I found this movie on a list of modern horror movies you probably haven’t seen yet… which was pretty accurate at the time because I hadn’t seen this or even heard of it. This one has the Michael Fassbender in it! It’s basically about this couple who go on vacation to Eden Lake and are terrorized by a group of teenagers. It was a decent movie, but it didn’t do anything new or exciting to earn a re-watch badge with me.
I’ll start with the effects because I’m me and duh. There were 2 shots I remember that had great effects and made me really uncomfortable. One was the close up of Steve’s wounds because they looked pretty realistic and you could see the blood gushing out of them. The second one was when his wife, Jenny, gets the spike through her foot and she’s trying to pull it out. Both disgusting and painful to look at. Don’t believe me? Look at the image for this post and tell me that wouldn’t hurt!
As far as the acting goes, Fassbender was top notch and just like in The Mist, the A-lister steals the show. The kids were decent enough, but I found it extremely difficult to understand what they were saying, with the main kid being the worst offender. The British accent was so thick I could’ve benefited a lot from subtitles. Going back to the main kid, I thought he looked familiar and it turns out he starred in Starred Up a few years after this movie came out which I found very fitting. It’s almost like a sequel to this movie, where his stupid ass gets sent to jail for being a violent psychopath. It nearly makes up for the story which I’ll get into next.
The story itself isn’t too original; a couple goes away and the locals attack them. The execution was good, but it still had some annoyingly cliche scenes. One cliche being “woman hears noise outside tent and man goes to check it out”. Sure it scared me a little bit, but it was too cheap of a thrill for me to really appreciate. Another thing that annoyed me in this movie was that whenever they got into a car they would floor it through the woods. Hello, the guys you’re running from are on foot or, worst case, on bikes. You don’t need to floor it, just drive at a safe woods speed and you’ll get away without getting stuck or crashing.
Eden Lake is an alright one-watch horror film. It has good acting and gore effects, but the story has been done to death. Without Michael Fassbender, I think this would’ve been forgettable, but since he’s in it I’d say it’s worth a watch at least once in your life.
Verdict: 6.8/10 *mumbles something in a British accent*
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