Alive or Dead (2008)

User Rating:

3.0/10   

Director:

Stephen Goetsch

Writer:

Stephen Goetsch (writer)

Genre:

Horror

Plot:

On a desolate road, an abandoned school bus with the words 'HELP ME' written on a window, Maria stops to check it out...

Plot Keywords:

Main Character Dies | Cannibalism | Phone Sex | Scene After End Credits | Suicide

Cast

Ann Henson	...	Maria
Angelica May	...	Sarah (as Angélica Magaña)
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Gretchen Busenitz	...	Gretchen
Thomas Crnkovich	...	The Bus Driver
Diego De Vargas	...	Howard
L. Flint Esquerra	...	Frank
Masao Kitamura	...	Bubbles

Also Known As:

Inhospitable (USA) (working title)

MPAA:

Rated R for horror violence, language and some sexual content.

Runtime:

USA:83 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.78 : 1

Filming Locations:

Lake Hughes, California, USA

Company:

Legacy Mill, The

Movie Connections:

References First Knight (1995)

Huh?

A young woman, driving along on a dirt road in the middle of nowhere, is having phone sex with her boyfriend (?!) when she realizes she's lost (like she didn't appear to be already). She stops near an abandoned school bus with the words HELP ME written on the inside of the windows, gets two flat tires & of course promptly gets into the school bus which is then driven away by some nut case that has just dragged the body of some man aboard and then stops to get a couple bags of "self serve" ice and throws them into the back of the bus. (note: the car with the "flat" tires comes into play a bit later when the tires aren't flat at all, especially when the car is moving at full speed).

HUH? The bus drives on through the night into a very remote area where there is this huge, castle-like structure, and the stowaway woman manages to let loose a young girl who is chained in the back of the bus, after which she beats the bus driver to death with a stool. The man that was dragged onto the bus (turns out his name is "Frank") is not dead and comes to and follows the girls throughout this castle-like building as they explore. And guess what? Frank's the real loony, and the bus driver was a good guy? WTF? There are other characters that pop up and die here and there, plus there's a pizza-faced cannibal boy that follows one girl around with a wedding ring he took off of his lunch.

And then of course there is the question of Frank's origin which has something to do with one of the girl's fathers, who was a doctor, and who recently died.

I've seen plenty of really bad movies in my time but this may well take the cake. It's VERY badly written & is thrown together into an incomprehensible mess that's not even worth trying to sort out. Avoid this one like the plague. 1 out of 10.