PLOT: The Keenan family checks into a quaint inn called The Pines, “the pearl of Pennsylvania,” only to find that there is no Wi-Fi, cell phone signals are blocked, the exits are locked, and four masked killers are stalking the halls.
REVIEW: Directed by Terrifier cast member Michael Leavy, the slasher movie Stream has two major selling points going for it: Terrifier franchise director Damien Leone provided the bloody special effects, and the cast list reads like the Expendables or the Avengers of horror. The line-up includes Jeffrey Combs (Re-Animator), Danielle Harris (Halloween 4), Felissa Rose (Sleepaway Camp), Dee Wallace (The Howling), Mark Holton (Leprechaun), Daniel Roebuck (Final Destination), Dave Sheridan (The Devil’s Rejects), Terry Alexander (Day of the Dead), David Howard Thornton (Terrifier), Tim Reid (Stephen King’s It), Charles Edwin Powell (Exorcist III), Tony Todd (the original Candyman himself), Bill Moseley (The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2), Terry Kiser (Friday the 13th Part VII: The New Blood), Bob Adrian (The Conjuring 2), Sydney Malakeh (Cheer Camp Killer), Wesley Holloway (Terrifier 2), Jadon Cal (Megaboa), Phuong Kubacki (Cabin Girl), Damian Maffei (The Strangers: Prey at Night), and Tim Curry (Stephen King’s It again – plus The Rocky Horror Picture Show).
So we’ll address these points up front. The body count in Stream is quite high, and while some of the kills take place off screen in typical slasher movie fashion, there are several kills that are brought to the screen with impressive gore effects, including one that is drawn out like Terrifier kills sometimes are. So viewers who come looking for some cool Leone bloodshed will probably be satisfied. As for the genre icons in the cast – of course, when you’re dealing with this many known names, most of them are not going to have substantial screen time. Many of the horror stars only show up for cameos… and for a few of them, the scenes they show up in didn’t even seem necessary. They just seemed like an excuse to stick a few more familiar faces into the movie. So some fans might be let down by that. Some of the icons do have substantial roles, though, and I will admit that I was surprised at just how much Jeffrey Combs is in the movie.
Powell and Harris play Roy and Elaine Keenan, who have decided to take their kids Taylor (Malakeh) and Kevin (Holloway) on a family vacation – and while they’re on this vacation, they’ll be staying at a quaint Pennsylvania inn called The Pines, where Combs’ character Lockwood works the front desk. The family hasn’t been at The Pines for very long before it becomes apparent that there’s something very strange going on here. The guest Wi-Fi is down, no one can get a cell phone signal, and all the exits are locked. That’s because the cameras that are set up throughout the building are broadcasting a livestream on the dark web, where viewers can be entertained by the sight of the inn’s guests being knocked off by the four masked killers stalking the halls. These killers never remove their masks, but their unique personalities and styles come through anyway. There’s the more low-key Player 1 (Jason Leavy, who had roles in Terrifier and Terrifier 2), the flamboyant brother and sister duo of Players 2 and 3, played by Thornton (a.k.a. Art the Clown) and Liana Pirraglia, earning her first horror feature credit, and the hulking Player 4 (Mark Haynes, who was Dave Bautista’s double on the set of Knock at the Cabin).
The broadcast stalk and slash takes up most of the movie’s running time, and since there are plenty of halls and rooms to run around in, several guests to slash through, and some character moments interspersed throughout, this does take up a whole lot of time. Stream ends up being 123 minutes, which feels like a good 20 minutes longer than it should have been. The movie could have been whittled down a bit, some moments dropped here and there… and some of those cameo scenes are superfluous, but it’s cool to see the cameos anyway. Sure, the movie could have done without, for example, the monologue delivered by Todd – but who doesn’t want to see Todd deliver a monologue? He’s awesome. Aside from Combs and Harris, who have prominent roles, standouts among the familiar faces include Reid, playing a retired cop who has heard about situations like this; Sheridan, who just wants to get a high score on an arcade game; and Roebuck’s drunken character, who has a hilarious moment of bickering with his wife, played by Rose.
One of the complaints you often hear about slasher movies is that the characters make dumb decisions, and Stream does not avoid that pitfall. There are at least three or four moments where viewers will be shouting at the screen because characters in dangerous situations act like total morons and pay the price for being stupid. For fans, characters making dumb decisions can sometimes be part of the charm of these movies, but a couple of these characters are ridiculously dim.
Despite moments of characters being stupid, a bit of questionable acting here and there, and the movie being too long for its own good, Stream is an entertaining movie with some cool stalk and slash sequences and a nice chase or two. The masked killers do a fine job of cutting their way through the cast, there’s some nice twists and turns along the way, and there’s some good emotional content in there, thanks to the characters in the Keenan family. The movie didn’t quite live up to the hopes I had for it after seeing the cast list, but I had a good time watching it nonetheless.
So if you’re a slasher fan, check out Stream and have some fun watching the masked killers make a mess out of the guests at The Pines. Just don’t make your viewing decision based on the presence of any one particular genre icon (unless it’s one mentioned as having a prominent role), because you may be disappointed by how quick their appearance is.
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