Taste of Flesh

One of the many inspirations for Taste of Flesh was quite obviously The Texas Chain Saw Massacre as there are two characters who resemble 'the cook' and 'Leatherface'.  The film begins with four girls drinking margaritas to celebrate the start of summer and decide to go to a rave in a warehouse down town that they saw advertised on a flyer at college.  Unfortunately for them, there is no rave and the warehouse is solely occupied by masked cannibal The Hunter and his culinary assistant The Chef. 
 
The action cuts between the building and a police car outside where the cops are oblivious to their proximity to the crimes taking place and their 'most wanted'.  As each girl is brutally dispatched - strapped down and cut up by The Chef - help is so near yet so far.
 

I'd be lying if I said this was completely involving and that the characters were, pardon the pun, fleshed out.  I couldn't tell you what they were called and who was who yet you obviously root for them rather than the demented cannibals.  It's all relatively brief with some decent gore and special effects but the choice to add some dark humour (The Hunter sits on the toilet and complains how one of his victims is playing havoc with his digestive system and that there's no loo roll left) doesn't work with the extremely dark story.
 
The acting is as good as you'd expect in a film like this with forgettable characters and horrendous overacting in a very basic plot.  It's a pale imitation of TCSM but is watchable - let's face it, there aren't many films that live up to Tobe Hooper's masterpiece.
 
 

The Disc

 
Picture and Sound
The letterbox picture has some extremely bad black levels that make the events in the final reel very difficult to understand - you can't see who is who in the gloom.  The dialogue is also indistinct and it sounded like the microphone wasn't positioned properly at times, picking up some actors better than others.  You can make out what is happening but the disc doesn't make it easy.
 
Final Thoughts
I got the impression that this didn't know what it wanted to be as the moments of extreme horror were mixed with levity, something you don't want to do if you are making an intense horror film.  It's not funny enough to be horror comedy and the ill-judged amusing lines (I use the word advisedly) detract from the good stuff.   Not a great debut from Christopher D. Grace but there are signs that he has talent and can maybe do something better with a bigger budget.