If you were to grab your DVD copies of Vacancy and Psycho, and add some sort of life looping scenario together – you would get a film called Terror At Ten Acres. Terror At Ten Acres takes your standard creepy motel where a bunch of 20-something-year-olds are staying and, of course, follows the tragic and horrific events that happen to them during the duration of their stay.
The star of this film is Julie-Ann Hamolko who also appears in the previously reviewed film Deadly Detour. I kind of prefered her acting in TaTA more than the last film. The film also contains a lot of appearances from the cast of another upcoming Graffiti Playhouse film, Armageddon Ed’s Ticket To Hell; appearances including Kevin Orosz, Efraiem Hanna, Michael Coppolecchia, and Joe Nicoletta. Kevin Orosz is also the director of the film, with Randy Wilson as editor.
Being that the production company behind TaTA, Graffiti Playhouse Productions, is from South New Jersey and most of the actors are from the area as well, I can only assume that the setting of this film is, you guessed it, New Jersey. That being said, and being from South Jersey myself, I just need to say… The dialogue could have used some work. As New Jersian’s, we’re known for being sarcastic, brash, and ballsy. The insults and curses slung in TaTA were all “dick this,” and “faggot that,” which could come out as borderline racist seeing how they are used by characters so frequently up until all the men are mostly killed off. Come on, you could have been much more creative…I’m still trying to get “Cunt-a-sorous” to become a common insult. But, at least one girl’s retort in the film was “Eat my ass,” which is actually something I say frequently when talking to coworkers about the stupid customers who come into my workplace.
The kills in Terror At Ten Acres are hit or miss in most cases. There is a scene where the killer is stabbing someone in a diner and there’s obviously no penetration by the knife, and thus no blood at all. But, then there are some pretty great kills! My favorite was someone’s head getting plowed over by a car; along with the awesome blood splatter to go with it. Another kill, a hot clothing iron, gets an honorable mention too. So, gore fans will enjoy some of the death scenes and hopefully that will be enough for them to excuse the other somewhat lamer deaths in the film.
TaTA has a few small chase scenes. They reminded me of the final chase scene between Alice and Pamela in the original Friday The 13th. By this I mean it’s “one hit, run, one hit, run, one hit, run.” There’s never really a good ass kicking until the very end. Still, as a big fan of the good ol’ chase scene, I was pleased to see a little running around. Although, they were sometimes comical. In one of the chase scenes, you can clearly see the camera guy following the actors as they run because of his shadow reflecting off the sides of the walls. One of the fun qualities of indie films is that you can find bloopers without searching too hard.
So, what is my final verdict on Terror At Ten Acres? Well, when you look at it as a micro-budgeted indie horror film, there’s not a lot to complain about. You know what you’re in for as soon as you pop it in the DVD player. Could things have been tightened up? Sure. The script, overall quality of film, and special FX could have been better, but luckily the film’s good qualities and accidental humorous outcomes make up for the bad aspects. Let’s just call it even, shall we? Terror At Ten Acres isn’t indie horror gold, but I’ve seen worse. I’d say it was an awesome try!
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