[Staunton Hill]
Plot:When a group of hikers take off for a weekend of fun and adventure in a remote mountain region, they unwittingly stumble across the Staunton family - for whom the hill is named - and find themselves at the mercy of a depraved, diabolical brood that will stop at nothing to rid their property of these "trespassers."

Cast:Kathy Lamkin, Kiko Ellsworth, David Rountree, Cooper Huckabee.

My Thoughts:Very real at times.

Review:"Staunton Hill" is the first genre effort from G. Cameron Romero, son of the legendary George A. Romero. The film is set in the hippie days, where some kids are on their way to a rally in Washington D.C. They stop in a small rural town though, and I can already here people reading this review saying..."uh oh". Being that they're hitch-hiking to D.C. (in typical hippie fashion), their ride soon decides to abandon them. So they end up having to hitch a ride with someone else, who they don't know, but being that he's close to their age, they trust none the less.

Later on, the truck breaks down, and now they all are in need of a place to stay. Enter The Staunton Family, a family of god-fearing southern farm folk, who welcome the teens in with open arms. But what the teens don't know, is that this family has a secret. They're local flesh-peddlers, and killers as well. Will the group of young people discover the Staunton's secret before it's too late? If you're wondering if "Staunton Hill", is another tragic tale of young people victimized by crazy southern white people, then you guessed correct. And in a way, it's sad because I expected better from G. Cameron.

This movie is so cliche, it even sports Kathy Lamkin in the cast, Lamkin who has appeared in two "Texas Chainsaw Massacre" movies. The remake from 2003, and "The Beginning" from 2006. So when she's your leading lady in a slasher movie about rural wackos killing unsuspecting teenagers, you are really shooting for cliche and retread status. Our cast of good-looking, unsuspecting teens of course accept the southern hospitality of the Staunton family who come complete with every flyover country stereotype in the book.

Hyper-christian, racist, dirty-looking, and there's even a mentally handicapped guy who lives with them named Buddy. Buddy's strong, weird, and does all the dirty work like skinning people and stuff. Leatherface anyone? At any rate, it's only a matter of time before the Staunton's stop coddling the kids and turn their attentions towards terrorizing and murdering them in deadly and vicious fashion. Anyone surprised yet? Good, I'll continue...our group of unsuspecting teenagers, who now, because one of them have been shot, are very suspecting, by this time, have let their guards down so far that even when they get the idea to try and escape, they're too trapped, and are out in the middle of nowhere.

And we all know that the entire town is in on the game, so they have nowhere to go. Leaving them completely at the mercy of the evil Staunton clan. Which is where this movie fails the most. In films like this, there's always a strong guy or gal, who manages to muster up the courage and conviction to fight her way out of the situation. But not in this movies case. Instead, the movie lets the villains just have their way with the kids, and maybe it was because they were hippies, and were all about peace and love, but come on.

When someone's got a gun, and a mentally handicapped guy wants to skin you alive, the survival instinct has to kick in at some point does it not? If this movies goal was to give white smalltown americans a worse cinematic rep than they already have, well then it certainly succeeded. But one more thing the movie succeeds in doing is making the teens actually likeable! This particular group of kids weren't tedious, annoying, or obnoxious. So when you see them die one by one, horrific and undeserving deaths, it really makes you pity them. As opposed to yawning and saying "good riddance who's next?"

And there's nothing worse than not giving likeable characters a fightning chance, which is why I was not big on this film at all. Romero though doesn't let the film go without throwing in the biggest cliche of all though, the twist ending. Which is one big eye-rolling moment where one asks the question..."was that really necessary?" I guess Romero felt it was. But I didn't, nor did I feel that this movie was really necessary...to be made that is. "Staunton Hill" may be a big hit with the small niche of horror fans who love southern-fried-slashers, but for the more broader-based genre fan, it's just another 90 minute cliche.

Positives:The teens in the movie were written to be likeable characters.

Negatives:Too many cliches. In fact, this movie wasn't accidentally cliche in it's story structure, antagonists, and it's twist ending. It was overtly and blatantly cliche. It's one thing to accidentally put forth a few genre cliches, it's another to purposely exploit every single last one of them.

Overall:One star our of four.





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