Before we begin I just have to ask, has anyone out there at any point, ever wondered about the origins of the trio of inbred cannibal brothers featured in the Wrong Turn series – and of you did: why? You see, not only do inbred cannibals tend come with their beginnings already somewhat implied (they’re born, dude), the problem with a horror origins is that they often strip a character of the inate mystery that made them so memorable in the first place. Be it Freddy’s secret daughter, to Pinhead’s time in the military, to the two prequel films that Leatherface has endured, going back to try and find an explanation for pure evil almost aways ends up as unsatisfying as a heavily censored Friday The 13th sequel.
However, what happens when we get a starter story for characters we never really gave a shit about in the first place? What happens when there’s actually no mystique to ruin? What happens when Wrong Turn almost makes a right one?
It’s 1974 and while the Glenville Sanitorium in West Virginia maybe the most cartoonishly remote medical centre in cinema history as it sits, perched on a mountain, when you see the kind of patients they have stashed there, you’ll wish it was located on the fucking moon. That’s right, the lower levels are jam packed with lethal, deformed deviants who are so deranged, they’d would probably benefit more from a lead pill than any sort of medication they have on hand. However, the worst of the worst are the Hillicker brothers, three teenage inbred mutants lack the ability to feel pain and have been named for their various deformities – Three-Finger, Saw Tooth and One-Eye. Of course they escape (maybe don’t keep a trio of murderous brothers in the same cell, dumb-ass) and release the other inmates causing a gruesome riot that reduces the staff into mangled heaps of violated flesh.
We bounce ahead 29 year to meet a bunch of nine students so painfully vapid I can’t even be bothered to list their names, but alongside the token final girl we have the usual assortment of horny lesbians, peeping toms, jokers, nice guys and arrogant dicks who are all hoping to spend a cold and wintery weekend in a cabin. However, after taking a… wrong turn (Cue Leonardo DiCaprio pointing meme), the group get hopelessly lost in a violent blizzard and instead stumble across the abandoned Sanitorium.
Weighing up whether they should freeze to death or spend a night goofily fucking about having wheelchair races, the group wisely chooses the latter, buy soon it becomes apparent that the Hillickers are still lurking about the premises and are looking for meat to sustain them over the cold, winter months. Thus a battle for survival ensues and the Hillickers manage to offset the numbers difference by having a home field advantage and employing their especially vicious brand of hunting skills to get the job done. Who will survive until morning to pick up (or possibly eat) the pieces?
I have to say, Wrong Turn 4: Bloody Beginnings, kind of caught me a little by surprise – which is fairly impressive for the fourth instalment of a B-grade franchise that immediately descended into direct to DVD hell after its first instalment. Oh, there’s still all the shitty aspects that come complete with yet another entry into the series that no one seemed to actually want such as the flick is crammed with stock morons played by actors mostly hired because they were willing to endure either heavy gore prosthetics or do a lot of nudity and the flick frequency switches between mean spirited slasher stuff and some typically unpleasant torture porn that goes on for ages but yet adds zero to the plot. However, thanks to its prequel leanings and a completely different location change, Bloody Beginnings might actually be one of the better instalments.
For a start, returning director Declan O’ Brien seems to have gotten the weird, uneven, jokey tone of Part 3 out of his system and actually gets to work on a prequel that harkens back more to the straight-laced feel of the first film. While his attempts to create actual tension ultimately fall flatter than spilled intestines, the fact that he’s trying to do something other than douchey, jock humour is noticed and appreciated even if there’s a guy in the group that’s always trying to spy on the horny lesbians and everyone seems bizarrely cool with it. Oh sure, the odd, dufus line sneaks in here or there, but they actually prove to be pretty funny (“They probably turned Porter into a porterhouse by now!” is a genuine banger) and the gore proves to be pretty badass even if the blood is obviously digital and the prolonged torture sequence seems solely to be there to pad out the runtime.
The other aspect that makes Wrong Turn 4 stand out is the fact we’re now knee deep in the snow now which not only revitalises the concept a little, but also results in some pretty good production values for such a limited budget and at times it even feels like an unofficial remake of Blood Tracks, a little seen Hills Have Eyes ripoff that also predominantly features lumpy faced flesh eaters and snow. Finally – and I can’t believe I’m saying this – but it’s weirdly reassuring that the prequel nature of the film means we get to see the original line up of mutants back together again. I mean, it’s hardly the horror equivalent of Take That reforming, but the sight of the constantly giggling Three-Finger going solo was actually getting quite annoying (also, shouldn’t he be called Eight-Finger?). However, the source of my earlier confusion is this: was I surprised by Wrong Turn 4 because it’s actually good, or is it that it’s simply not a shit as I assumed it was going to be? There was certainly a better, more original movie buried here if the film had shifted gears completely and based the film entirely around the Hillicker’s stay in the Sanitorium while saving the breakout for the climax, but considering that’s the plot of 2017’s Leatherface, maybe I would have been wrong.
Never before has a film made me wish I employed 1/2 stars on this page, because a mark of two seems too harsh for a film that seems to be genuinely trying to mix things up, while three also seems to be way too generous for a flick that suggests that a Sanitorium for animalistic lunatics would keep so much razor wire just laying around. Oh, and while we’re on the subject, what’s the deal with the giant, portible, petrol powered drill that’s kept in the building, were the hospital staff hoping to give a lobotomy to Paul fucking Bunion or something?
Still slave to its direct to DVD roots, I have to give Wrong Turn 4 its props for trying to reset the status quo and tone to something slightly more hard hitting while still including all the obligatory dick jokes and boob shots. And even if it includes the usual idiotic moments (one guy on watch instantly falls asleep three feet from the cell with the mutants in) and its best moment is a total steal from 2005’s 2001 Maniacs, it still manages to end the prequel on a fitting down note that still invokes inbred, if hardly thoroughbred, thrills.
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