2001 Maniacs (2005)

User Rating:

5.3/10   

Director:

Tim Sullivan

Writers:

Chris Kobin (writer)
Tim Sullivan (writer)

Release Date:

13 July 2006 (Thailand)

Genre:

Comedy | Horror

Tagline:

You are what THEY eat!

Plot:

Eight college students traveling to Florida for Spring Break stumble into a remote town in Georgia where they are set upon by the residents who are out to avenge their deaths by Union troops over 100 years earlier during the Civil War.

Plot Keywords:

Mayor | Georgia | Blood | Death | Severed Leg

Awards:

1 nomination

Cast

Robert Englund	...	Mayor Buckman
Lin Shaye	...	Granny Boone
Giuseppe Andrews	...	Harper Alexander
Jay Gillespie	...	Anderson Lee
Marla Malcolm	...	Joey (as Marla Leigh Malcom)
Dylan Edrington	...	Nelson
Matthew Carey	...	Cory
Peter Stormare	...	Professor Ackerman
Gina Marie Heekin	...	Kat
Brian Gross	...	Ricky
Mushond Lee	...	Malcolm
Bianca Smith	...	Leah
Brendan McCarthy	...	Rufus
Adam Robitel	...	Lester
Christa Campbell	...	Milk Maiden

MPAA:

Rated R for strong horror violence and gruesome images, sexuality/nudity and language.

Runtime:

87 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital

Certification:

USA:R | Australia:R | Germany:18 | Canada:13+ (Quebec) | Canada:18A (Ontario) | Canada:R (Manitoba/Nova Scotia) | UK:18 | Netherlands:16 | Portugal:M/16 | Finland:K-18

Filming Locations:

LaGrange, Georgia, USA

Company:

BloodWorks

Trivia:

Producer CAMEO(Eli Roth): man whose armadillo is hit by a car.

Quotes:

[first lines]
Professor Ackerman: Unprecedented, historical categories. More Americans died in the so-called Civil War than in the two World Wars combined. 618,000. Although popular media usually portrays the Civil War as a series of epic battles for honor and glory the reality is far from either. General Sherman's march through South Carolina alone cost over 8,000 innocent Southerners their lives.

Movie Connections:

References The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975)

Soundtrack:

Sex Montage

There's always room for one more ... MANIAC!

The almighty Hershell Gordon-Lewis already promised us through a very catchy song that the South was going to rise again... and it did! Slightly more than forty years after the Godfather of Gore's terrific splatter-classic, energetic director Tim Sullivan gathered quite an impressive cast and updated Lewis' screenplay with new gory sickness and nowadays sleaze 'n swearing! I'm usually not this enthusiastic when it comes to remakes of classic horror films, but "2001 Maniacs" simply is a fun & unpretentious little movie that clearly intended to please horror fans first, rather than to hit big at the box office. The original story is preserved, as a whole bunch of young party animals on their way to the Southern beaches are detoured the peculiar little town of Pleasant Valley where they're given a warm reception as honoree guests to a local jubilee. The townsfolk, with one-eyed mayor Buckman in charge, all soon turn out to be deranged killers that are still very rancorous about the Southern Civil War casualties and, one by one, the Yankee tourists are butchered in very imaginative ways. Some of the killings are strangely similar to the ones in Lewis' original, some of them are completely new...but they ALL are utterly grotesque and exhilaratingly gross! Whenever there isn't any gore on display, we're treated to absurd dialogues, morbid jokes and – oh yeah – loads of naked flesh supplied by the most ravishing babes of nowadays horror flicks. Of course, purely talking cinema, this isn't much of good film because it totally lacks tension and it's tasteless, offensive and completely ridiculous. Personally I couldn't care less about this because A) you pretty much know what to expect here and B) it's a splendid throwback to the rancid 60's and 70's; the times when horror cinema didn't necessarily had to justify its exploitative tendencies. Robert Englund clearly hasn't had this much fun portraying a mad character than since the original "Nightmare on Elm Street" and Lin Shaye once again proves she's a sadly underrated but great actress that delivers no matter how silly her lines are. The younger cast members perform adequately and Sullivan's directing is fairly surefooted as well. Although the additional maniac in the title never really gets introduced, I suppose it relates to the little silent girl who dissects rats for fun. "2001 Maniacs" is one of the most entertaining horror films of the past couple of years and I recommend it highly!