THE LOCALS

Scifind.co.uk rating - 4 - out of 5.

Reviewed By: Brian Edwards

Starring: John Barker, Dwayne Cameron, Kate Elliott, Aidee Walker, Paul Glover, Glen Levy, Dave Gibson, Peter McCauley, Kayte Ferguson, Greg Page,

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Low budget, horror, teenagers, YAWN.

BUT wait, against all odds this is actually a very good film.

Two best friends, Grant (Barker) and Paul (Cameron) set off for a weekend of fun. As their trip takes them across various back roads and well they are teenagers in a horror movie so it is fare to say that the odds are stacked against them having a good time.

After meeting up with a couple of ladies all dressed for a retro party, there car gets stuck in a ditch and in trying to find help the end up witnessing a murder.

The film is all up hill from here on.

There is a rather puzzling story element set up right at the beginning of this horror movie and although you know it will pay off by the end you find it difficult to see where it fits, so this movie keeps you on your toes.

This is a product of New Zealand, and despite New Zealand's horror movie heritage (BrainDead, Bad Taste and anything else by Peter Jackson in the Eighties) doesn't wallow in gore and humour. I am impressed as this movie succeeds in keeping up the suspension of disbelief (even without a large special effects budget), keeps characters going and doesn't resort to becoming a 'horror comedy' which is usually the cowards way out on the low budget horror movie scale (no disrespect to Simon Pegg and Shaun Of The Dead).

In short, this is a good movie that does hit with the unexpected and doesn't discredit itself trying to ham up for laughs or overdoing the gore. Horror in its best form. "