[yasr_overall_rating]
Daisy is the all-American girl next door with a hunger for true love and an appetite for murder. Then one day Daisy meets the man of her dreams, only to discover that his own lust for killing might make her his next victim.
Upon first viewing the trailer for “Appetites,” my initial reaction was that of disbelief that we had yet another low-budget movie to look forward to, one that looked disastrous in every sense of the word but I digress. What the trailer doesn’t show you, is the black humor that permeates throughout the entire movie, from beginning to end, which elevates it above mediocrity into “Evil Dead II” territory. While not quite in the same league as Sam Raimi’s cult masterpiece, it most certainly comes close. Director Cameron Casey creates an extraordinary tale filled with unconventional characters, interspersed with outlandish scenes of mayhem and carnage that only add to the already unorthodox narrative.
As the movie begins, Daisy (Lauren Parkinson) and her mute older brother Bubba (Scott Barrows), are chained in the basement of their house by their abusive father Leland (David Harper). After beating Bubba, he proceeds to rape Daisy but upon hearing her screams, Bubba breaks free of his constraints and kills him. As the years go by, the two become inseparable and while he stays in the house, away from civilization, Daisy gets a job waitressing at a local bar in order to pay the bills. But Daisy is not your average small-town girl. She has an appetite for murder and knowing that she has a killer body and looks to match, she enjoys picking up lonely male hitch-hikers and then hunting them on her fenced-in property.
After killing them, Bubba brings them back to the house where he dismembers the bodies and they spend quality family time dining happily on their corpses. At the same time, a new stranger to town, John Doe (Bret Roberts), makes an impression on Daisy as he frequents her bar but unbeknownst to her, John has a deadly secret of his own, he seeks out any and all lonely women he can locate who, according to him, have abused their bodies through the medium of tattoos and kills them. When he and Daisy finally meet, they fall for each other, both oblivious to each other’s unique characteristics but that all changes when in the throes of passion, John discovers a small tattoo on Daisy’s stomach.
Unable to restrain himself, he pulls away from her, literally and figuratively, disgusted with her body graffiti and she quickly ascertains that he is just another loser but this is by no means the end. As he follows her home, with every intent of killing her, he is genuinely surprised when he sees her picking up a lonely drifter and as he proceeds to follow her, he is dumbfounded as he watches her give chase and eventually kill him. After Bubba takes the body back to the house, Daisy heads to town for some groceries and John takes advantage of this opportunity and lays in wait for Daisy’s return. The story never clarifies John nor Daisy’s relenting compulsion to kill members of the opposite sex but that is part of the film’s charm, we just have to accept it and go with it.
“Appetites” employs so much morbid humor it’s difficult to know whether to laugh, cringe or do both. During one scene, after John and Daisy have had their first romantic evening together, the movie breaks into a music video montage of the two together with John singing the song in the forest, playing his guitar. Not the kind of scene you’re used to witnessing in a movie of this genre but it actually works, in a darkly satirical sort of way. Our male protagonist, John Doe, looks like a scruffy Lorenzo Lamas from “Renegade” but when he speaks, he is more comparable to that of Michael Jackson than the deep commanding voice you would typically associate with a guy of his stature. “Appetites” will assuredly not be to everybody’s liking but if you can get past the cheesy musical numbers, the melodramatic acting and the lack of any genuine character development, then you might just have some fun!
Available on DVD August 4th
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ioFXAlysH5I
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What dear critic “cheesy musical numbers”? But that is what make this film fun, unless you are just looking for a sadistic slasher film with no heart. The allure of this film is you like it although the content is disturbing, which make you think what is wrong with me; it is sick twisted and fun in my humble opinion. I want to see it again – man I am sick!