LAST GIRL STANDING (2015)

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What happens after the horror movie? Generally speaking there are a few big screen sequels and then it all goes straight to video before crashing entirely. But let’s consider the question in a less flippant way. Presumably for the characters involved the answer is a lot of prescription drugs and a shaky mental state for starters. This is the question being posed by the poster tag-line right up front here. Though as you might be suspecting the answer is… still just another horror movie. The artwork doesn’t exactly suggest this will be a serious or grounded look at any post-traumatic stress disorder type issues after all. There are no docudrama studies to be found here. But it is a film that tries its hand at a few different ideas with varying effectiveness. Will there be some real catharsis or is this just another bloody mess?

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Last Girl Standing starts as it means to go on with an average camp fire slasher sequence. This prologue is complete with a masked serial killer and a lot of dead teens. ‘The Hunter’, as he becomes known to the press, chases the last of the campers through the trees as we see the aftermath of his latest rampage. The mask design itself is pretty effective, though any hints of the killer’s interest in ritual totems and ceremonial blood letting could have been explored a little better. The rest of the film isn’t really about that, which is a shame. In the final moments Cameryn (Akasha Villalobos) gets the better of him and escapes from the woods. She runs into the breaking daylight just in time to stop a passing car and lose her mind a little. You know the drill.

But her troubles aren’t over yet, and as the opening credits roll and five years pass by. It’s all highlighted by a few handy newspaper headlines and crime report close-ups. As the present day arrives our lead soon finds herself in a new kind of nightmare – a tedious day job at a dry cleaners. The horror, the horror. The location actually lends itself to her post therapy mindset since it’s all so drab and grey. Not all the staff members speak English which emphasises her sense of lonely isolation and generally this a good starting point for the story. However the awkward and mundane daytime grind is interrupted when Cameryn begins to see the killer when she’s working late at night. Or does she?

The first act introduces her newest colleague Nick (Brian Villalobos) and after some old wounds are re-opened he does what he can to integrate Cameryn with his house-mates. While her vaguely catatonic state doesn’t exactly make for a compelling character study, things pick up once the other cast members are introduced. Her efforts to fit in with a new crowd have some charm, and the cast are pretty naturalistic. It’s a reasonable portrayal of a bunch of students even if their shenanigans are less than gripping. The performances aren’t all great but most of it works. A few standard archetypes are covered such as quirky artist, a dippy spiritualist, and drunken waste of space. But this is often too meandering and uneventful. It takes too long for the generic flashbacks and nightmare moments to come along.

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It soon becomes clear that Cameryn has a lot of baggage to deal with. This isn’t helping by the fact that her apartment is filled with boxes of case files and newspaper clippings about her harrowing experiences. There’s also a map to the killers ‘unmarked’ grave which really isn’t going to do her mindset any favours. How exactly has she acquired all these police photos? That’s a whole other mystery all by itself. It’s obvious from the outset that her personal issues should be the focus here. But rather than depicting these problems in a realistic way the story is often rushed. The film-makers have no patience and it all starts to hint towards the way things will end way too early on.

As boilerplate thrillers go the sound effects and music are pretty atmospheric in at times. There are some effective technical inclusions every so often. But that being said there’s a lot of flat lighting elsewhere. The distinct lack of tension building does it no favours. Even during moments of sudden drama there’s no real suspense. The bloody violence and other special effects are all fine once things kick into gear during the climax. It’s just a shame that more interesting the plot elements never build to anything particularly satisfying. Fleeting moments of real human drama are overshadowed by schlock and gore, which undermines any hints of character development that were included along the way.

Ultimately it’s a real missed opportunity because of this uneven narrative. There are moments when the story elements about dealing with grief and finding closure after a tragedy are given some proper focus. There’s a great road trip sequence in which the two leading ladies try and work things out for the better. But like the music used in this scene it feels like another movie has suddenly landed before the rest of the story rears its head. These disparate chapters never really mesh at all. Mystic River this is not. If you’re looking for some cartoonish mental breakdowns and a few bloody slasher scenes then the film just about delivers. But in terms of the more complex themes and ideas being grappled with? Not so much.

Rating: ★★★★☆☆☆☆☆☆

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About Mocata 140 Articles
A sucker for classic epics, 80s science fiction and fantasy kitsch, horror, action, animation, stop motion, world cinema, martial arts and all kinds of assorted stuff and nonsense. If you enjoy a bullet ballet, a good eye ball gag or a story about time travelling robots maybe we can be friends after all.

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