Interpretation: Robert Englund, Lin Shaye, Giuseppe Andrews, Jay Gillespie, Marla Malcolm, Matthew Carey, Dylan Edrington, Mushond Lee, Bianca Smith, Brian Gross, Gina Marie Heekin, Adam Robitel, Brendan McCarthy, Christa Campbell, Wendy Kremer, Kane Hodder .
My thoughts: predictable
Review: "2001 Maniacs" is supposed to be a remake of "Two Thousand Maniacs" by Herschell Gordon Lewis. Although I've never seen this movie, the problem with “2001 Maniacs” is that it's too predictable. .
The story follows 2 distinct groups of young people heading to Daytona Beach Fl. For spring break. Unfortunately, they come across a detour sign on the road and as any good horror fan will know, "Detour" signs always mean "danger" in a horror movie. Before they even knew it, the two groups of teenagers stumbled upon a small town called "Pleasant Valley", where the people, while strange as hell, seem friendly enough. Soon another handful of young people arrive in town, a black guy named Malcolm and his Asian girlfriend Kat.
The citizens of Pleasant Valley make all young northerners their guests of honor and waste no time showing a little southern hospitality. But soon some of the young travelers from the north start to disappear, and it becomes apparent that all may not be what it seems with the supposedly good folks of Pleasant Valley who, behind the backs of the unsuspecting northerners , are planning a huge "Feast" ... literally. "2001 Maniacs" offers a good subplot that explains the sudden appearance of cities out of nowhere. It appears that during the Civil War a group of renegade Northerners wiped out the entire town of Pleasant Valley, all 2001 of its citizens in fact.
Now, they've returned for revenge from the north, the same day their city was desecrated all those years ago, and it became apparent from the start that these northern travelers are going through tough times. However ... it takes a while for travelers to realize this and the question becomes: will they be able to put 2 and 2 together before it's too late? While "2001 Maniacs" certainly delivers in the Blood, Blood, and Splatter department as a whole ... the film lacks an ora of mystery and telegraphs way too soon. It all turns out as you expected until the end, where a little creativity kicks in as the last two survivors fight for their lives. The killings are pretty creative, but you can pretty much figure out who is going to die and in what order, which further enhances the predictable nature of the film. The people of Pleasant Valley themselves are a boring bunch, even the very attractive girls in town are painful to watch when they start talking.
Southern stereotypes of bestiality jokes, incest jokes, and weirdly weird jokes of southerners in general are all over this movie. And that's what kills the fun the most. It would have been a nice change of pace for the people of Pleasant Valley to differ in their personalities rather than having everyone act the same. The teenagers in the film are a little better represented. While we bring out the usual group of guys out to fuck, we also have a guy with two girlfriends who has a huge twist applied to his character later in the movie. You'll have to see it for yourself but take my word for it, it's pretty funny, and we get the interracial couple where the black guy is a biker and digs Led Zepplin ... which is pretty much the ultimate. ultra in creating an exterior the character of the box.
Robert Englund gives a good performance as Mayor Buckman of Pleasant Valley who is rivaled only by Lin Shaye as Granny Boone. But even the two can't completely make up for the rest of the cast who portrayed the citizens of Pleasant Valley in a very poor way. "2001 Maniacs" also has its good points, and director Tim Sullivan who also co-wrote the film with penner Chris Kobin - really knew how to make a "horror movie" out of it. No annoying cuts or shortening scenes to avoid showing too much blood on the screen. No, here we get the whole affair which includes the body crush, the mutilations, the eyeballs sticking out of their sockets, the acid death and two other murders even more twisted than the ones I just mentioned. I just wish they had surrounded all that blood, blood and chaos with better villains.
While I thought Englund was a big bad guy as Mayor Buckman, the other bad guys were either portrayed by bad actors or too boring to be cool baddies. Now you can tell that because I'm a northerner, I don't connect with the whole southern character, which is why I didn't care about most of the bad guys. But conversely, I thought the Firefly clan in "House of 1000 Corpses" which was yet another psycho redneck film, were super villains. But they were a lot more hardcore than the folks in Pleasant Valley, who just felt a bit too cornball and not serious enough to make them good bad guys.
Pros: Creative killings, blood and gore abound, travelers from the north were sympathetic for the most part. The final act of the film which includes a confrontation between the two survivors and Mayor Buckman and the citizens of Pleasant Valley was awesome. Lin Shaye performs well as Granny Boone despite limited screen time.
Cons: With the exception of Robert Englund as Mayor Buckman, the bad guys weren't tough enough, and like I said in the review, everything is explained too quickly to the viewer about what will happen to these kids and How? 'Or' What. I didn't like the ending either, and the chain of events leading up to the films' final ending made me shake my head.
Overall: Average horror movie that has a few elements that keep it from being a total waste of time. Worth a rental when it releases on March 28.