• Rating:
Sex. Blood. Death. More Sex. More Death.
Cabin Fever, if I'm not mistaken, the debut film of director Eli Roth, famous thanks to the Hostel series, plays with the most classic elements of horror cinema, namely sex, blood, and death, drawing heavily from various films like The Evil Dead, the countless Zombie movies (even though there aren't any here), and a bit of healthy paranoia.
The plot is simple, but to avoid spoilers, I'll just say that the film borders on the ridiculous at several points, saved by a certain sense of (self)irony, which is significant, making the whole thing lively and enjoyable.
It might also be the random sex scenes scattered here and there (starring genuinely impressive chicks getting it on left and right) that make you forget the absurdity of the plot: a virus infecting some kids stranded in a cabin in the woods, making them victims of paranoia so thick you can cut it with a knife, up to the absurd final climax.
The tension, if it can be called that, increases dramatically during the progression of the film, and there are also several interesting twists (take this term with a grain of salt), which suggest that the director is not completely unaware of the direction given to the work, and plays more with the audience to entertain rather than "scare" them.
There are various splatter elements, of course, and a series of characters are characterized reasonably well, despite the film's short duration. Also, the film's atmosphere has something peculiar, almost engaging, which prevents me from completely trashing the film.
It's interesting to note that even "blockbusters" like The Cabin in the Woods, one of the most successful "horror" films of the last decade, blatantly steal from Roth's work, suggesting it's not a film entirely to be discarded, as it might seem.
In the company of a few beautiful girls and a couple of beers, the film can be an excellent adjunct for an evening, let's say, interesting, while if someone is expecting a dense masterpiece of horror cinema, absolutely stay away.
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