Review of Small Town Folk

I'm a big fan of the so-called horror/cult sub genre of "Rednecksploitation". This was another typically 70's cinema phenomenon, primarily popularized by the huge success of "Deliverance" and including some glorious titles like "Poor Pretty Eddie", "The Texas Chain Saw Massacre", "Two Thousand Maniacs!" and "Just Before Dawn". These disturbingly demented movies are by definition set in small Southern American communities where the local (and usually inbred) population doesn't care too much about dental hygiene, copulate with barn animals, dance to hideous banjo music and – naturally – rape & kill all the civilized persons passing through their territory. Genuine "Rednecksploitation" movies like that simply cannot be made nowadays anymore, because they're filthy, discriminating, rough and extremely women-unfriendly. When coincidentally stumbling upon "Small Town Folk", I secretly hoped this would be the long-awaited return of hillbilly-horror, or at least a competent enough homage to the good old days. And this miniature British production surely had a lot of things going for it. The British as well have their very own cinematic Rednecksploitation classic ("Straw Dogs"), the film was entirely put together by a group of friends (which usually means fewer restrictions) and the cover promisingly depicts black-teethed & crazy-eyed posing with scythes and axes! Unfortunately the film isn't nearly as good as it looks, but still I can't bring myself at writing overly negative stuff. After all, there's a lot of obvious goodwill and ambition present in this, just the execution and eventual outcome is somewhat unsatisfying. For some reason, maybe to make the film more accessible for wider audiences, the digital filming style and narrative structure makes "Small Town Folk" look like a fantasy-tale as much as like a horror film. The fantasy and comedy aspects inevitably undercut the horror ideas and eventually the film becomes too silly to pass for a full-blooded horror film and yet too grim & bloody to pass for a fantasy flick to watch with the whole family. The story is standard, with a young couple driving their Jeep through isolated British landscapes and hopelessly getting lost. Two Knackermen – whatever the hell that may be – advise the couple to stay far away from a little place called Grockleton, but naturally that's exactly where they stop to spend the night. The hideous locals are very interested in Susan, since there's a severe shortage of women in Grockleton, but her hubby Rick fights back and he gets some welcome support from a teenage biker armed with a Polaroid camera and a helmet. The Grockleton hicks outwardly live up to the all known stereotypes, but unfortunately none of them gives a convincing performance. The main redneck characters (Landlord, Dobbin…) all severely overact and lack something essentially petrifying. Actually, the only truly menacing-looking ones were those whose faces were covered and didn't talk much, like the scarecrow-brothers and the horseshoe-archer. There are some nice bits and pieces of gore, including a couple of sickle-killings, but "Small Town Folk" never fully feels like the brutal backwoods horror film it ought to have been. Warwick Davis of "Willard"-fame and numerous "Leprechaun" movies makes a small appearance, but few of the stuff he says makes any sense and I seriously have no idea what a Knackerman does for a living. It's not a great film, but if Peter Stanley-Ward and his circle of pals decide to make more films, I won't hesitate to check them out.