2001 Maniacs: Field of Screams

The first I heard of Tim Sullivan was when he remade Herschell Gordon Lewis' 1964 splatterfest Two Thousand Maniacs!, which he more or less stayed faithful to, but renamed it 2001 Maniacs. Since then, he has made a couple of interesting movies including Driftwood and, as a writer, Hood of Horrors but, in 2009, he returned to the film with which he made his name to pen and direct a sequel. Robert Englund was unavailable, so he was unable to part in this follow-up to Sullivan's 2005 comedy-horror so his role, as Mayor Buckman is taken by genre stalwart Bill Moseley, who was recently seen in films such as The Devil's Rejects, the Halloween remake and The Graves and had asked Sullivan for a role (any role) in this film.

Whereas the first film was set in Georgia where a group of college students stumble into Pleasant Valley only to be set upon by the townsfolk who butcher them in 'an eye for an eye' revenge slaughter for something done during the Civil War, this remake sees the cannibalistic residents of Pleasant Valley take to the road when no one shows up with the idea that, if the North won't come to them, they will have to go to the North.

At the same time, 'Road Rascals', a reality TV show featuring Rome and Tina Sheraton (an obvious parody of Paris Hilton and the Olsen Twins: they complain about being forced to wear knickers when they go out and not being allowed to shave their heads), is on the road once more but heading south to Georgia. As the driver is busy being 'entertained' by his girlfriend and navigator, he loses track of where they are and bizarrely ends up in Iowa which is, coincidentally, where the residents of Pleasant Valley have decided to hold their annual Guts N' Glory jamboree.

When the Road Rascals meet Mayor Buckman and the other displaced residents of Pleasant Valley, you know that there will be blood, plenty of blood along with some twisted and offbeat humour and nudity. Tim Sullivan obviously decided to go with the old 'if it ain't broke, don't fix it' motto and pretty much follows the formula from 2001 Maniacs. So that, in this film, the Northerners initially think that this is all a bit of good fun, even though the people are a bit weird, but they quickly realised that their lives are in peril as the likes of Granny Boone, Milk Maiden and Crow are a little more strange, threatening and meat fixated than they expected.


Sullivan set the film up with a series of distinctly unlikeable and stupid characters, especially the Sheraton sisters, one of whom carries around Biscuit, her stuffed dead dog, so when they die you really don't sympathise with them and are almost rooting for the cannibalistic Confederates. Other members of the Road Rascals cast and crew are extremely superficial, vacuous or ridiculously over the top that you almost want to see them on butchered in extremely nasty ways and, if the first 2001 Maniacs was anything to go by, you know that's exactly what is going to happen. Of course, there will always be some humour to go with the gore but, again, if the first movie is anything to go by, it will be extremely uneven with some jokes and situations working and others just falling flat.

2001 Maniacs: Field of Screams was just about what I expected going by the first 2001 Maniacs film and the very brief synopsis on the press release. You have a series of utterly stupid and ridiculous characters killed in extremely nasty, brutal and sadistic ways by a group of Southerners who are hellbent on revenge for a massacre committed hundreds of years ago. I have seen a lot of fairly horrendous on-screen murders before, but the first one to go in this is probably up there in the all-time top five: a woman, strapped to a table, has a circular saw rise up from between her knees and move fairly slowly up towards, and into, her body, throwing up blood and flesh as it goes.


If you want a sophisticated and thought provoking horror film, then this is clearly not going to be a film for you as it is a clear cut case of 'if you liked the first 2001 Maniacs film, you'll like the second'. It pretty much goes over the same territory with the same brand of gratuitous violence and scattergun humour although, in tone, it is more similar to Lewis' film than the first. In terms of all of the intrinsic components: acting, writing, direction etc., then Field of Screams is a fairly average movie which is definitely on a par with the first one (John Landis is on record as saying that this is "one of the rare sequels that surpasses the original", but I'm not so sure but, then again, who am I to argue with the director of An American Werewolf in London?).

I found this to be perfectly watchable fare, nothing special or groundbreaking but neither was the first film.

The Disc

Extra Features
There are two main featurette so long with a trailer under the extra features heading. The first of these is a slideshow of on set photographs and some publicity material which plays for nearly 27 minutes[!) with a soundtrack of music related to the film and filmmakers.

The next extra feature is a making of which isn't your traditional featurette as it cuts between Tim Sullivan sitting in his office talking about the film and the shoot and some footage from the filming to illustrate what he was talking about. If Sullivan is nothing else, he is a good talker and goes into detail about the more complicated scenes, casting and why he decided to make the movie. This is well worth a watch and I can't imagine a commentary track adding a great deal more detail than is included here.


The Picture
With bright colours, good contrast levels and skin tones, this high definition picture is better than some but is far from reference quality. Some of the SFX make-up is far from convincing and you can tell that it is a saw tearing into prosthetic flesh in one scene and, in another, the entrails aren't that much different to the ones that Tom Savini was using in George A. Romero's a zombie movies in the 1970s and '80s. Then again, this isn't a film with the biggest of budgets so you can understand that certain aspects were done 'on the cheap' and is really to be expected in an exploitation film like this.

The Sound
Just as with the visuals, the Dolby Digital 5.1 surround soundtrack (sadly, there is no HD option) is far from convincing as it seemed to be mixed badly in parts and I found myself switching from the surround soundtrack to the DD 2.0 stereo option which has the edge when it comes to clarity and crisp dialogue, although you do lose something in scenes when there are night time scenes with cicadas all around you.

This isn't a disc that you would use to show off your home cinema system so all that really want from it is to present the dialogue well and uses the surrounds when necessary to create a soundstage that is both aurally pleasing and fits the visuals. I didn't find that this did exactly that as there were several scenes when the sound just seemed 'off', but this was only the case with the surround sound option and wasn't so bad with the stereo soundtrack.


Final Thoughts
Reviewing a film like this is almost like preaching to the converted as, if you didn't like the first 2001 Maniacs film, there is no way that you're going to wastes time and/or money on this but, if you loved since the first film, then all you need to hear is "this one's like is the first". Of all the different genres around, horror-comedy is possibly the most difficult as the film needs to work as both a horror film and as a comedy without falling in between the two stills and failing to be either. I wasn't a big fan of Tim Sullivan's debut film, despite the impressive performances by Robert Englund and Lin Shaye (who, along with several other 2001 Maniacs alumni, reprises her role here).

Although I am a big fan of exploitation cinema, I much preferred Sullivan's second film, Driftwood, in which he seem to have matured as a filmmaker but this sees him right back where he was five years ago with many of the same actors and filmmakers and using the same type of humour and gore horror.

Taking this on its own merits, it works fairly well and is entertaining for the 80-plus minutes but, and this is from someone who has watched it twice, I don't think it has a great deal of longevity and is certainly not the finest horror film released this month, let alone this year.