Review by Abbie Stutzer
Cannibal Diner is nothing special. It’s a run-of-the-mill “murderous mutant family” horror film. It’s filled with gross-out gore and most of the deaths are relatively tame, and not creative. Lame! (I mean, you’d think mutants would think of creative ways to kill young co-eds, whilst wasting away in their toxic, industrial home. But what do I know…)
Moderate spoilers ahead.
The film starts off similar to a found-footage film. This choice is effective, albeit confusing at first. We see the main characters of the film (a group of busty women – yawn) filming each other while hiking to their weekend campsite.
Suddenly, the audience’s view is pulled back into the woods and we are watching the women from afar. The angle suggests that (not so subtly) the women are being watched by someone, or something. This suspicion is quickly confirmed once a woman who is driving to the campsite (separately from the main gaggle of girls) gets lost, and comes across a drunken, female harbinger in the woods. The shady lady directs the young woman to drive through an industrial site that’s been condemned for leaking toxic fluids, which, apparently, turned the people near the site into mutant freaks. Totally safe!
While this wayward busty chick is wandering around in an attempt to find the industrial site, the film cuts back to the other women who are part of the group of female weekend warriors: One group (the original group) of ladies proceeds to get high, and have a topless make out session; the other group consists of two women who are riding a pseudo-bike cart… for some reason. It doesn’t take long for all of the women to become overwhelmed by the soot-covered slobbering fools. How these mutants over-power the women, I’m not certain. I mean these things can barely walk in a straight line. Anyhow… the mutants begin to pick off the girls one by one, and either kill them, or place their semi-alive bodies in their family’s cannibal diner.
The one woman who is not immediately overcome by these strange-o mouth-breathers (not surprisingly, she’s the most “titted up” one) is able to use her wiles to get through the toxic site. “Sadly,” she is eventually captured by one of the mutant people and is brought to the compound’s kitchen. The dining area is, of course, covered with dirt, maggots and blood. And guess what the mutants eat? They eat decaying, maggot filled humans! And the filmmakers make sure to direct the actor zombie freaks to eat all gross and slow-like, just to make the point that the mutants are disgusting and have no morals – they’re freaks, you see. Got it.
Our female lead is forced to eat the mutants’ human meals and watch one of her blonde buddies get slaughtered. During a scuffle, she breaks free only to be chased down and almost raped (because really – what is a mutant without the desire to rape?) She kills her partial human assailant and moves on to find her way out of the cannibal complex.
The last surviving woman stumbles around the complex for a few more minutes, but gets attacked by another sullied male. However, she’s learned something from her previous attacker – mutants enjoy looking at ta-tas She uses this knowledge to her advantage to easily defeat the dude by distracting him with her naked body. After our heroine fights off the second would-be rapist, the film pretty much stalls. The main character stumbles around in the dark, attempting to find her way out of the building, only to get attacked by another mutant. That’s when the film comes to an abrupt end.
Sadly, this film has the same tired tropes that every other “deadly weirdo family” movie follows, and it doesn’t even depict the standard storyline well. The film has hardly any surprising moments, and there are no characters that are likeable (case in point: I couldn’t even remember then main character’s name.) That’s mainly because the plot is simply, “hot girls get killed by mutant freaks.” And, hey, I’m the first to say that I love some ridiculous tits-and-ass-heavy films. I’ve no problem watching bombshells meet terrible demises. But I do have a problem with this weak genre staple when there’s no story, or real horror, in a film.
Cannibal Diner is out now on US DVD and VOD from BrinkVision.