Writer/director Donnie Hobbie brings us Jump Scare, a shout-out to The Texas Chainsaw Massacre while adding his own touch to this horror comedy about a female metal band who retreat to a remote cabin and come across a family of cannibals living next door.
It’s circa the 1980s, and Jump Scare, the band, hasn’t been together in two years. Jen (Erin Ruth Walker), Kye (Shannon Dang), Debbie (Madison Abbott), and Val (Chelsea Talmadge), seeking inspiration for their next album, end up at a cabin where another band, Blitzchasm, died. The place is creepy, to say the least, and their aspiring producer, Dale (Casey Morris), discovers that the van they arrived in now has a flat tire—and unfortunately, they were already driving on the spare tire.
Dale heads to a neighbor’s house to use their phone to call for help. When he arrives, he walks into the living room, notices two neon crosses on the wall, and is suddenly struck on the back of the head. When he doesn’t return, Kye and Jen go looking for him. At the neighbor’s house, they meet Karen (Natasha Estrada), a smoking, cross-bearing redhead with horn-rimmed glasses and an eye patch. Of course, she hasn’t seen Dale, and there’s no phone, but she does offer the girls a fruitcake. Although the others know better, Val digs in and eats, leading to dire consequences. Fed up, the group ventures out and encounters the “other” members of Karen’s family, and that’s when things get really interesting.
“Fed up, the group ventures out and encounters the ‘other’ members of Karen’s family…”
The first thing I have to say about the film is: bravo. From what I could tell, this is Donnie Hobbie’s feature directorial debut after making many shorts. In the spirit of the band, let me say that Hobbie hits all the right “notes,” from the choice of genre to the casting, pacing, and visual style.
The cinematography is one of the film’s biggest strengths. A desaturated look gives the movie the feel of a grindhouse film, and Hobbie’s experience as a cinematographer is on full display. What could have been a flat production is additionally elevated with fun animated sequences that took me back to MTV’s Liquid Television, which those in Generation X will likely remember as the first home of Beavis and Butt-Head.
The editing is equally effective. Although it’s called Jump Scare, in some ways it could just as easily have been called Jump Cut. Hobbie makes frequent use of jump cuts, keeping scenes moving while preventing them from becoming stale. It’s not a technique I’d recommend using often, but it works here in much the same way YouTube creators use quick cuts to keep viewers engaged.
It’s refreshing to avoid the typical horror movie girl-in-distress stereotype. Instead, we get a confident, funny, and direct group of women who relish swinging an ax. This isn’t a hyper-realistic horror film. It doesn’t take itself seriously, and that’s part of its charm. It has a tone reminiscent of Assassination Nation, Grindhouse by Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez, and classic exploitation films.
The movie can easily be dismissed as a low-budget comedy-horror, but it definitely shouldn’t be. It’s punk. It’s metal. It’s full of fake blood, angst, sass, attitude, and sharp objects.
