it's all "The Rage" if you like putrid filmmaking

It's a "classic splatter-fest," they said.

It's "one hell of a gory good time," they said.

But after enduring what could've been the longest 86 minutes of my life at the hands of this movie, Robert Kurtzman's "The Rage," I can safely say that I'm never believing anybody who endorses this movie ever again.

I must admit, however, that being the horror film junkie that I am, I was sucked in by this film's appealing cover, with said endorsements peppering the graphic of a rather unhealthy-looking face trapped in a cannister of mystery liquid. Seeing that it was directed by the dude who did makeup for a lot of 80s horror movies, such as "Friday the 13th" and a couple "Night of the Living Dead" installments if I'm not mistaken, I decided to give it a shot. (Hell, I was bored on a weeknight and my girlfriend was busy. What to do besides rent schlocky horror movies and drink beer, right?!)

Wrong.

Something should've triggered a red flag somewhere in my head when I realized "The Rage" was directed by a dude who normally does makeup, but inexplicably, I rented the fucking thing anyway.

The film stars two people named Andrew Divoff and Erin Brown (the latter of which has a resume' that includes a starring role in "Bikini Women on Dinosaur Island.") Divoff plays your stereotypical misunderstood German mad scientist who's pissed at the world because the gestapo came and destroyed his research when they found out he discovered the cure for cancer. They stole his ideas and tied him up in some secret prison somewhere to torture the living shit out of him for some time to come, which of course drove him completely insane. AND! AND! GASP! This mysterious cure for cancer was "mutated" by herr doctor after the torture and such made him a little disgruntled, and the results turn everyone into bloodthirsty freaks who look like Ron Perlman.

But, you see, we find all this out in the final 15 minutes of the movie, at which point the script decides to suddenly not suck. If you're still watching at this point, I congratulate you, because I was near the point of completely losing interest after a pack of virus-crazed vultures chase a pack of non-actors into an RV after they run over Reggie Bannister. (Why they had to kill the only actor with any horror movie significance whatsoever attached to his name in the first 20 minutes just speaks volumes about how infuriating this movie really is.)

The pinnacle moment of pure unfiltered Suck in "The Rage," however, came in the final few minutes. The barrel-chested, long-haired hero and boyfriend to Erin Brown's character, Kat, says to Divoff, "Let her go you crazy madman!"

Not only was the delivery among the worst and most unconvincing I've ever heard, but the tone the actor used would've been more appropriate for something out of a bad Saturday morning cartoon.

Fuck, even my cat jumped off the couch in disgust.


The Verdict:


Would be good for a drunken night of heckling the shit out of a terrible movie, but otherwise, don't waste your money.