Some horror movies try to conceal their terrifying intent with a deep rooted mystery or highly perspective plot (The Shining) while others take the time to slowly build tension through an unseen foe (“Jaws“). The 2002 slasher-junkie Eli Roth movie “Cabin Fever” wastes no time in jumping right in with what it is – an awful movie.
Right from the beginning, the acting, music, and on screen story mirror horror movies my friends and I made as teenagers with clumsy analogue type camcorders and no budget, acting experience, or effects involved. Despite being unpaid and inexperienced sixteen-year-olds, our movies were a lot better.
“Cabin Fever” opens in a thoroughly disgusting way as an incompetent idiot roaming through the woods comes across his dead dog, though he must not be aware that the obvious carcass (with flies buzzing around) is deceased as he foolishly attempts to revive the mutt. Simultaneously, a group of completely objectionable and obnoxious college kids embark on a camping trip. The five friends mimic any stereotypical group of young stupid adults, and other than their one by one deaths, offer nothing else for the movie.
Verbose slut Marcy (Cerina Vincent) is hot and included for no other reason than a handful of strategically filmed scenes – one such depicts a lengthy camera shot showing nothing but her buttocks encased in tight jeans as she leisurely struts into a house. Chubby beer guzzling frat boy Burt (James DeBello) wears a hat embroidered with the etching ‘FU’ and, when asked why he would bring a gun to shoot at squirrels responds with the ignorant “because they’re gay.”
The defacto leader of the group is Jeff (Joey Kern) who looks more like a forty-year-old man and makes a bet with Burt to drink nothing but beer the entire week, and the quintessential best friends since childhood Paul (Rider Strong) and Karen (Jordan Ladd). If you couldn’t have guessed, Paul is in love with Karen though she still sees him as just a friend.
“Cabin Fever” seems to start out as a comical rift on the decades old backwoods staple “Deliverance” as the college friends encounter a rural town filled with bumpkins, hicks, and hayseeds en route to the cabin they have rented. In true “scary” fashion, they are warned by one of the townsfolk to “be careful if they go in the woods.”
The basic concept of the movie is that of a mysterious flesh eating virus that takes over a living host before quickly destroying it in a gruesome fashion. “Cabin Fever” would have succeeded better as a comedy, in the mold of a “Scary Movie” since it isn’t at all scary, but it turns out to be nothing more than a sickening blood fest.
I understand the appeal of a simple gory horror film, but it always helps if the people making said film put forth a modest amount of effort. Scenes in “Cabin Fever” border on the ridiculous like an otherwise fine vehicle not starting at a key moment, a guy grabbing a six pack of beer before running into the woods to escape near death, or a girl in a row boat reaching a neighboring camp at the same time her friend gets there on foot.
Some scenes do depict memorable deaths, but they are all done in such a way that you will feel nauseous, not scared. The acting is abysmal on all fronts, which I guess should be expected from a fairly unknown crew, but you’d think students in a high school drama class could have produced better results.
By the end of “Cabin Fever” you’ll be rooting for the virus to obliterate everyone as fast as it can so you can start watching anything else.
by – Matt Christopher
