MURDER PARTY

The opening credits sequence sets the scene well here: a small American town, where it's folk are preparing for Halloween - pumpkins sit on doorsteps, people roam the streets dressed as ghouls and balloons hang outside houses adorned with skulls.

Through these carnival-like streets walks Chris (Chris Sharp, GOLDFARP), returning to his shabby apartment with a mysterious invitation in his hands. The invite is to a "Murder Party", and request that he "come alone".

Chris decides it's a worth a go, and after feeding his cat and watching a dodgy horror video (the brilliant-sounding "Scarewolf"), he makes himself an outfit - knight's armour, kitted out with cardboard.

He then leaves for the party, complete with his fancy dress outfit on and some freshly home-baked pumpkin bread as a token gift.

But when Chris eventually arrives at the party destination on the other side of town, he's alarmed to find there's no-one there. When no-one answers the door, he lets himself in to what appears to be a rather run-down and untidy warehouse.

Chris stumbles upon a small group of teenagers, who he learns shortly after have lured him randomly to this destination with aspirations of killing him onscreen for their "art".

But not yet ... the teens tie Chris to a chair and await the arrival of Alexander (Alex Barnett, CRABWALK), who, it becomes apparent from the way the others talk about him, clearly runs the show.

While waiting for Alexander to show, one of the group - a girl named Sky (Skei Saulnier) - decides to pass the time by troughing into Chris' pumpkin bread. However, an allergic reaction to some of the ingredients results in her violently convulsing - smashing her head so severely that she bleeds to death within seconds.

The group frantically hide all trace of Sky's corpse just in time, seconds before Alexander arrives, with his dog Hellhammer and new friend Zycho (Bill Tangradi, LOVESICK) in tow.

One by one, the group tell Alexander how they would like to kill Chris on camera. He listens intently, before rubbishing them all while making a lengthy, pompous speech on the art of murder, and declaring that they will kill Chris in the name of art at the stroke of midnight.

Suitably perturbed by this news, Chris wrestles with the ropes around his wrists and makes a bid for escape ... unsuccessfully.

Shackled to the chair in chains, Chris seems destined to die at midnight. But the group seems destined to implode before then, as they pass the time with booze, injecting drugs and playing bizarre games ...

When one of the group goes insane and Hellhammer eats a whole stash of cocaine, things go from slightly loopy to downright demented ...

MURDER PARTY is very reminiscent of those comedy-horrors that were rife in the late-80's: NEON KNIGHTS, BRAIN DAMAGE, that type of thing. Even the soundtrack is like a naff late-80's compilation, and oddly endearing for that reason.

The film wears its comedic roots proudly on its sleeve, with obvious references to MONTY PYTHON and early Peter Jackson movies standing out.

The humour is handled dryly and avoids annoying slapstick for the main. The violence is surprisingly graphic with some unexpectedly gory murder scenes. The FX work is good, too - better than you'd expect in films of this budget.

Speaking of budget, MURDER PARTY is obviously a low-budget affair (a project by the aspiring "Lab Of Madness" team), written and directed by relative newcomer Jeremy Saulnier (CRABWALK).

Characters are lampoonish caricatures of New York stereotypes - the nerdish civil servant, the moody Goth, the angst-ridden art student etc. All performances are over-the-top, but this suits the schizophrenic tone of the movie.

The script is, admittedly, a little overdone in its attempts to correlate violence with art. The spoken sermons are cringey enough, but there's a couple of later scenes where Saulnier drives the point home visually too - the massacre at an art exhibition, for example. Unnecessary, and not half as clever as intended.

Still, this is largely stylish and engrossing fare nevertheless. The humour isn't too intrusive, and while the first hour may seem a little humdrum the final third is very gory and creative - well worth sticking around for.

The screener disc from Revolver unfortunately didn't have anything in the way of extras (there wasn't even a menu or screen chapters).

However, the film looked good in a sharp, clean anamorphic 1.77:1 transfer.

The English 2.0 audio provided clear, consistent sound throughout.

Well worth a look, nicely priced too.

Review by Stu Willis