Shallow Grave kicks off with a fairly spot-on recreation of the famous shower scene from Psycho. Unlike Alfred Hitchcock, director Richard Styles does not shy away from gratuitous boob shots, which makes him an even better director than Hitch in my book.
Then… SURPRISE! We learn it was all a prank. (Exactly how I’m not sure, since the big-boobed girl clearly got stabbed in the opening, but oh well.) After the Catholic School girls involved get a good tongue-lashing from the head nun, they head on down to Ft. Lauderdale for Spring Break! Unfortunately, they get a flat tire along the way. Stranded on the side of the road, one of the girls goes for help. Meanwhile, another gal goes into the woods to pee where she accidentally witnesses a deranged sheriff kill his lover. Naturally, he takes on after her, and from then on, it’s one relentless game of cat and mouse… err… mice.
OK, so maybe Styles isn’t necessarily BETTER than Hitchcock, but you have to give him credit. Like the Master himself, Styles does a good job blending chuckles and thrills. Things quickly turn on a dime as the movie abruptly switches gears from a Spring Break comedy to a white-knuckle thriller. Styles delivers some legitimately suspenseful sequences along the way. Among them is a finely crafted scene where the girls arrive at an abandoned gas station to call for help only to slowly realize there’s a guard dog on the premises.
The plot maybe twiddles its thumbs a bit too much in between the highlights, and the scenes of two guys looking for the girls kind of curtails the film’s momentum, especially in the second half. However, this is a frequently surprising and entertaining thriller that is nastier and meaner than you might expect. In short, Shallow Grave cuts deeper than most of the low budget flicks that flooded video store shelves back in the ‘80s.
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