Gnaw (2008)
Directed by: Gregory Mandry
Written by: Max Waller, Michael Bell, Rob Weston
Starring: Carrie Cohen, Hiram Bleetman, Nigel Croft-Adams
[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zskVbzkS2Zo&feature=related[/youtube]
Well, how this film ever made it to become an 18 certificate is beyond me. You will notice a theme running through this review, and that theme is about playing it safe, because that is what Gnaw does, brilliantly and I mean that in a bad way. Watching this movie, it feels like director Gregory Mandry was desperate for his film to be granted a 15 certificate so that it would reach a wider audience? I could be talking complete crap, but that’s how I felt after watching this. I felt cheated out of my sex and violence because the blasted camera pans away from everything, god dammit!
The film shows early promise as a girl is running through the woods in her nightdress, with no explanation we can only assume she is being chased by someone she doesn’t want catching her. Covered in bruises, it would seem she hasn’t really had a good time with her pursuer and the fear in her over exaggerated expression leads us to believe there’s something funny going on in these here woods. Being an opening of a film, she is caught in dramatic style as she trips over what could only have been a small stone or piece of grit and low and behold, with the killer right behind her in his truck, she can’t get up. Why do they constantly do this in films, they fall down and suddenly lose the power in their legs. She is captured and we then see her tied to a workman’s bench, torture-porn here we come, or so it seems. The killer teases as he runs his hand up her leg, but the camera then pans away, he then cuts open her dress revealing her underwear and just as we get a glimpse, the camera pans away. He runs his hands over her naked belly, ooh, let’s quickly look at something else, without warning he then cuts her open but all we see is her expression and some blood trickling down her thigh. All the glory is taken away from this scene because it would seem the cameraman was too afraid to film it, pulling away at all the best bits, the wally. And this continues throughout the film I’m afraid.
Six friends on a trip into this glorious English countryside have booked to stay in a bed and breakfast run by some woman obsessed with cooking and showing that oh so great English hospitality. The six friends are a right bunch of losers to be honest and I’ll make a wager now that you will not connect with any of them. They do what any excited group would do on holiday and laugh and joke and drink, a jolly old bunch and that joy is soon to be taken away as the killer we met at the beginning has spotted them and wants to chop them up into little pieces. He spots one of the girls in the bath as he peeps through hole in the wall, but god dammit she keeps her back to us and we see sweet fuck all. Later on a couple play sex games in the woods, the girl is blindfolded as the guy teases her but no one gets the chance to get down to it. The guys does a runner for something from the car, and our killer turns up behind the girl with his bizarre bear skin mask on which, to be fair, is quite creepy. Once again we have a glimpse of something perverse as the guy runs his hands over her, but in a flash it’s over and he picks her up and takes her home. When the so-called boyfriend catches up with them and see’s the love of his life being tortured he does what any loving boyfriend would do, he does a runner the twat! Doesn’t even attempt to save her but runs off to tell his friends, thank Christ he’s not my mate.
The usual stalk and slash fun follows; with each kill being half shown and we really have to make it up as it happens. There may have been the odd scene that is slightly nasty, but nothing special and nothing memorable. The cast are fools in all honesty, no one has an ounce of brains and they do the stupidest things but I can’t even be bothered to rack my brains for an example. The killer never says a word and follows horrors golden rules and never offers up anything new or inventive. Oh, and there’s a twist! Yeah, genius it is never saw that one coming! Oh hell this is so average it’s painful, a pitiful and painful horror that prefers to hide its violence and nudity. A strange move really as it’s the violence and nudity that is the only thing it actually has going for it. It certainly doesn’t offer up an interesting plot, or characters you can care about. Gnaw, why don’t they just call it Yawn!
Rating: 
[pt-filmtitle]Gnaw[/pt-filmtitle]
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