Freak Out
(British Horror Comedy)
Picture: C+ Sound: B- Extras: C Film: C
In a new
cycle of independent productions about geeks, Christian James’ Freak Out (2005) is a British entry
with much promise, but one that unfortunately does not pan out as well as it
should have. The geek here has a best
friend who is also not all there, which leads both to try and turn a local kid
with mental health issues into a clone of slasher killer/heroes. This one has a hockey mask. Instead of turning into Fade To Black or something as mature, it is a comedy and become Weekend At Bernie’s with some
potential.
This is
not to say anyone is dead or this would then be Alfred Hitchcock’s The Trouble With Harry, but the biggest
problem is that we are never convinced that Marv the Geek (James Heathercoate)
is such a big fan or even knowledgeable about anything to do with Horror. It should be added that plastering a bedroom
set with great posters is not sufficient and this deficiency epitomizes the
lack of grace of the screenplay by James and Dan Palmer, who might not be sure
if they are just goofing around or making a movie. Too bad, because the actors are interesting
throughout.
The
anamorphically enhanced 1.85 X 1 image is on the soft side, looking like it was
shot on video versus film and a bit mixed to boot. James shot this too. The Dolby Digital 2.0 and 5.1 mixes are not
bad, but the 5.1 is better and there is a real effort to make the surrounds
work, even when they do not. This makes
the combination more watchable than it otherwise might have been. Extras include two audio commentary tracks on
the first DVD, then DVD 2 has a making of featurette (it took four years to
finish this), piece on Internet critics discussing the film, 17 deleted scenes,
spoof film, sketch with all the characters, Music Video tied to the film,
effects for the finale to be seen after watching the feature and 5-minutes-long
student film. That is also as ambitious
as the feature itself, if not always successful, but I would like to see what
James does next.
- Nicholas Sheffo
