The Caretaker
Directed by Bryce Olson
Courtesy of Ed Baran Publicity/ MTI Home Video
Released: 2010
I have to start this review with a complaint:
I cannot stand it when a movie touts an actor’s name on the cover, but then only gives him eight minutes of actual screen-time. To me, this is false-advertising. It is just about the equivalent of having a sign in front of a building that boasts to be the hang-out of your favorite celebrity, when in reality said celebrity only popped in once to use the restroom.
Such is the case with The Caretaker. Both Jennifer Tilly and Judd Nelson are listed on the cover, and granted, Tilly does get a fair amount of screen-time. But Judd Nelson is literally absent for the majority of the film, seen on-screen probably a total of less than ten minutes. I have nothing wrong with cameos…heck, they are nice surprises if you are not expecting them. But this is not a cameo, and I do not believe you should advertise an actor or actress if they are not a prominent member of your cast. As a fan of Judd Nelson, I was very disappointed to see him on-screen for such a minimal amount of time.
With that being said, though, the movie itself is quite a bit more agreeable with me. Although timid and mild for the most part, The Caretaker offers a more subdued version of the high-school-hijinks-gone-wrong scenario. The plot, according to imdb.com, is this:
A group of teenage boys out to give their girlfriends a good scare on Homecoming night, which also happens to be Halloween, head to an abandoned house in an out-of-the-way fruit orchard where they uncover the story of a real life urban legend.
In the film, the boys tell the girls an urban legend about Adam, the caretaker of the orchard, and his wife Tansy. An undisclosed amount of time ago, Adam went mad and killed Tansy. He disposed of her body and then ran off with their baby, abandoning the orchard to start a new life. Or maybe not, it seems.
While the teens are in the house, a masked killer shows up and starts killing them, one by one, using a sharpened fruit-picker. The killer announces his intent to his victims by rolling a grapefruit to them on the floor before he strikes. As the teens try to escape, the mystery around Adam deepens when one of their teachers from school arrives on the scene.
The story of The Caretaker has several themes we have seen before: high-school teens with mischievous goals…the new girl in school with the mysterious past…a faceless killer with a penchant for the dramatic. But although repeated, these themes are what help drive the whole basis of the movie. Curiously, the combination of these elements helps to offer up a mostly enjoyable ride.
There were a few aspects of the film that left me unfulfilled, however. Two such items were the lack of gore and the lack of on-screen killings. Whenever The Caretaker kills someone, the camera-shot usually switches to another scene, just as the Caretaker is committing the act. If it doesn’t switch over and remains on the scene, the killing is very anti-climactic, with no visible gore or even reaction from the victims. I have to ask this out loud: what is the point of making a slasher-flick if you do not see the slashing or the results thereof?
Another aspect that I did not like was the abandoned house itself. It seemed to be way too modern to be the location of something like this. To me, an urban legend is something that is created from events that happened decades ago or even longer. But the house at this orchard is fairly modern, probably built within the past twenty years or so. It was difficult for me to think of The Caretaker urban legend in terms of ‘legend’ because the events supposedly happened such a short time ago. The look of the interior of the house threw the mythos off for me and thus never let me immerse myself completely in the story.
But despite my misgivings about these few aspects, the film is fun to watch overall. The actors and actresses do a good job with their characters and I never once questioned the believability of their roles. There were some camera-shots that were very well done, as well. One specifically that stood out to me was from the beginning of the film: a girl is stripping for her boyfriend, who is outside the house watching her through a window. While the girl is engaged with the window, the camera shifts slightly and The Caretaker becomes visible…standing in the doorway directly behind her.
And speaking of the girl stripping…have you ever seen boob-o-lanterns? No? Neither had I…until I watched this movie. That scene in itself is reason enough to check this movie out.
The bottom line here is that fans of milder horror should be happy with The Caretaker, especially if a lack of gore is on the checklist. Just do not expect to see Judd Nelson very much. And take care to pay attention to details, as you will need to recall them in order to understand the twist ending.
MSB
