A brutally sadistic rape leads to a series of bizarre gory murders during a midnight disco bowl-a-rama at a popular bowling alley. One by one, players of two teams meet blood-drenched gruesome deaths at the hand of a black bowling-gloved masked killer. This alley runs red with blood by sunrise.
Gutterballs is written and directed by Ryan Nicholson who also is one of the executive producers, the film belongs in the rape/revenge genre and we get plenty of nudity (there is actually both full female and male genital nudity), some borderline explicit sex, a lot of explicit language (there is easily thousands of F words in this film), sleaze and gory killings. On the topic of nudity, it's nice to see women with believable, realistic bodies (aside from Candice Lewald's stripper physique and implants). One of the great things about independent films, everyone's not gorgeous and perfect. In one of the first scenes we get a close rear-end beaver shot of Lisa (Candice Lewald). Yes, that's right, her shaved genitals is right in your face for about a second. And in that moment you realize what you can expect of the film.
There are several inventive kills and superb gore FX, trust me if you are a fan och blood and gore you won´t be displeased. Only one of the killings is off screen and according to Ryan Nicholson it was never scripted to be an onscreen death.
On the technical side, most of it is shot well, it´s lit very well and the set design is great. The soundtrack by Gianni Rossi is good and has a nice 1980s vibe
Dan Ellis, a Ryan Nicholson regular, is excellent and probably the most talented member of the cast. The acting varies from bad to good but it´s a clear improvement compared to Ryan Nicholson´s earlier Live Feed but hey I didn´t expect Oscar worthy performances. Gutterballs has been accused of glorifying rape but I don´t think the film does try to glorify it, it's nasty and like most reviewers I find the scene disturbing which it's supposed to be. The rape scene is long and unpleasant and makes the protracted revenge scenes so much more enjoyable! So in that context the rape scene is completly relevent. So, as you might have guessed, Gutterballs is not for the squemish or the politically correct.
The review is based on the DVD released by Dark Entertainment which has swedish subtitles but sadly, for some reason, some of the dialogue isn´t subtitled.
Rating: 7 out of 7. Gutterballs accomplishes a lot, especially considering it´s limited budget. Sure it has some faults but it's a movie made by the horror fan for the horror fan. It´s a very entertaining and nice little horror film. I loved Gutterballs! I want a part two or a prequel!
/JL
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