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Cast: Cooper Huckabee, Kiko Ellsworth, Cristen Coppen, Kathy Lamkin
When a group of hikers heads into the mountains of Virginia for some weekend R & R, their pleasant trek goes off the rails when they run into the Stauntons, a deranged family who will do anything to get the interlopers off their land. Now the friends are in a desperate fight for their lives in the isolated backcountry.
The Next generation of Romero is now on the map, this is not Cameron's first directing job but it seems it is his first to get him noticed and no it is not a film about the living dead which is good because we have seen a lot of those kind of movies lately but it doesn't offer anything really new either. The story is simple, a crazy, violent family living in an isolated area is set upon by a group of well meaning, attractive young people who unwittingly are picked off one by one. Staunton Hill does offer up a twist towards the end of the film which I thought was good but for the most part it borrows from many other movies before it. What the film does offer that many don't is the in-your-face violence, you can easily tell Romero is not one to shy away from showing the violence on screen and it offers up some very good gore that should please almost any fan. The cast did a terrific job playing their roles and I must throw in some credit to the effects team for making the blood and guts very real. The story is slow at first, the violence really doesn't kick in till almost an hour into the movie but once it starts it doesn't stop till the very end. Sure the film is lacking any originality but it delivers on what matters most and more than a lot of other movies that came before it. If your looking for something different I think you might end up being a little disappointed but if over-the-top violence is what you enjoy in your horror movies then this is one for you. So in the end Staunton Hill is an enjoyable "B" horror flick that makes up for being predictable with some good gore scenes,some actually so gross that you almost want to look away. If your a horror buff I recommend picking this one up, the pace is pretty good and the characters are interesting enough to keep you from getting bored until the action kicks in. It is nice to see Cameron following in his father's footsteps and I look forward to seeing what his next project will be.
Released by Anchor Bay Entertainment
*** Out Of *****