Eric Covers the Splat Pack
With Saw III and The Descent on the New Release wall, I thought I'd do a little writing on the "Splat Pack." This is an unofficial set of filmmakers grouped together by Alan Jones of Total Film magazine-- people who chafed under the trend towards PG13 horror films and attempted to make the theaters much, much bloodier. I don't agree with all of his list, but, hey, I'm a contrarian (go ahead, ask me about Little Miss Sunshine) by nature... The team behind Saw* (writer/director James Wan, actor/producer Leigh Whannell, writer/director Darren Lynn Bousman) pretty much epitomize the Splat Pack moniker-- these are films much more involved with making an audience flinch for what's being shown on screen than the traditional suspense of "what might happen next" of a traditional horror movie. The Saw movies are fairly ambitious, though, obsessed with elaborate traps, unusually motivated villains, and many other holdouts... from... well.. David Fincher's Se7en* (including their overall look). If they sacrifice characters and logic for twists, games, or attempts to be overly clever, so be it-- the Saw movies are the first recognizable franchise of the Splat generation, and easily the genre's flagship.
The rest of the Splat Pack seems fairly obsessed with the 70's "grindhouse" cinema. French director Alexandre Aja even went so far as to remake the grindhouse cornerstone The Hills Have Eyes* , undermining the original's preoccupation with "the nuclear family" in favor of a denunciation of American family values. His already splattery US debut, High Tension* , had previously announced Aja's hallmarks-- he is dedicated to long, slow, building suspense followed by explosions of violence (and geysers of blood).
If these films have their faults, Aja is at least working on more of the craft of the horror movie than just the Splat. Splat, however, is all that seems to matter to Eli Roth, the most outspoken and garrulous proponent of gore in horror films. Cabin Fever* came out in 2002, before any of the other Splat Pack films, and was absolutely obsessed with turning humans into goo and rot... but it was a faithful exercise in "spam in a cabin," as exemplified by the Evil Dead* movies, as well as being a well metered study in paranoia and friends turning on friends, much like John Carpenter's classic The Thing*. Roth turned down the genre influence and turned up the onscreen body horror for Hostel*, which has the most graphic eye trauma since Fulci's Zombi* movies. A celebration of Splat, Hostel is mostly a film about torturing various teenagers... the kind of film that dares you not to look away. Speaking of torturing teenagers, Greg McLean's passcard into the Splat Pack is Wolf Creek*, which offers a very slow start, ominous and building suspense, and a few sces of shocking, sadistic violence. Wolf Creek takes a great deal from the father of grindhouse, the Texas Chainsaw Massacre*.
Speaking of grindhouse, Texas Chainsaw Massacre seems to be Rob Zombie's primary influence. His debut, House of 1,000 Corpses* is closer in tone to Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2* (itself a cult classic, and a bit of a genre satire), sort of apes the Chainsaw arc and ideas, it has a hodgepodge "style over substance" feel-- you can almost hear the director off-camera: "Now say 'run rabbit, run' over again a few times. Crazier." But for as much as I don't care for that film, the sequel, The Devil's Rejects*, manages to get everything right. The characters, most of them carried over from the first picture, are handled with wit and intelligence, and, like the best exploitation films (and grindhouse is an exploitation genre) it playes with audience culpability and involvement. These elements, I think, tend to elevate Rob Zombie beyond the "Splat Pack" moniker and into more of a serious filmmaker, with a real handle on his genre.
With both The Descent and Dog Soldiers* to his name, Neil Marshall is probably the director most likely to balk at the Splat Pack label-- though his films are not squeamish, the gore in a Marshall film is more in service of traditional monster movies, with no hint of torture obsession or audience punishment. Dog Soldiers is a sly werewolf film very much in the style of James Cameron's Aliens* (marines versus fast moving monsters), that is both very funny and effectively scary. New on DVD, The Descent is probably my favorite horror film of the last five years. Forsaking the humor of Dog Soldiers for claustropobic atmosphere and overtly feminine symbolism and imagerly (again referencing Aliens, but also Carrie's* blood-soaked avenger). Marshall is easily more interested in subtext and the substance mined by traditional horror movies than any member of the Splat Pack, and also displays a genuine, cinematic understanding of lighting, camera movement, and character archetypes (note one of the Descent's major characters is named Juno). He doesn't make "Splat Pack Movies," he makes horror movies... very good horror movies.
1 Saw and Saw 2 are both available in our Horror section. back
2 Se7en is available in out Brad Pitt and Morgan Freeman actors sections. back
3 Both the original Hills Have Eyes and the remake are back in our Horror section. You can also find the original under Wes Craven. back
4 High Tension is available in our Horror section. back
5 Cabin Fever is available in our Horror section. back
6 Sam Raimi's Evil Dead movies are all available in our Zombies section. back
7 The Thing is available in John Carpenter's director section. back
8 Hostel is available in our Horror section. back
9 Fulci's Zombi pictures are available in our Zombies section back
10 Wolf Creek, the Texas Chainsaw Massacre movies, and both Rob Zombie films are available in our Horror section back
11 Dog Soldiers is available in our Werewolves section. back
12 Aliens is available on our Perfect List. back
13 Carrie is available in our Stephen King and John Travolta sections. back