Effects (1980)

3.5 / 5 May '09
Tagline: Making movies can be MURDER!
Directed by: Dusty Nelson
Written by: William H. Mooney, Dusty Nelson
Actors include: Joseph Pilato, Debra Gordon, Susan Chapek
Genre: Horror, Thriller
Length: 84 minutes
Banned: Nope
Country: USA

Review:
This one doesn't start out a winner, we meet a group of people making a low budget horror film and for a while we phase in and out of the movie leaving us a little confused which we are experiencing. Then things start to become a little more clear as we see the director only wants to shoot death scenes at night with a skeleton crew. Then about 40 minutes in we get something actually quite shocking, we are shown a "snuff" film (or rather a member of the film crew breaks one out). It's shot in gritty black and white and it was actually hard to watch even though it was relatively short, it made me uncomfortable to say the least. Of course we learn that the film that we are watching being made has a little more reality than some suspect, but who is in on it and what will be in the finale? It's actually a somewhat complicated plot that does come together so long as you are paying attention. It's just that some parts are rather dull but then some parts are extraordinary so it's quite a mixed bag. Recommended for fans of horror as the "good" scenes are spectacular plus Tom Savini did the effects (me thinks) or at the very least, he's a character in the movie! Quite an interesting rarity of a film that does deserve a little more attention.