stetsonmedley I can overlook the bad acting. I can overlook the horrible pacing. I can even overlook the generic kills. But one thing I can't overlook is an ending that does not pay off or leave me satisfied. Without spoiling it. I will just say this. They couldn't have ended the movie any worse. You don't care about any of these characters, and most are complete douche-bags and stereotypes. This is about as garbage as a movie can get. I gave it a 2 because there is one kill that was wee executed. A movie I will keep in my collection just to tell visitors, "hey you wanna see the worst film in my collection?" To me it was a slap in the face to filmaking. If you want movie that has terrible acting, horrible pacing, and a lazy and underwhelming ending, this movie is for you. Do yourself a favor and stay away from this one.

Woodyanders A motley assortment of international tourists venture out into the Icelandic ocean for a whale watching expedition. Things go horribly awry when the group wind up trapped on a barge with a crazed family of murderous lunatics. Director Julius Kemp, working from a crafty and engrossing script by Sjon Sigurdsson, relates the absorbing and twist-ridden story at a brisk pace, builds a considerable amount of nerve-wracking suspense, delivers a pleasing smattering of tasty female nudity and a handy helping of in-your-face brutal'n'graphic gore, and further spruces things up with a wickedly funny sense of pitch-black humor. Moreover, Kemp and Sigurdsson provide a surprising and fiendishly enjoyable feeling of deep-seated misanthropy that depicts the human race as a general whole in a remarkably dim, hateful, and negative manner: The tourists find themselves in jeopardy because of the idiotic actions of an obnoxious French drunk, perky token American Marie-Anne (the fetching Miranda Hennessy) ultimately turns out to be a selfish and unsympathetic bitch, and clever and resourceful sole survivor Endo (splendidly played to the ruthless hilt by Nae) comes across as even more scary, deadly, and disturbing than the family of nutjobs. In addition, Pihla Viitala is strong and appealing as sweet German gal Annette, Terence Anderson as gutsy and noble black gay Leon rates as a genuinely radical and refreshing out of the ordinary hero, and genre icon Gunnar Hansen does well in his secondary role as grizzled old sea salt Captain Petur. The family of psychos are a memorably nasty bunch: Helgi Bjornsson as hulking brute Tryggvi, Stefan Jonsson as depraved hunchback Siggi, and Gudrun Gisladottis as sadistic matriarch Mama. The startling outbursts of ferocious violence and the grim conclusion both pack a really mean punch. Kudos are also in order for Jean-Noel Mustonen's sumptuous widescreen cinematography and Hilmarorn Hilmarsson's rattling score. Good grisly'n'twisted fun.

Tender-Flesh Here in the States, my rental was called Harpoon and not Reykjavik. The film certainly doesn't go for the same old setting in a slasher film. I'm not sure if the rest of the title, Whale Watching Massacre, helps or hinders prospective viewers from picking this up for a boring Tuesday night. Anyway, the story revolves around several people from different countries who board a rusty old bucket for some supposed whale-watching. Things go awry, and one of the crew is killed, which leaves you to wonder exactly how things would have proceeded had he not died, albeit accidentally. After that death, another small craft rescues the passengers and motors them off to another vessel waiting some distance away. Now, it seems like the crew of the second ship are cannibals or something, but we never get down to that because they aren't known for restraint and almost as soon as the passengers all board the Cannibal Cruise Line, one of the villains, who appears to be a rather dim bulb, attacks them. This sends people scattering in all directions, including one guy swimming away(which I'm sort of surprised they all didn't do) only to be harpooned! His body hangs off the side of the ship for the remainder of the film.The harpoon gun kill aside, there is also a hand-held harpoon kill, a "suicide bomber," a flare gun face-shot(reminds me of Dead Calm), a beheading, and a final and hilarious off-screen death that would make Richard Harris very proud(or very ashamed).My biggest complaint about the film is the sound. Those who could speak English either didn't speak it very well or the sound-mixer was drunk. Still, Icelandic horror films are rather rare, and those set aboard whaling ships are rarer still. Could it be setting a precedent for a new genre, similar to the much-loved or much-maligned Nazi Zombie film? Thar she blows.

Mr Saxon Around twenty minutes into this movie I started to wonder if "Reykjavik Whale Watching Massacre" was meant to be a dark comedy. After all, how could this be a serious horror movie when it included scenes such as a traumatised woman singing Björk's "It's Oh So Quiet" over the loudspeakers of a ship whilst a tragedy occurs on the deck? Or the moment in the movie where the scene suddenly changes to a group of people discussing their love for whales? But if it's a comedy, where are all of the scenes designed to make you laugh - or at least smile? It's almost as though the scriptwriter was as confused about the movie they were making as I was about the movie I was watching.Obviously "Reykjavik Whale Watching Massacre" is a homage to the far superior "Texas Chainsaw Massacre" - the original Leatherface (Gunner Hansen) even shows up here. However, everything that "Texas" did right, "Reykjavik" does wrong and then some. The victims here are some of the most one-dimensional stereotypes you could ever assemble from the loud, drunk Frenchman to the Japanese tourists with their camera gear, and none of them are particularly sympathetic or appealing. The only exception is a young black American man (portrayed by an actor in serious need of accent training) whose sexuality prompts one of the most unrealistic dialogue exchanges i've heard (and that's before you take into account the fact that this exchange takes place whilst the two characters are running for their lives from insane whalers). I'm not even sure who was supposed to be the main character in this movie which shows how problematic the story was.This already unsteady boat is further sunk by gaping holes in logic which will leave you scratching your head in disbelief. For example, early in the movie we're introduced to a character whose presence seems to indicate that our victims have been lured into a trap. However, their fate actually has nothing to do with him but rather an unfortunate (and highly unlikely) accident. This is indicative of the poorly written script in which strangers suddenly and inexplicably relate their life stories to one another merely for the purpose of giving the audience some back-story, or act out of character to set up a specific plot point (see the crazy sequence of events which begins with the line "Your father was a real kamikaze!" for evidence of this).There is only one death scene that is of any interest and the villains aren't terribly memorable. Whilst it's exciting to see a slasher movie emerge from somewhere other than America, I can't recommend "Reykjavik Whale Watching Massacre" due to its many, many flaws. You would be advised not to waste your time and to instead watch a movie like 2006's "Severance" which manages to be both funny and frightening - two things which "Reykjavik Whale Watching Massacre" completely fails to be.