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Den

USA 2001
produced by
Clown Tears Productions
directed by Greg Arce
starring Greg Arce, Stephanie Retting, Dana J. Ryan, Sabrina O'Neil, Lee Schall, Adrian Lee
written by Greg Arce

review by
Mike Haberfelner

... for a second opinion by Dale Pierce, Click Here !

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Den (Greg Acre) has kidnapped four people, a prostitute (Dana J.Ryan), an ex-nun (Sabrina O'Neil), a psychiatrist (Lee Schall) and his wife (Stephanie Rettig), and locked them up in his basement, each attached to a chain in a seperate corner of the room, just so they cannot reach each other. With all of them just out of each other's reach, Den starts playing his mindgames with them, playing them against each other - because you see, they are all linked (without necessarily knowing it): the psychiatrist's wife had a lesbian affair with the ex-nun, while the psychiatrist, who's also a homophobe, racist and bigot, was a regular at the hooker. Sometimes, too, Den just tortures them, and claims to do everything in the name of God - which especially disgusts the prostitute, the atheist of the bunch but also the only one who seems to have any brains, because she's the one who tries to put up some resistance, while the others are plainly too stupid to organize to fight their oppressor. And thus, while the prostitute puts up a fight, the others are killed off one by one. The hooker, Den keeps for last, but she's not stupid and tries to bring down the high moral grounds Den pretends to walk with bible quotes that contradict each other - which endsDen and her killing each other ...

 

The premise of this film - a religious fanatic who plays his (torture) victims against one another - is actually pretty interesting, if at best half as interesting as filmmaker Greg Acre wants it to be. Plus, Acre is not half as subtle as a director as the film would have needed, his script is rather crude, superficial, clichéed, lacking really interesting characters, and full of plotholes (how come a hooker - or anybody for that matter - knows quite as many bible quotes by heart?), and as an actor he hams up his role a bit too much - which can be said about the whole cast though. That's not to say that Den is a bad film, just that it's not all that good either.

By the way, you might have noticed from my synopsis that Den shares quite a few plot elements with the later and much better-known Saw plus sequels - which did not go unnoticed by the filmmaker either, who even considered sueing Saw's production company ... and yet, while there might be similarities between the two films, Den is not exactly walking new grounds here (as stated above), and with a bit of research it's more than possible to come up with a dozen or so similar films that were made even earlier - so no real reason to point fingers here ...

 

review © by Mike Haberfelner

... and a second opinion by Dale Pierce ...

A very small company produced a very interesting film, where a religious fanatic kidnaps a load of sinners and imprisons them, as he starts to play a load of diabolical games. As the film progresses, it is revealed these people are not total strangers to each other, but have various links and ties, which this madman has known all along. The people have not been selected at random

Den is the name of the fat, bearded killer, played with convincing fury by actor/director/writer/professional magician Greg Arce. He asks trivial pursuit questions (I thought I was the only person who remembered the old tv show, Shennanigans, with Stubby Kay, in which kids played for prizes on this gigantic gameboard, with one of the stopoffs being a haunted house, inhabited by the Shenani-ghoul. I kid you not. The Den character brings this up in the film), quotes from the scriptures, taunts, abuses and kills.

In the end, Den is confronted by a lone survivor, an atheist who chooses not to run, but to stand her ground. As Den tries to "save" her, she counters with glowing errors in The Bible which would make great fuel for anyone wishing to argue the pros and cons of Christianity with their own hopefully less psychotic Dens of the world. A knife-bladed crucifix points the way, so to speak, and they end up dying together. No one in the script leaves the film free and happy!

Similar to Saw or more specifically the story line for Saw II (which I have only seen trailers for)?

Yeah, Arce noticed that too and is seeing if there is a possibility to bring suit against those involved with these two films. Will it work out or does he have a case? That remains to be seen, but Clown Tears staff made note that some of the people involved with Saw had seen Den at a film festival, thus giving him a little more grounds for action. The brewing real-life battle may be more dramatic than anything in either film.

The Den character is particularly rattling to watch, for history shows many such people have existed before, killing in the name of God, angelic voices within the brain or murdering sinners in order to save them. The Catholic Church was real good at that in The Inquisition and had he been born early enough, Den would have fit right in, helping the likes of Bernard Gui or Tomas Torquemada, several centuries ago.

 

 

review © by Dale Pierce

 

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In times of uncertainty of a possible zombie outbreak, a woman has to decide between two men - only one of them's one of the undead.

 

There's No Such Thing as Zombies
starring
Luana Ribeira, Rudy Barrow and Rami Hilmi
special appearances by
Debra Lamb and Lynn Lowry

 

directed by
Eddie Bammeke

written by
Michael Haberfelner

produced by
Michael Haberfelner, Luana Ribeira and Eddie Bammeke

 

now streaming at

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