PEEPING BLOG

PEEPING BLOG

I was mildly entertained by Creep Creepersin’s easy on the eye and brain effort DING DONG DEAD recently. Well, the maverick director is back with his latest fare - but this time, humour is at a premium. The taboo of STALKING is the subject of his movie PEEPING BLOG which boasts that it has been called "...the PARANORMAL ACTIVITY of stalker films..." on the discs packaging.

The opening scene starts with the clicking and clacking of a computer keyboard as our blogger reveals the dubious statistic that "1 in 12 women will be stalked in their lifetime.... 15% will be killed at the hands of their stalker.." He somewhat menacingly concludes his blog with .."…and I just got a camera..."

And off we go into a POV scene tracking a blue Ford Explorer. We follow it into a typical suburban retail park and wait… The driver, a female in her 30’s emerges. We watch as she enters a coffee shop. There is no dialogue (obviously) but we are treated to the nasal snort of the driver! She sits on a table and through our windscreen we observe her sipping her coffee and reading her book. Now I am not saying the movie is slow but the paragraph you just read pads out the first 20 minutes of the movie!!

Next we find ourselves in her apartment where the stalker helps himself to a microwave meal from her freezer before ‘concealing’ his somewhat lumbering frame behind a hat-stand as she returns. We observe as she watches TV. She makes a phone call. She watches more TV and 35 minutes in and I am beginning to understand that to be a good stalker you need to be able to breathe quietly and be bloody patient!

She leaves momentarily and we finally get to the good stuff: The obligatory "smell the underwear and caress her toilet seat" scene that all self-respecting ‘stalking’ movies should have.

The picture trundles on in similar fashion until the welcome end credits creep up the screen after an hour and a quarter of good ole fashion peeking!

Ok, first things first: The only comparison with Paranormal Activity I could find is the fact a digital camcorder is used. It’s like comparing Toy Story to the Wild Bunch simply because both movies have cowboys in them!

And don’t expect any gore either. But what it does lack in gore it makes up for with creativity. I guess when your film contains a kinky attack by means of a fly-swat and dildo, it goes some way in justifying the self-applied ‘super artsy cinema verte’ moniker doesn’t it?!

There are some interesting ‘EXTRAS’ featured on the disc. The ‘deleted scenes’ actually show some blurred typing of the blog among other things. But my personal favourite has to be the director reassuring the actress that:

a) He won’t break her nose with the dildo and

b) The dildo came straight out of the packaging before the scene.

You see, she was worried that the sex toy had previously been… well I think you can figure that one out yourselves mutees!

There is a short interview with chain-smoking Mr Creepersin also included that almost induced yours truly to a coughing fit. What I am referring to is my suspicions that the guy even goes to sleep with a lit cigarette hanging lazily from his bearded his mouth!

It’s just a shame that a commentary track wasn’t included. I imagine it to go something along the lines of… "Yeah this was the second scene we shot and the chair you see on your screen now belongs to my uncle. He has owned it for… man, must be about 8 years now. Unusual to see a chair with brown AND orange cushions ain’t it? Yeah… it’s some chair….." And so on and so forth!

On a serious note, I honestly think Creepasin missed a golden opportunity here. Stalking is indeed a seedy little subject and could potentially make a very gritty movie. Take us into the intricate functioning of a stalkers demented mind etc. And you know what? You don’t even need a sizable budget or massive cast to do a movie like that. But if truth be told, PEEPING BLOG is a rather monotonous affair with the odd laugh and predictable shock.

Anyway gotta run – the cute chick that works in the local bakers finishes in ten minutes and I need to get a decent parking spot just out of view…!

Review by Marc Lissenburg


 
Released by CREEPERSIN FILMS
Region 1 - NTSC
Not Rated
Extras :
see main review
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