The Hunt Review
Graymark Productions & Image Entertainment - Buy this DVD Today!
March 20th, 2007

Good horror films are hard to come by, which means phenomenal ones are even more obscure. Sometimes it comes in the form of a major motion picture like Saw, and sometimes they're extremely low budget in the form of The Blair Witch Project. The Blair Witch Project took off because it took home all the awards at just about every film festival it showed up at, and a cult following began. Remember Children of the Corn; that film took a similar route to success with a ginormous cult following that is still growing to this day. Well sitting in front of me now is a review copy of what could arguably be the successor to the Blair Witch in "The Hunt", which is about to get unleashed onto DVD store shelves everywhere today (March 20th, 2007). The Hunt is directed by none other than Fritz Kiersch, the same dude who directed the already mentioned cult-classic Children of the Corn, and that's not the only good thing this film has goin for it. On top of the outstanding director, The Hunt garnered a ton of nominations at the last Chicago Horror Film Festival, including Best Picture, Best Special Effects and Best Cinematography. It also won the award there for Best Actor in Robert Rusler. This film is about a father and son heading out to film an instructional hunting video when they stumble upon restricting land that hold some horrific, extra-terrestrial secrets; while they entered the woods as the hunters, they will attempt to escape as the hunted. Outstanding special effects, a very well written script, an award-winning director, and some solid actors really make this a pretty solid horror film. That says a lot too, because I'm a pretty tough critic on the horror genre.

What about the special features? Are there any, because I don't see any listed on the back of the DVD? I don't know why Graymark Productions didn't list the special features on this title, because they're actually quite good; in fact they're exceptional considering this was a ridiculously low-budget film. Here's what you'll be looking at when you click on special features: an official trailer for the feature film and a simply awesome, in-depth behind the scenes look at how this movie was made, how it went from it's test phase to major release, and how they built up it's story online using grassroots techniques on popular UFO message boards. You never, ever get to see a behind the scenes look like you do here, and it really adds exponentially to the overall value of this DVD. I'd recommend if you pick The Hunt up to watch this behind the scenes look first, because it will really give you a better appreciation for the actual film. For what they had to work with, monetarily and material-wise, and what they ended up with is absolutely incredible, and is the reason behind all the awards this title brought home. If you're looking for a good horror film that isn't the usual release, look no further than The Hunt. Overall I'm pretty impressed; not a bad movie and solid special features.


Rating:
(3/4)



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