Sunday, November 18, 2012

The Hills Have Eyes 2 (2007)

I don't think I'm alone in liking The Hills Have Eyes remake.  I sort of forgot there was a Hills Have Eyes 2 until I was flipping through the channels this afternoon and saw that it was going to be on SyFy.  Wes Craven apparently wrote this sequel with his son.  He's really fallen off since Scream, hasn't he? 

This movie could basically be called "National Guard people doing stupid crap." Also there's all kinds of random backstories and such that are never fully explained.  Basically, the Army is stationed on the land where all the nonsense went down with the cannibals two years prior.  It looks like they're building some sort of thing in the mines that looks like those fake families/setups from the last movie. 

A group of National Guard trainees show up for some exercises, and are surprised to see that the camp is empty.  They see a distress signal from afar, and hear some garbled communication on the radio.  So they set off on a search and rescue mission.  Of course, the cannibals are lurking, but they're not as creepy or scary as in the first remake.  The group plods about, making fun of each other, and generally not watching within two feet of themselves as the cannibals pick them off one by one.  There's some randomness thrown in, like a guy living in a porta-potty with cuts all over him.  And also an Army guy who was maybe trying to find/kill the cannibals?  It's not really explained.

They get stranded near the top of the mountain with no way to get down, and think that their only way out is through the mines.  Bad idea, of course.   But there's a nice cannibal who wants to help them out, so maybe it's okay.  He's kind of the "Ruby" of this movie.  Lots of cannibal and human deaths ensue.

I did like the grossness of the opening scene to this movie, which we then never revisit!  It's a girl tied to a bed with super long gross toenails having a baby.  But she's just a baby machine, so she gets whacked right after she pops it out.  But what is the point?  Are they going to eat the baby or raise it as a cannibal?  So many questions, Mr. Craven!

The acting was horrible and the story was meh, but it wasn't the worst two hours I've ever spent on the SyFy channel.  It seemed like it was trying to line up with the Wrong Turn franchise, but I think that series just has a great formula that cannot be competed with. 

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