The Cottage

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Horrorphile - August 2008

The Cottage

August 28th 2008 01:29

I’d been anticipating this movie ever since March when I was in London at the beginnining of my honeymoon and a double decker bus drove by with a banner for The Cottage (2008). I was like “Oooo! That looks good!” I assumed it would eventually arrive down under, although I hoped it would get a theatrical release. One can never tell these days. I guess it didn’t do the kind of box office business the distributors had hoped for. Apparently the same thing has befallen Neil Marshall’s Doomsday (2008) movie (mediocre box office = DVD only release for Australasia). I hate that shit.

The cottage ... but not the farmhouse

Writer/director Paul Andrew Williams made his debut with the critically-acclaimed drama-thriller London to Brighton. Now he turns his attention to the horror-comedy. For the most part he’s pretty successful. The movie sports a strong central cast, some decent gags and well-executed ultra-violence. But it also falls into the silly pit on numerous occasions and has characters that run dangerously close to annoying (but I’m assuming that’s partly the point). Most importantly, the psycho villain just isn’t that scary, but more on him a little later.

The Cottage Reece Shearsmith, Andy Serkis and Steven O'Donnell

The three stooges: Peter (Reece Shearsmith), David (Andy Serkis) and Andrew (Steven O'Donnell)

Brothers David (Andy Serkis) and Peter (Reece Shearsmith) have kidnapped Tracey (Jennifer Ellison), the foul-mouthed daughter of a powerful gangster who owns a strip-club David frequents. They’ve taken their hostage to a large remote cottage in the countryside for the night and have arranged for Tracey’s crooked step-brother Andrew (Steven O’Donnell) to collect one hundred grand from the boss in ransom money and deliver it to them. Little do they know that the crime lord has had two Chinese hitmen tail Andrew.

Jennifer Ellison as Tracey

To add fuel to the fire of disaster Andrew is a complete moron and he fucks up royally; when he arrives with beers to celebrate, David reveals that instead of cash in the duffel bag there are only wads of toilet paper. To aggravate matters Peter has dropped his mobile phone in the nearby pond and Andrew’s phone battery is dead (David doesn’t own one). David has to drive to the local village to make a phone call. When he returns Andrew is out cold, Peter has vanished and Tracey has escaped.

An at-the-end-of-his-tether David and Andrew traipse off through the woods in search of Peter and Tracey and eventually arrive at the neighbouring farmhouse. It is here where hell really breaks loose. I should also stress that from the get-go (as you’d probably have guessed) The Cottage uses the Murphy’s Law narrative spanner and throws it in the works at regular intervals.

David Legano as the farmer

Tracey discovers one of the farmer's secrets

Both Serkis and Shearsmith are excellent as the bickering chalk’n’cheese brothers. The motivation that drives them is acquisition: Peter wants the deed to their dead mother’s house which is in David’s name, but David won’t give it up until he’s got the cash to buy a super-yacht so he can bugger off outta Britain. Ellison’s Tracey has stepped straight out of the Ladettes to Ladies reality show; plaits, tracky-dacks, huge cleavage and a Liverpoodlian tongue on her to rival a trooper, and she’s not a compliant hostage by any means. As for Andrew, well, to put it bluntly: he’s a fuckwit, and O’Donnell plays him to the hilt. The two hitmen (Logan Wong and Jonathon Chan-Presley) are a mildly amusing distraction at best.

Errrrm, that looks sharp!

The true nastiness at the dark heart of this comedy of errors comes in the form of the disfigured psycho farmer (David Legano). He’s basically a British Leatherface, and Peter, Tracey, David and Andrew all fall foul of his house of horrors. The problem I had with the farmer is the special effects prosthetic makeup that covers his head was unconvincing. The injuries the character’s sustained are the result of a freak machine accident, but the head-mask looked way too rubbery. I was expecting the character to take it off to reveal and a genuinely scarier persona underneath, especially when it’s revealed he actually makes skin-masks from his victims’ faces.

The farmer has a trophy

The final confrontation between the farmer and David and Peter is all too silly, and the “plausibility” factor is finally thrown to the dogs, but director Williams has kept an ace for the final shot, which fits the black humour edge like a glove. Of note: there’s also a rather unnecessary post-credit sequence which features an uncredited Steven Berkoff as the crime lord (curiously his only line of dialogue is in the DVD deleted scenes, as it is apparent one of the featured extras playing a goon corpsed – pun unintended - on both takes, rendering the shot unusable).

The Cottage Andy Serkis and Reece Shearsmith

Peter attempts to un-pin his brother

The Cottage is derivative, but definitely entertaining for those who like a healthy helping of black pudding mirth with their crazed bloody murder; a sharp spade and pick-axe are put to very good use!

The Cottage David Legano and Reece Shearsmith

Who's a naughty boy then?

Here's the dinky little "Old McDonald had a farm ..." trailer:

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Posted By: Bryn - Category: movie reviews

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Comments

8 Comments. [ Add A Comment ]

Comment by Cibbuano

August 28th 2008 02:10

20/20 Filmsight
Science News
Hunt Famous
Orble Post of the Day
Fat Cult
Techbreak

dunno... I quite enjoyed "London to Brighton", but that shot of the farmer looks like too much bad makeup.

ah, the trailer was fun, though, with the music. I wish modern trailers wouldn't rely so strongly on nervous editing.

Comment by Bryn

August 28th 2008 04:21

Horrorphile

Cibby, yeah, I've been meaning to watch that thriller, and yeah, like I said in the review, the farmer's wearing too much make-up, so any scary facial espressions are completely lost.
Trailer is fun though. And Jennifer Ellison has a nice bounce to her performance. Ahem.

Comment by David O'Connell

August 28th 2008 05:17

Screen Fanatic

Hey Bryn, nice review of this one - it looks like an interesting change of pace for the director but after the brilliant London to Brighton I'd be very curious to see how he follows it up as well. Was the score any good? I've heard it's heavily influenced by (or a rip-off of!) early Danny Elfman.

Comment by Damo

August 28th 2008 07:16

For the Sake of Argument
My Apologetics

I am not sure that I am a fan of the comedy horror genre after the parade of them through the eighties. Sometimes they mess up the horror and the comedy.
Yet if it does the comedy well I will watch it.(Shaun of the Dead was good)

The review is good but I am not really tempted to see this.

Comment by Bryn

August 28th 2008 07:50

Horrorphile

David, curious you should mention the score, as it kinda bugged me at the beginning, and I was gonna mention it in my review, but forgot. Yeah, it is Elfman-esque. I don't like his scores. But it kinda works for this flick. Just.

Damo, I'm very very fussy on my comedy-horror. Shaun of the Dead raised the bar very high.

Comment by JohnDoe

August 29th 2008 01:54

Film & TV on DVD

Hi Bryn,

I had all but written this one off when it came into the video store. Looked like it deserved its straight to DVD fate, now you have me thinking I will give it a bash.

Comment by KylieW

August 29th 2008 04:32

Celebrity Obsession

Looks a little bit silly.......but then I'm a sucker for that kind of thing. Maybe I'll check it out

Comment by Bryn

September 3rd 2008 00:26

Horrorphile

JD, can't hurt to check it out.

Kylie, yeah, I think you'll find some humour.

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