THE HUNTERS (2011)

The Hunters (2011)
Directed by: Chris Briant
Written by: Michael Lehman
Starring: Chris Briant, Dianna Agron, Stephen Waddington, Terrence Knox, Tony Becker

THE HUNTERS (2011)
Directed by Chris Briant
Written by Michael Lehman
Starring Stephen Waddington, Tony Becker, Terrence Knox and Dianna Agron

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ieFHFklhBCI[/youtube]

There’s two synopsis’ floating around the internet for this film and only one of them is true. If you are expecting a tale about a group of students investigating a forbidden abandoned fort only to find decomposing corpses, then you’ll be sorely disappointed, because the aforementioned group of students are actually of work age and star in a scene together for a whole minute. This synopsis is written on IMDB by the marketing manager but I can tell you for a fact that this is not the film I saw.
The true synopsis is as follows:

Alarmed by his superior’s unwillingness to investigate disappearances in the local woods, Detective Le Saint decides to defy their orders and look into the case himself. His leads take him to the mysterious and abandoned Fort Goben. A place which, he discovers, holds a terrifying secret. This is where The Hunters come for sport – and humans are their prey. When local girl Alice also stumbles on the Fort, she and Le Saint find themselves trapped in a horrifying and deadly game. The Hunters now have them in their sights…

Chris Briant takes the lead acting role as Le Saint as well as the director’s chair in this awkward, bumbling mess of a movie meant to instill fear in our hearts. Dianna Agron, from tv musical series Glee, plays the young woman Alice who is given about 5 minutes screen time in the film despite both synopsises implying otherwise. The Hunters is a horrible mess that does nothing to inspire or engage. With a reasonably okay start to the film, it just descended into obvious territory without a backbone or decent story to flesh it out. The acting is incredibly weak and the characters pointless. With a running time of 107 minutes, you’d be wishing for a plane turbine to crash into your house just so you don’t have to watch through to the end.  Being a brave soul, I unfortunately did this on your behalf so you don’t have to.

The story, of what little there is, follows four guys who are fed up with their lives, their wives and jobs and love nothing more than to go hunting in the abandoned Fort Goben. It soon becomes apparent that they aren’t hunting animals but humans. When Detective Le Saint discovers some vital leads in a case of 22 missing people in the area, his chief strictly informs him that the case is closed. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to work out that this police chief is corrupt and is covering up the entire charade. So it’s no surprise to learn he’s part of the hunting group and that all the missing people have been decapitated and are decomposing in the abandoned fort. When Le Saint is requested to protect a witness in an unrelated case, he organises to meet up with a witness at the fort and it isn’t too long before he gets trapped in there and has to fight his way out, single handedly, against the four hunters and his chief. Alice, who Le Saint met briefly during a jog around the park, ends up visiting the fort with her male friend, whilst the hunters are stalking around (or rather, sat on a log being indecisive). After a bit of “will he, won’t he”, the hunter shoots her male friend and Le Saint jumps in to save the day and shoots the hunter dead after polishing off the other hunters. At the end of the film, Le Saint and Alice are in the same cafe and Alice sits next to him to chat him up. THE END.

You may be suprised to learn that everything I have mentioned above is the entire movie, so you needn’t watch it. This is so painful to watch even the most hardcore of film enthusiasts will wriggle about in agony. One of the most out of place, torture-porn-esque scenes involves some young guy prancing around the decapitated heads, surrounded by candles, sticking his hands down his pants and mimicing having a wank. This is just pure crap, through and through. Avoid, Avouid, Avoid!

Instead, watch War Games (At The End of the Day) which is the film The Hunters wishes it could have been.

RATING: 0/5