Wrong Turn mostly right


Wrong Turn ★★★

THE horror franchise Wrong Turn does for West Virginian tourism what Ivan Milat did for the industry in Australia.

I mean nobody wants to go roaming around an area inhabitated by inbred, deformed hilbillies with a taste for human flesh.

There have been six films released over a period of 11 years in this series. I can’t vouch for 5 and 6, but the preceding four have all been surprisingly watchable.

The set-up is always largely the same – although part three deviates slightly – with a collection of people venturing into the backroads only to get lost and find themselves being hunted by a faimly of hillbilly cannibals, or is that cannibal hillbillies?

In this first instalment, released in 2003, Chris Flynn is driving to a job interview when he takes a detour to avoid a traffic jam and accidentally crashes into another car that has broken down in the middle of the road.

Chris and the group of campers whose car he smashed up are stranded and then seperate to find assistance, but instead stumble into a whole lot of life-threatening situations, some more effective than others.

There is a reasonable amount of gore and some decent jump scares along the way. The make-up on the deformed hilbillies is also effective.

The character types are a little different from the usual for this type of B-grade horror film, as are some of the set-pieces, including clambering across trees to avoid their hunters.

The two main actors, Desmond Harrington and Eliza Dushku, are ok. This first film was directed by Rob Schmidt who made a decent effort but still hasn’t managed to direct much since.