The Stitcher (2007)

A group of friends head out to a lake house that one of them has just inherited for a weekend of partying hard.  What they don’t know is that a crazed killer lives in the area and is protected by everyone who lives in the town because as one of them states, “Everyone round her is related to me somehow”.  The killer targets anyone who is wearing clothes with buttons, because he likes to stitch them to his skin after killing off his victims.    Why you might ask?  Not to worry because the entire back-story is given in a series of terrible flashbacks, complete with bad black and white digital effects to show you how long ago it was! 

This is a really badly written and acted movie.  The filmmakers are trying to make a slasher movie, which should be a simple endeavor.  But somehow they manage to clog the thing up with too many stupid characters.  For example how many dumb rednecks missing teeth do we really need to have in the movie?  I get it the town is full of hicks, okay so move on.  Know I don’t know if this was supposed to be funny, but it wasn’t.  And before anyone get on my case I actually go see all of Larry the Cable Guy’s movies in the theater, so I’m obviously not that picky!  There are a couple of funny bits of dialogue, but most of the dialogue is just bad.  I was trying to think of a clever word to use but sometimes bad covers it better than anything else could.  The cast manages to spit out the lines without stumbling over them too badly, but that is about the nicest thing I can say about them. 

I recommend that anyone interested in making a short independent movie take the time to watch the Stitcher.  It is an excellent illustration of the mistakes that you will want to avoid.  First of all if you are going to shoot at night or shoot a lot of dark interiors then you need to know how to handle the lighting.  There are so many scenes in this movie where you can’t see a damn thing.  Seriously the entire screen is black with some noises on it.  Kind of makes it hard to watch and know what is going on.  Secondly loud alternative rock music isn’t appropriate for every goddamn scene.  Just because you have friends that are in a band doesn’t mean their crappy music has to be blaring behind and sometimes over the dialogue.  Not that hearing the dialogue would have helped, but I digress.  Thirdly shooting footage isn’t enough, you need to have someone that knows how to edit.  Characters seem to appear out of nowhere, vehicles move by themselves, and the transitions between some of the scenes are awful.  This is all because your editor didn’t keep the movie cohesive.  Though to be fair I’m assuming that the editor cut the scenes establishing the first two and not that the director just didn’t shoot them.  Finally if you are going to make a slasher flick you need to have some blood and boobs.  Not trying to be crude, but that is what these movies are about.  The Stitcher has no good kills scenes and all the violence happens off screen.  All we get to see are people lying on the ground covered in fake blood.  Not a single knife or axe hitting flesh at all!  The movie doesn’t even make up for it by giving us any nudity.  In fact the only nudity comes in what is clearly an insert shot that has nothing to do with the cast.  I’m thinking someone must have asked for it or suggested it to spice things up.  Sadly it didn’t’ work. 

I’ve been accused of being too picky and rough on independent movies in the past.  While I won’t hold them to the standards of a well-funded studio movie I still require that they do something to entertain me.  If I sit thru your movie and at the end can’t figure out why anyone spent the time or money to shoot it then something is wrong.  If you really want to check this out it is available from VCI.  For more information check them out at www.vcientertainment.com/

½ out of 4

reviewed by John Shatzer

© Copyright 2008 John Shatzer