CLUB DREAD - DVD review

You'd think filmmakers would know better than to put a word like "dread" in their title, a word that can so easily be used against them by critics. But, then, maybe the filmmaking team of Broken Lizard, who created this 2004 comedy, were making a dare. OK, "Broken Lizard's Club Dread" is dreadful. You'll dread having to watch it. The whole thing is dreadfully deficient, its dreaded dreadfulness dreadable beyond compare. Even its main character's dreadlocks are dreadful.

There, that felt good.

Broken Lizard is the group that previously gave us "Super Troopers," a film I found extraordinarily corny, brainless, and juvenile but which is enjoyed by a seemingly ever-growing number of fans. "Club Dread," however, is just the opposite in its humor. Rather than being over-the-top and ridiculous, it's straight-arrow and sober to a fault. If in "Super Troopers" the gags were far too obvious, in "Club Dread" they're almost nonexistent. As a result, I found "Super Troopers" extraordinarily silly and "Club Dread" intensely boring. I'm not sure which is worse.

"Club Dread" is on the face of it a parody of slasher flicks. But it has two insurmountable problems. First, the "Scream" and "Scary Movie" series already covered the territory well enough that any further attempts like this one seem merely redundant. Second, the subsequent "Friday the 13th" movies and their kin were pretty much parodies of themselves, anyway, and "Club Dread" is so close to them in blood, gore, sex, and nudity that it's hard to tell the difference. So, what exactly is "Club Dread" spoofing that hasn't been spoofed before, even by the original films themselves?

The story line follows the staff and guests of a tropical-island getaway, Coconut Pete's Pleasure Island Resort, Costa Rica, as they come to realize that a serial killer is stalking them and there's no way off the island. Like the films it parodies, "Club Dread" features a throng of pretty girls in bikinis (you thought I was going to say a throng of thongs, didn't you), some moments of nudity and sex, and a plentitude of blood. About a million red herrings, false alarms, and ominous musical crescendoes accompany the action, which not only sends up "Friday the 13th" and its clones but things like "Psycho," "Jeepers Creepers," and "Wrong Turn" as well.

People get picked off one and two at a time, but nobody notices. When the staff members finally catch on that people are dying, they try to keep it from the guests, especially when it appears that the murderer is really just after them. They also discover that the only two emergency boats on the island have disappeared and all communications with the mainland have been severed. The regular boat that services the place isn't due to return for several more days, so until then, they're on their own. As in any Agatha Christie mystery, everyone becomes a prime suspect.

Most of the film's stars are members of the Broken Lizard gang, others are not. Director Jay Chandrasekhar doubles as Putman, the staff's tennis instructor, a straightlaced gentleman in the aforementioned dreadlocks, who appears to be from Jamaica and speaks in a proper but prissy British accent. Apparently, the dreadlocks and the accent are his claim to comic fame here. Kevin Heffernan plays Lars, the resort's new masseur, who is also a master of various martial arts. Steve Lemme plays Juan, the supervisor of water sports, whose activities with a goat makes him suspicious to the others. Paul Soter plays Dave, the resort's DJ and designated wacky drug connection. Eric Stolhanske plays Sam, the chief of the island's Fun Police. Brittany Daniel pays Jenny, the aerobics director who's just gotten her own TV show when the former star died of rat poisoning. And Bill Paxton plays Coconut Pete Wabash, the owner of the place and a onetime famous recording artist who glories in reliving his past, singing his corny old songs, and picking up chicks.

Everybody on the island does a good deal of running around in the jungle, mostly at night and alone, but there isn't much actually happening. Just as in typical slasher flicks, we're supposed to guess who the murderer is, all the while laying odds on which characters will die in what order. Only the ending of "Club Dread," where the villain keeps coming back for more, shows any spark of imagination or wit. The rest of the time, things are pretty dull.

Video:
The movie is presented on flip sides of a single disc in both full and widescreen. The fullscreen dimensions are a 1.33:1 ratio pan-and-scan, meaning the sides of the widescreen image have been shaved off, leaving the middle to get blown up to fill out a standard, 1.33:1 ratio television screen. The movie's original theatrical-release dimensions are largely preserved in the anamorphic widescreen version, however, which measures an approximately 2.13:1 ratio across a normal television. The video quality is quite good, quite clean, and reasonably well defined, with bright, colorful hues throughout. I noticed a few moiré effects, but, overall, I have no complaints about the widescreen picture. Losing about thirty percent of the image left and right in the P&S version is an issue easily resolved by not watching it.

Audio:
The Dolby Digital 5.1 sound, too, is pretty good. The surround channels reproduce the odd bird call, the occasional scream, and plenty of musical ambiance. Dynamics are very strong, important to the many false alarms I mentioned earlier, but bass is not as deep as might be expected. Still, the viewer will not fret over any loss in audio values.

Extras:
There are not a lot of extras involved unless you like audio commentaries. There are two of them on this disc. The first is with director, writer, and co-star Jay Chandrasekhar and writer and co-star Erik Stolhanske; the second is with writers and co-stars Kevin Heffernan, Steve Lemme, and Paul Soter. Having two complete commentaries seems like overkill, to say the least. Sorry, couldn't resist. In addition, there are thirty-two scene selections and a promo for the movie's CD music album. English, French, and Spanish are the spoken languages involved, with English and Spanish subtitle options.

Parting Stabs:
The Broken Lizard team of actors, writers, and directors who make these things seem like funny, personable folks in their films, and one can easily see their intentions are well meaning. I give them credit for following up on the dopey "Super Troopers" with something less infantile, but I think they went way too far in the opposite direction this time, forgetting to provide any laughs. Maybe the third time will be the charm because I have no doubt these guys will be in the filmmaking business for a very long time.