Jackals

A family employ a former Marine to kidnap and help reverse the brainwashing that their one son has under gone when he joined a dark and dangerous evil cult. The members want him back and lay siege to the family's isolated house. Jackals has a very basic plot but that does not matter, this movie is an exercise in terror and suspense, of violence and darkness. It is well acted and shot, the location gives a real feel of isolation and helplessness. The cult members, all dressed in leather and wearing creepy animal style masks, look terrifying. The movie is set several decades before it was made, I don't know why - perhaps it was to eliminate the ability of any body trapped inside the family home to use their cell 'phone and call for help? (needless to say the landline had been cut off). Overall a pretty decent 85 minutes, better than The Strangers.

Imagine your child has decided to identify with a cult. Not just any hippy, love is the answer, group of petal pushers. This one is calculated, large in numbers, and not prone to losing members.

The history of Jackals screenplay was written early in the torture porn industry created by Saw, Hostel, and Wolf Creek. Years later, the script was finally realized, ironically, by Saw editor and director Kevin Greutart. Let the games begin.

First of all, the Halloween influenced opening is solid and grabs you from the get go. Silent, yet violent and revealing. Soon after, an off-road kidnapping takes place; all the while mirroring a small family unit taking solace in a cabin.

Colliding head on, the plot takes shape. The kidnapping is that of said families estranged son/boyfriend/brother in an attempt to deprogram him from the cult he fell in to. Credit to Stephen Dorff as the military deprogrammer, getting lean and mean while still staying sympathetic to the family.

Soon, as expected, the cult come knocking at the door; wanting a sheep from their flock back home. Enter the home invasion aspect of the film. Outside, the cult wants their member back. Inside, the family refuses to give up their own.

Had this film been made when it was meant to be, it would have been released theatrically along side Saw IV and Hostel 2. Jackals does feel a bit dated, however, there is a lot of heart injected into each of the characters. Good and bad. So much so, that a sequel wouldn't be out of line. It's rare to find a DTV film that asks you: How far will you go to save a member of your family; even if it costs you the remainder of the rest of them.

Just another knockoff of The Strangers. In fact, this director worked on that movie, so I guess that's where he got the idea. The bad guys here have slightly more motive than in The Strangers, they're attacking this house to get one of their members back, but beyond that we know absolutely nothing about them or their motives, only that they're another group of mysterious masked people who like to arbitrarily torture and murder anyone in their way.

It's not a terrible movie, but it doesn't really do anything new or interesting either. It's watchable, but completely unmemorable. Don't expect any form of satisfaction from the ending either.

One more thing. Why did they bother to make this set in the early 80's? It seemed to have no bearing at all on the plot or characters and if it wasn't for the old style TV and picture of Ronald Reagan on a mantle that they show for a few seconds in the beginning, you'd never know this was supposed to be happening in the 80's. There's no 80's feel to anything in the movie. Somehow I suspect that they did this for the sole purpose of creating an excuse for no one to have a phone...

Just pure and simple lazy writing. Movie had potential but it was obviously rushed in hopes that the creators would just hope that the movie watchers don't have a brain. And just go eww ahhh scaryyy.. lame!

I've dig movies like this; a small group of people stuck in a location that fight for their lives against a cult/gang in order to make it through the night. It's a sub genre of thrillers and horror films that we don't get that often and it's a real shame; movies such as "Straw Dogs", "Assault on Precinct 13", and last year's "Green Room" are phenomenal examples of that specific type of movie I'm referring to. While this I wouldn't say is quite on par with the ones I just mentioned, I still found this to be a very intense ride.

Going into this movie, I had no idea as to where it was going or even what it was about. I knew the title and that it was some sort of horror film judging from its box cover. And truth be told, that is probably the best way to go into this movie, so if you are curious to check this out if you are in the mood for a terrifically suspenseful and somewhat gory thriller then skip this review now and go straight to it. I believe it is worth the watch, but if you'd like to hear some of my thoughts well...you're in luck because I don't feel like shutting up just yet.

A movie like this can run into major problems with the characters, particularly that they're just flat out unlikable. Fortunately the writer and director seem to know what they're doing and make sure that even when the characters are being assholes, they're still believable as to why they're doing what they're doing. Every character's motivation is clear and works well in order to create a tense atmosphere for their situation. The score and direction reminded somewhat of John Carpenter's early filmography, especially with its opening scene paying homage to Carpenter's "Halloween" and once the cult shows up in the film it is reminiscent of his film "Assault on Precinct 13" with how they're shot. Speaking of the cult, I did like that this movie captured them as an extremely imposing and intimidating force to be reckoned with. Also, because of this being the kind of movie that it is, it is relatively unpredictable as to how things are going to end, which I also liked about it.

I have issues, honestly some major ones at that. Such as some characters doing some really stupid things occasionally, yet at the same time I had to think about what I would do in the situation and if push came to shove I may have done similar things. Plus this is supposedly based on a true story, so for all I know all of this is completely accurate as to what actually happened. Although with how it ends, which is ridiculously abrupt, it makes me question as to how much of this is factual. Another problem I have with the last act is that a certain character is made out to have a "change of heart" about something that didn't make much sense, granted it turned out to have been a trick, but still the film seemed to be under the impression that I was suppose to buy into this notion. Yet nothing up to this point ever led me to believe that this character would have actually changed like that, which only resulted in making the remaining moments of the movie predictable and I had to wait for it to catch up with me. One last little tidbit, while I did like the opening sequence of the film, it was also pretty pointless; not connecting to really much of anything with the actual story. As though it were inserted at the beginning because the filmmakers needed something in order to get the audience on edge early, but had very little to bridge the gap to do so. Still a neat opening and does introduce the viewer to what they're in for, I just would have liked it to have been better connected to the main plot is all.

One last nitpick was that I had to constantly remind myself that this was taking place in the 1980s. Something about how a large sum of this film is shot and edited, how the characters look, how they're speaking for some reason never felt like I was watching something that was set in 1983. I can't quite put my finger on it. Even the locations that the movie used I sat and thought to myself, "Well I guess this could be taking place in the 80s, or the present". There wasn't anything that stood out to me as, "Yes, this is obviously in the 80s" and because of that I kept wondering "why aren't they just using their phones to call the cops or something?" but then I have to think about it for a moment and remember that this is supposed to be 1983. I don't know exactly what it was about this movie, but that was a problem I kept coming across throughout the run time. Granted, it is a really stupid nitpick that is only the result of the film's probable low budget, but it was still a slight distraction that I thought was worth mentioning.

Regardless of all the negatives listed, I still found this to be an intense slasher that is serviceable for a few scares if that's what you're looking for. It's nice to get a movie like this as apposed to the countless ghost/demon possession we seem to get all the time now. Don't get me wrong, there are plenty modern ghost/demon/possession films that are just fine if not truly great. But I just miss having a little more variety. As much as I love "The Conjuring", I wouldn't mind getting more like this one here. Especially in the theater, which is almost practically an extinct option currently. Anyways, give this a watch. I think it's worth your time if what I have said sounds appealing.