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Overall Rating : 2/10
Directed By : Steve Sessions
Debbie Rochon (Skin Crawl)
Brinke Stevens (Slumber Party Massacre)
Jeff Dylan Graham (Terror Toons 2)
Eric Spudic (Killers By Nature)
Supplied By : Lionsgate Films
Film Reviewed By : Rick L. Blalock
Date Reviewed : August. 16, 2007
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| PLOT Fifty years ago, a bridge collapsed in the small coastal town of Port Emmett, plunging a circus train into the dark water below. The clown car was never recovered. Now, an innocent group of residents are visited by an unspeakable horror as the zombie clowns emerge from the bay to exact their revenge on the descendants of those who left them for dead a half-century ago. |
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| THE REVIEW Years ago in the costal town of Port Emmett during a hurricane a circus train crashed, falling from the bridge, the clown car was submerged under water and later was never recovered. Years later the clowns that had died have came back as Zombies to wreak revenge on the current residences of the small town. Lionsgate has a tendency of releasing some really low budget films direct to video, as financial gain for Lionsgate is not guaranteed when they release them, they do little to no advertising with them, but they do however give them top notch cover art in hopes to at least catch the average movie renter's attention. Often times these films haven't been that great, and someone that rents or buys them because they were quickly drawn in by the snazzy cover art, unfortunately learns this after their hard earned money is spent. A number of Lionsgate's direct to video films have focused on clowns, with titles like S.I.C.K., MR. JINGLES and FEAR OF CLOWNS. out of those three, only FEAR OF CLOWNS was worth my time(I saw a Director's cut version, far longer than Lionsgate's cut). Well, following their "clown trend", they release yet another clown themed Horror movie called DEAD CLOWNS, Since DEAD CLOWNS was made in 2003, I had heard about it for quite awhile, there was some kind of dispute over the US distribution rights, which caused DEAD CLOWNS to be released elsewhere, while it sat on the proverbial shelf in the country in which it was filmed(as do many other films. For those who had seen DEAD CLOWNS, a majority of them praised it for it's gore if nothing else - making me that much more anxious to see it. A mere three years after completion, it has been released finally in the US via Lionsgate, unfortunately, I saw it to be a film that should've stayed unreleased to us region 1 folks. I will be the first to admit that, I absolutely love clowns, especially evil clowns, so the thought of anything having to do with Zombie clowns had me interested! I have seen some terrible clown movies(like the first two I mentioned above), and I have seen some great ones, and yes DEAD CLOWNS had a plot with amazing potential, but the way the story was approached totally ruined everything, The film moves at a snails pace, of characters spitting out meaningless dialogue, that at times seems unenthusiastic and improvised, as if the film was shot on-the-fly, not to mention the use of repetitive stock footage. The town of Port Emmett is supposed to be under an enormous storm, so to display this, we get treated to various footage of palm tree and other things getting blown in heavy winds - it's not too fun when things are blatantly obvious. As for the clowns, as I said, they are what had me wanting to see this, and even the films cover art teased me even more. But just like any other cover graphic Lionsgate markets for a film - the clowns look absolutely nothing like the one being advertised. Instead, the clowns look like nothing more than graveyard skeletons in clown suits and shoes, and are really unattractive and un-scary. The camera rarely features their faces, and I guess this is a technique to hide just how awful they look, who knows - but one thing it does is diminishes the clowns' screen presence, throwing any purpose for this movie being made out the window.... Surprisingly enough, DEAD CLOWNS has a great cast, with the likes of Debbie Rochon, Brinke Stevens, and guys like Eric Spudic and Jeff Dylan Graham, who have showed that they are talented in the Indie Horror genre. The acting wasn't bad at the fault of the actors I thought, but rather because none of the characters were developed at all, with the exception of Brinke Stevens' character - which was also poorly developed. It just seemed like someone wanted to combine NIGHT OF THE LIVING DEAD and CLOWNHOUSE, so they just got a bunch of actors and made a silly film about Zombie clowns killing them. This film could've been accomplished by amateur actors, why would someone as talented as a Debbie Rochon waste her talent on a pointless film like this, and continue to do so? - It is completely beyond me... Overall, DEAD CLOWNS rates right up there with S.I.C.K. and MR. JINGLES when it comes to bore factor. When I finished watching this I could'nt shake the thought from my head of having wasted my time watching this, and here I sit wasting more of my time writing about it. |
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| GORE
METER 5/10 There is plenty of gore, but not the highly effective kind....more like the highly exaggerated cheesy-laughable kind. |
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| MUSICAL
SCORE 2.5/10 The score was very generic, and often times didn't seem to fit in with the scenes it accompanied. |
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| OVERALL
IMPRESSION OF THE FILM On the cover art for DEAD CLOWNS, three websites are quoted, one well known site, one that i'd never trust at all, and one i've never heard of, and they all hail it as some kind of gory masterpiece. After seeing this film, its obvious those three individuals just wanted attention. Sure it had gore, but it was not well done and unbelievable, as for the rest of the story? It really has none....in other words this film has nothing to keep your attention, nor any real purpose. |
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