TheTripper

The Tripper (2006)

Do you like chainsaws? Do you hate hippies? Then this just might be the movie for you! Seriously though this is an interesting little flick that revolves around an outdoor music festival that invades a redwood forest that is home to a homicidal maniac that has a real hatred for the granola crowd. This of course isn’t a good mix and soon after the festival crowd shows up the bodies start to appear. But this just isn’t your average redneck in a pair of bloody overall and a ball cap. Nope this killer runs around killing hippies dressed as his favorite president Ronald Regan! Will anyone survive this presidential inspired homicidal maniac? Does a bear crap in the woods? Of course someone lives, I mean there has to be someone left for the sequel.

Right of up front I want to say that I’m a registered Republican and a big fan of Ronald Regan. But I just don’t get the people that get pissed off because this movie is supposedly political. Director Arquette doesn’t seem to have an axe to grind and skewers both the Republican crowd and the lefty-liberal hippie crowd (literally in some cases). So anyone that wants to make this movie anything more than just a slasher flick needs to chill out. Now as a slasher movie I sort of dug it. The setup is there and it is pretty obvious who the killer is. But that doesn’t ruin the movie for me and he does at least try a couple of red herrings to throw the audience off the track. If fact until the last 10 to 15 minutes of the movie I was having a blast. But then the movie does this strange drug trip thing that obscures tons of cool kills and even leaves you wondering about the fate of one of the main characters. This was a real drag and I didn’t like it at all.

The cast is brilliant. Thomas Jane plays the local law enforcement, Buzz Hall, who tries to warn the local authorities that the festival is a bad idea. Even before he starts finding bodies in the woods. Jason Mewes of Clerks fame is perfectly cast as one of the stoners, Joey. He has one of the best lines in the movie after the killer cuts off his hand. Finally my favorite performance in the movie is that of Paul Reubens, who is the concert promoter. There is one scene that is just him on the phone that had me cracking up. The rest of the cast is also very good in their roles. I’m figuring that Arquette called in a few favors to get this much talent in his first directorial effort.

The effects in the movie are pretty good. There is some CGI, but it is well done and is there to support the practical effects. From a good opening where the age-old question hippie vs. chainsaw who wins is answered to a broken arm that had me cringing the Tripper delivers the goods. Plus the movie sports what is some of the best fake poop I’ve ever seen on screen (God I hope it was fake) in what is the most nauseating escape from a slasher ever!

I’m torn on this one. I dig the gore and the story, but the ending bit with the drug trip feels really lame to me. Really this was on it’s way to being a solid film until I saw that on screen. So I have to knock something off of the 3 star rating I was going to give the movie.

2 ½ out of 4

reviewed by John Shatzer