's so much fun, on both an intellectual level and on that visceral bloody-fun level that only the best in Troma can bring out (or just creative comedy horror in general) can bring out. It also reveals that Jason Eisner, the director and also the force behind the little-seen Grindhouse trailer (only shown in Canada with the Rodriguez/Tarantino film but also infamous online), has a real potential career ahead of him. What Treevenge exactly spells of it I can't say with the best crystal ball. But there will be something, with blood perhaps.

If you haven't seen this short, do yourself a favor and go watch it online. I just went on Joblo.com and I noticed they had posted this short and being that it's from the people that brought us Hobo with a Shotgun, I had to check it out. It's about 16 minutes long and it works in two ways being a parody of slasher movies from the 70s and 80s and actually being a gory comedy/horror film, it totally accomplishes both. I really don't want to give away too much because there are a few moments that will shock the hell out of you and make you laugh at the same time. Basically it's about Christmas trees that take their revenge on humans on Christmas day. The set up works extremely well for the gory payoff in the third act. Being a fan of The Canadian show Trailer Park Boys I was extremely happy to see Sarah Dunsworth and Johnathan Torrens(aka J-roc) in this. This is a really entertaining short, it's very funny and I loved the Fulci-esquire gore. My favorite line "It's Christmas and I wanna f*ck!". I really hope to see more from these filmmakers, excellent work.