Hazmat (2013)

Hazmat (2013)
directed by:  Lou Simon
starring:  Norbert Velez, Todd Bruno, Amiela McGuiness, Daniele Larez. Gema Calero, Mario Nalini, Gordon Diaz, Dennis Spain
format:  NTSC Region 1:  Personal Collection
tagline:  "It's all fun and games till someone loses their head!"

(out of 5)

     I really, really wanted to like this one.  Hazmat suits are scary and I was really hoping this one would be a good and brutal slasher type and it wasn't.   The story started off interesting enough we have a group of people setting up a sort of reality show called Scary Antics in an old abandoned building where a freak chemical accident occurred.  The show is focused around playing scary gags on people and I'm pretty sure there is actually a show like this on tv.  Anywho the movie follows the group as they are playing a trick on Jacob (Norbert Velez) whose father was killed in the chemical accident in the building.  Well Jacob doesn't like the fact that he's being pranked and in fact just goes completely ape shit and starts chopping people up with an axe.  The producer David (Todd Bruno) and most of his crew are trapped inside a locked room with no food or water.  The wait is on to see how long they go before each of them tries to escape.  This is where the movie falls flat for me.  I do not like it when people say how dumb people are in movies but I'm sorry the characters were just plain dumb and the dialogue was sub par. 

     There was more than a couple open doors which would have been an easy escape but no they stopped, turned around, etc.  And of course with these open door scenes we have the "grab and pull the body out of view" shots which is cool once...once!  When you do it more than once it's just plain redundant and silly.  But maybe silly is what they were going for I don't know but it sure didn't seem like it to me.  Then you have one of the victims trying to escape and using the brightest camera light he can find to get him through the darkness and then later mentions that the camera has night vision? 

     What did I like about the film?  The fx were pretty on point.  No silly cgi thrown around in excess which for me is a necessity.  Cgi is good for a lot of things but far too many filmmakers use it as pure convenience and that is not what any effect is for in my opinion.  I really did like our story as well it just wasn't scripted very well if that makes sense.  The actors were all pretty solid especially Norbert Velez he was truly scary.  Will I watch Hazmat again...oh I'm sure I will but I really wanted a more believable script with a movie that had a lot of potential.  Bad slashers are a dime a dozen and while I can't say this movie is "bad" the said complaints really annoyed me.