Prowl Prowl aka The Strays (2010)
Directed by Patrik Syversen
Oh After Dark, you never disappoint me. When I ask for a cliched, stereotypical horror movie with dumb white kid fodder, generic pseudo vampires and frenetic camera movements you deliver on q.
Straight from the revamped After Dark Originals lineup comes Prowl aka The Strays, a horror movie that takes a different spin on the night crawlers who meet some Abercrombie and Fitch wearing small town white kid hipsters and you know...get slaughtered. Yawn.
As much as the film likes to think it's different...it's not. It's your same old bag of scares, cardboard cutout teens and army of blood thirsty creatures. Funny enough, the whole thing kinda is The Hamiltons meets 30 Days of Night. Is that a good thing? I don't even know..it's certainly not a compliment.
Boring Plot-O-Matic
Amber dreams of escaping her small town existence and persuades her friends to accompany her to find an apartment in the big city. When their transportation breaks down, she and her friends gratefully accept a ride in the back of a semi. But when the driver refuses to stop and they discover the cargo is hundreds of cartons of blood, they panic. Their panic turns to terror when the truck disgorges them into a dark, abandoned warehouse where blood-thirsty creatures learn to hunt human prey, which, the friends realize, is what they now are...
Awesome Review-O-Matic
I read the other reviews by some well respected horror critics. They actually found this movie OK though cliched. But one thing you'll find from me is if I didn't enjoy a film, I let you all know it. So as this movie is as cliched as a Jokey Smurf gag gift, you get a cliched Q&A review.
1.) So who's the final girl and does she have final girl superpowers?
Our final girl is Amber, a blonde cutey who longs to leave her small town for the big city. The first half an hour is the movie explaining this to us. Really? I get it. All I needed to know is she wants to leave cuz she's from a shitty small town. Plus after the nerdy, fat Jewish kid tries to put the moves on her, she rejects him. How can I possibly root for Amber and her stuckedupiness now? I hate her already.
2.) Is it true they wear Abercrombie and Fitch clothing, play Truth or Dare in the back of a truck in which they hitchhiked in and are white in color?What other race would wear A&F? Venezuelans? It makes no sense to hitchhike to the big city in the back of a fuckin truck but they do it...cuz white kids do dumb white kids stuff. Where other races deal with real problems, white kids problems are "Are we out of Cloves and Wild Turkey?"
No way a brotha gonna ride in the back of a creepy redneck trucker guys truck. Unless he was Carlton Banks.
3.) I'm 100% sure the teens cell phones all work because AT&T and Verizon cover 97% of America and one of them must have AT&T or Verizon and not shitty Metro PCS or *gasp* T-Mobile...right?
Like every other horror movie, either the battery has run out or every other horror movie takes place in that damn 3%. I'd like to totally visit this 3% place. I am 100% sure it's one of the Dakotas.
4.) The film introduces night birds of prey vampire demony type creatures that hunt human prey and thirst for blood. So are there naked boobies in this?
Girls in tank tops only. One day, we'll see a girl run away from a creature and rip apart her shirt for no apparent reason. On that day, I will cry and say "Thank you, I'm so happy you understand me Mr. Director".
5.) I've tasted human blood and it kinda tastes like purple drink. Why can't these creatures just buy some purple drink from the local 99 cents store instead of murdering innocent mall shopping teens?I like purple drink too. Next thing you know purple drink gonna be sold at Hot Topic and mass marketed to suburban kids everywhere. Gone will be the days where people enjoyed the novelty of purple drink as a cheap, watered down grape tasting beverage. What was your question again?
6.) How's the splatter content? Will I say "Fuck yeah!" in any of the gore scenes?
Severe neck trauma, arms and limbs flung all around and death by bashing of a gas canister.
7.) Why are girls so good at hiding? Is it genetic? Do they go to a pre-school Hide and Seek class? I've tried Googling this with no luck.
All girls are given cloaking devices on their 13th birthday. Oh and all women are part chameleon.
8.) Cmon, there's gotta be something cool that happens in Prowl. Like a giant robot saves the final girl right before she is about to be attacked by by a horde of blood creatures.
You know what saves the day? A lighter. I shit you not.
9.) I heard there's a twist in this flick that will make you crap in your pants (you know not literally crap in your pants but metaphorically, because I've never crapped in my pants ever, and if I did I would not be know as the "master crapper", fuck you, stop calling me that) So is there a crazy twist ending that will make you metaphorically crap?
Yes there is. It makes no sense. Like time travel and beef jerky. I mean dehydrated beef? What's the fuck is that?
10.) Is there a wildly, ambiguous ending that foreshadows a sequel that will never see the light of day? I guess so. Do you want there to be one? Give me $1 and I'll say yes if it makes you happy.
WTF moment
The supposed twist ending
The Jaded Viewer's Final Prognosis
Prowl is now out on DVD as well as a few other After Dark originals. It's pretty much the same as the other After Dark selections blending road tripping teens who meet blood thirsty creatures. As much as others claim there is character development, I saw none. I saw characters I actually wanted to die in horrible and gruesome deaths. From the first minute of the film, I wanted all these characters to suffer.
Does that make me a bad guy? And nobody said "Prowl on this motherfucker" before they killed one of the creatures. Big FAIL.
The Vitals
Rating:
Check out the trailer.
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