Sawed Off

Act One is the talky part: Marjorie (Eva Hamilton) invites two exes -- pals Jon (Jody Barton) and Frank (Trae Ireland) -- to her woodland cabin where the guys intend to do some hunting. The three friends chat a lot, the dialogue either improvised or very badly written: it's largely incoherent rambling, with some terrible overdubbing. It's not a great start to the film.

Act Two is much more entertaining. The two men go hunting, but Jon is affected by a strange force and accidentally shoots Frank dead. Things take an even darker turn when a duplicate Frank, not happy with being shot, appears and stabs Jon in retaliation. Jon also returns from the dead, and the pair take it in turns to kill each other, a living duplicate of each man appearing shortly after. It's not clear what is causing this supernatural phenomenon, but it's a lot of fun, Frank shooting Jon and planting an axe in his skull, and Jon chopping off Frank's arm and chainsawing off his head.

Act Three is totally baffling: Marjorie turns into a bargain basement deadite (no prosthetic make-up, just bad face paint), shags Jon in the woods, and introduces him to a horned tree demon in a fur coat that promises immortality in exchange for consuming Frank -- or something like that.

4/10 -- just about worth watching for the middle act, which features some reasonable practical gore effects.