[MANIAC
screens Saturday July 13 th at midnight at the Cedar Lee Theatre.]
Review
by Bob Ignizio
Frodo goes psycho as Elijah Wood takes
on the title role in this remake of the infamous 1981 slasher film
MANIAC. The plot: Wood plays
Frank Zito, a twitchy sleazebag who kills and scalps women, then takes
the bloody hairpieces with him to staple on to his collection of
mannequins. He feels bad about it, but just can't help himself. Rinse
and repeat until 90 minutes are up. That's about it, seeing as the
tragic romance subplot that gave the original version some degree of pathos has been retooled in such a way here as to be nearly
insignificant.
The
fact that MANIAC is
shot almost entirely from the POV of Wood's murderous protagonist is
about the only thing even marginally interesting about it. Even
that aspect of the film is as likely to feel like a cheap gimmick to
some viewers as it is to seem like a clever artistic choice to
others. Of course that's hardly the only thing in MANIAC
likely to polarize audiences.
As with the original, many will find it excessively violent and
misogynistic. It's hard to deny that there are moments in MANIAC
that genuinely feel aimed at the kind of people who get off on seeing depictions of women being brutally assaulted and murdered.
