Open Season is a terribly unpleasant melange of The Most Dangerous Game and Deliverance. It was a critical and commercial flop in its day, and was further criticised for wasting the talents of some usually reliable actors like Peter Fonda, William Holden and John Philip Law. I'm a fan of William Holden, and as a completist I was eager to seek out the film. However, having finally tracked it down and watched it, I can honestly say that it was not worth the effort. This is a poor movie indeed.
The wafer thin plot has three ex Vietnam vets heading off in the autumn to their remote hunting lodge. En route, they kidnap a young, romantic couple and imprison them once they reach the lodge. After fattening them up and sexually degrading them, the delightful trio turn their prisoners loose and pursue them to their death.
The plot is such a nasty concoction of themes that it needed sensitive handling to avoid becoming an exploitation piece. Peter Collinson directs with a sledgehammer, stripping the film of any dignity that it may have had and making it a truly horrid little item. The arrival of William Holden at the end, in a half-decent climactic shootout, is the only moment that the film comes to life, but by then most discerning viewers will have bolted for the exits (if in a cinema) or pressed the stop button (if watching a video or DVD). Open Season is a bad, bad film, offensive and unpersuasive throughout and utterly deserving of all the negative reviews it has received over the years.
The wafer thin plot has three ex Vietnam vets heading off in the autumn to their remote hunting lodge. En route, they kidnap a young, romantic couple and imprison them once they reach the lodge. After fattening them up and sexually degrading them, the delightful trio turn their prisoners loose and pursue them to their death.
The plot is such a nasty concoction of themes that it needed sensitive handling to avoid becoming an exploitation piece. Peter Collinson directs with a sledgehammer, stripping the film of any dignity that it may have had and making it a truly horrid little item. The arrival of William Holden at the end, in a half-decent climactic shootout, is the only moment that the film comes to life, but by then most discerning viewers will have bolted for the exits (if in a cinema) or pressed the stop button (if watching a video or DVD). Open Season is a bad, bad film, offensive and unpersuasive throughout and utterly deserving of all the negative reviews it has received over the years.