Six movies
in. That's pretty amazing when you think about it
because I'm pretty sure no one thought that 'Wrong Turn' would
turn into a franchise in the first place, much less a
franchise that I actually enjoy. More or less. But
now we are in for a bit of a change as the director for the
last three sequels, Declan O'Brien, has jumped ship and turned
over the controls to one Valeri Milev. O'Brien clearly
left Milev with a basic outline of what to do with this movie,
that being lots of boobs and brutal murders, but something
seemed to be missing this time around. Not the boobs and
the murders, those were certainly there, but something else.
So what we have observed up to this point with these 'Wrong
Turn' movies is that they tend to emulate other movies, albeit
with inbred cannibalistic hillbillies inserted. So
whereas 'Wrong Turn 5' was cannibals meet 'Assault on Precinct
13', this is cannibals meets 'The Grand Budapest Hotel' or
something along those lines. Our filmmakers get the
boobs and murder out of the way in the first scene where we
happen upon a very healthy young lady and her man riding their
mountain bikes in the backwoods of Bulgaria pretending to be
some Southern American state. They run across a hot
spring, get naked, do that nature thing, then promptly get
hunted, slashed gutted and beheaded by three finger and his
brothers. By this time you would think the word would be
out that biking, hiking, jogging, or driving through these
woods is not advised, but alas this is clearly not the case.
We won't concern ourselves too much with today's batch of
disposable young adults, just Danny (Anthony Illott) and his
lady love Toni (Aqueela Zoll). Danny is a failed Wall
Street trader who just learned he is adopted and has inherited
a large hotel somewhere in West Virginia, so he drags his
girlfriend and a bunch of disposable but attractive young
adults to survey this rather amazing structure. Waiting
for Danny most anxiously are some of his long lost kin in
brother / sister / lovers Jackson (Chris Jarvis) and Sally
(Sadie Katz). Why are they waiting for Danny? Not
quite sure… something to do with inbreeding and cannibalism I
would imagine.
So Danny
gets the lay of the land, learns about his roots and stuff,
his friends do obnoxious stuff while at the hotel, like steal
stuff and engage in sex in odd places… usually when they have
sex, Sally is hiding somewhere watching because Sally really
likes to watch… until eventually the friends and the
girlfriend find out that everything going on in this place
isn't exactly what it seems. I mean it is what it seems
to us, that they will all be brutally slaughtered and eaten,
but it's a total surprise to them. The question that
needs answered this time around is will Danny embrace the
family business of inbreeding and cannibalism, or will he look
out for his friends and help them make it out the Grand Hotel
alive? Well, if you've observed the way these 'Wrong
Turn' movies go, chances are you already know the answer to
this basic question.
Here's one question I have for Three Finger and his brethren,
in that they seem to eat people meat exclusively.
I mean I've never seen them eat a little salad or corn on the
cob or maybe another meat like chicken. The cool thing
about chickens is if one comes up missing, their pictures
usually aren't put on bulletin boards, say like the
overflowing bulletin board we saw here in fake West
Virginia. Maybe it's time to bring in homeland security
for this issue.
What we are trying to figure out here, personally, is why did
we find Wrong Turns 4 and 5 oddly entertaining , but found
this one strangely inert? The basics of boobs and
brutality were there, but what was missing? I'm thinking
what was mainly missing was Three Finger and his brothers and
the mayhem and carnage they cause. There was some of it,
but not enough of it. They were supporting characters in
their own movie.
This particular episode expands somewhat on the family of
Three Finger and them, with 'Wrong Turn 5' introducing us to
the inbred, deformed kids Uncle Maynard. Now that was
cool in the last movie if for no other reason than Douglas
Bradley and his character of Uncle Maynard was truly something
to see. Chris Jarvis and Sadie Katz as cousins Jackson
and Sally were good, especially Sadie Katz, but neither of
them brought the manic mayhem of Uncle Maynard which made it
far more acceptable for the audience to be away from the trio
of cannibal brothers for extended periods of time. This
also meant we spent far more time with obnoxious, disposable
young adults who haven't yet learned how to act yet.
Mind you, young actors who haven't learned to act yet are also
a staple of these 'Wrong Turn' sequels, but it seemed more
pronounced this time around.
Still, while we were ultimately a little disappointed in this
particular episode of the 'Wrong Turn' series, we do
understand that none of the sequels, outside of 'Wrong Turn 2'
in my opinion, are really 'good' movies in the classic
sense. So with this said, this one does manage to get
the basics right. Boobs and brutality. Maybe
'Wrong Turn 7' will fix what 'Wrong Turn 6' forgot to put into
the mix.
