Slaughterhouse Rulez

 



Director - Crispian Mills (A Fantastic Fear of Everything)
Starring - Finn Cole (Peaky Blinders, Dreamland), Asa Butterfield (Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children, Ender's Game), and Simon Pegg (Shaun of the Dead, Star Trek)
Release Date - 2018
Genre - Horror/Comedy
Tagline - "Bloodius, Hellius, Maximus"
Format - DVD (Personal Collection) (Screener)

Rating (out of 5):

 

     When I was in high school I can remember seeing ads for Shaun of the Dead on Upcoming Horror Movies.  I had been visiting the UHM message boards for years by that point and I did not recall hearing about that film until I saw those ads.  When it was released I remember hitching a ride with my dad to Wal-Mart and I grabbed a copy.  The trailer sold me on the film and the day I bought it I became a fan of Simon Pegg, Nick Frost, and Edgar Wright.  A few years go Nick Frost had a small role in the sci-fi horror film Attack the Block that was pretty entertaining.  Last year Simon Pegg wanted in on that monster madness and partnered with Nick Frost again in the horror comedy Slaughterhouse Rulez.  A few days ago I was lucky enough to get a copy for review.

     The film follows a prestigious British boarding school called Slaughthouse where the wealthy and the elite send their children.  Don (Cole) lost his dad sometime ago and inherited some money.  His mother decides to send him there to give her son the best she can but she doesn't know that the headmaster of the school has made a deal with a fracking company that has inadvertently unleashed subterranean creatures that are now turning the students and faculty into snacks. 

     Whenever I see Simon Pegg or Nick Frost attached to a project I immediately become interested.  When I received word about Slaughterhouse Rulez I couldn't wait to check it out but it seemed liked it took forever to get an American release so I eventually forgot about it until I received the press release.  Sadly, the movie just didn't do it for me.  I was bored for most of the movie and when the action hits you find yourself wanting the monsters to win.  The acting in this one is decent.  The cast gives amazing performances especially Pegg, Frost, and Michael Sheen but the characters are just so fucking unlikeable.  The only character that the viewer doesn't want to see die is Pegg's Meredith Houseman just because he is the only one with a personality.  The rest of the characters are just very unlikable.  The story for this one is mostly Attack the Block except taken out of the urban environment and placed in a boarding school with rich white characters.  The movie is painfully slow at first with some character development for no-so-interesting characters along with some background that does nothing for the story.  The last portion of the film is the bread and butter of the movie.  If you haven't turned it off yet you will be given some unexpected carnage and some laughs.  If the pacing in the last 30 minutes was evenly spaced throughout the film you wouldn't feel like you wasted an hour.  Finally, the film has several bloody kills on camera.  They have great practical effects and plenty of gore for those of you that likes the brutal side of horror.  Overall, Slaughterhouse Rulez sounded like a dream project for fans of Pegg and Frost but it does fall short.  The last 30 minutes is worth a watch but the build up hurts.  You will be bored to tears.  Check it out but don't expect a movie that you will keep revisiting.