Skip to main content

Toolbox Murders (2004) - Tobe Hooper

This updated version of Toolbox Murders is brought to us from horror icon Toby Hooper. This feature is bloody and raw but reeks of the early 2000's. From the colorless and drab setting to the emo actors. Namely, cult actress Angela Bettis. Her performance in May gained her slight success in the horror movie world. She is a great actress for forgettable roles. 

A young couple Nell (Bettis) and Steven (Brent Roam) move into a dilapidated old "historic" building in Los Angeles. Their neighbors turn out to be extreme caricatures of the usual people you would run into in LA. Slutty actresses, Scumbags, and self-absorbed jerks make up a good deal of the tenants. Early into the new couples stay, Nell finds human teeth in her wall. She is constantly harassed by the amount of commotion that goes on in the building and is certain that someone is murdering the tenants and in quite a brutal fashion. 

The title of the movie describes the how the killer murders his victims. We witness a number of murders with various tools like nail-guns, drills, hammers... etc. The movie has a conspiracy draped around it. The tenants seem to be almost covering up the murders and adding to a growing suspense as Nell is slowly driven crazy. This obsession with finding out what is going on drives her to discover some really interesting and neat plot devices. 

This leads me to the killer. A murderous psychopath named Coffin Baby that had apparently been living unnoticed in a townhouse located inside the historic apartment building!? His prefrerrd method of murdering is bludgeoning and murdering with tools. This character is not very original. However, how original can you get in the horror genre. 

The movie is executed well and it doesn't hurt that it is well made. Tobe Hooper just felt a bit disconnected from the project. Perhaps he wasn't proud of his work? Although it does have a ton of highlights and, to me, serves as a terrific remake despite the slight snags. Great movie for a Halloween marathon. 


  • Christian Bale stated in an interview that he tried hard to contact Tobe Hooper for the role of Steven Barrows and even personally recorded and sent a screen test of himself, but was never called back. He instead focused on scoring the role of Bruce Wayne/Batman in Batman Begins.
  • Lucky McKee was originally set to play the part of the killer, but dropped out to work on his own horror film The Woods (2006).
  • The tools in the toolbox belong to Tobe Hooper.

Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Human Monster (1939) - Walter Summers

Bela Lugosi turns in a fantastic performance. It is right on par with the exact same films that had made him famous like Dracula . My personal favorite being The Black Cat . Like the latter, this film suffered from poor circulation and lack of advertisement. Either that or the public wasn't interested in seeing Lugosi in anything else other than his famous bloodsucker. This film has a broad and well acted plot that was rich with detail.  Lugosi has two sides in this picture. His well loved and compassionate side. The other is a strict, brutal lone shark that acts as a sinister villain to blind and handicapped people. He really brutalizes his victims. It's a macabre message to pay your bills.  The film is slow moving and plagued by the usual setbacks from its time. Most of the nation wasn't really that concerned with horror at the time. But studios knew that they would always have an audience. This film is a prime example of that. It's sad because it's 
1 comment
Not scared yet? »

Ju-On (2000) - Takashi Shimizu

Watching Japanese horror is similar to watching British comedy. If you enjoy dry whit then you probably enjoy the boys of Monty Python in drag. That's the joke, they're dressed like women. Get it? Well, that's British humor. But if you're like most Americans you probably prefer Adam Sandler farting his way across a football field and hooking up with chicks that are way out of his league. Americans usually prefer this more in your face, crass brand of humor. My point is funny in England is different from funny in the US. The same goes for J-Horror. What the Japanese consider scary is very different from what Americans consider scary and it shows in this horror film. Japanese horror is generally slow (a little too slow sometimes), suspenseful and creepy. Ju-On is a creepy effing film. The movie has almost no soundtrack. It is incredibly suspenseful and the pay-offs are pretty awesome, but I think that it was done better in the American version (cultural t
Post a Comment
Not scared yet? »

Inseminoid (1981) - Norman J. Warren

What can be said for mindless schlock pictures like this one. They were pumped out in droves during the eighties. Inseminoid !? give me a break! It sounds like some pre-pubescent teenage boys came up with the title. On the plus side the movie isn't horrible to look at and it has a decent amount of gore. If you can separate yourself from the political incorrectness, then you might have a perfectly decent Sci-Fi Monster Feature.  A research team exploring caves on Jupiter accidentally awakens an ancient alien that rapes and impregnates one of the team members. She suffers from terrible shock and trauma, leading to a complete mental breakdown as her pregnancy accelerates faster and faster. Feeling threatened she decides to kill anyone she deems a threat. Can the rest of the research team survive or will they all become victims of INSEMINOID! Apparently this movie had a million dollar budget. That's really shocking considering the outcome of the picture. The acting
Post a Comment
Not scared yet? »