This by-the-numbers killer hillbilly horror movie was made by Aussie filmmakers Cameron and Colin Cairnes way back in 2012. I watched it instead of their more recent horror movie Scare Campaign, because Scare Campaign didn’t have anyone in it I’d heard of. But 100 Bloody Acres has two actors I like very much playing the killer hillbillies: a really standout actor named Damon Harrimon who you should know but probably don’t, and a character actor named Angus Sampson most folks will recognize as the doctor – well, “organic mechanic” – from Fury Road.
The twist here is that they’re not really killer hillbillies, but just a couple of schmoes trying to get by running a fertilizer business in the boonies. They’re not above grinding roadkill into their fertilizer, and when that roadkill is human, well, you gotta do what you gotta do. After all, they were that way when you found them.
100 Bloody Acres is riffing broadly and somewhat clumsily on the comedic Motel Hell-style follow-ups to Texas Chainsaw Massacre, which leaned into the stuff that Texas Chainsaw Massacre only suggested. I don’t care for this genre, mostly because I feel it’s a gross misreading of Texas Chainsaw Massacre, but also because it tends to be slasher-adjacent (slasher movies are where horror goes to die). Furthermore, if I’m going to watch a killer hillbilly movie where the twist is that the hillbillies are just misunderstood, I feel like the genre should begin and end with Tucker and Dale vs Evil, in the capable hands of Tyler Labine and Alan Tudyk.
But 100 Bloody Acres was competent, which is more than I can say for most movies in the genre. It worked mostly because of the two lead actors. Overall, it felt like a calling card for a couple of new directors, a sort of proof of concept. Which is why I watched it, because these brothers’ most recent project is Late Night with the Devil, which I also watched as the second half of my double feature. More on that in the appropriate thread, but, spoiler…I should have quit with 100 Bloody Acres, while I was ahead. : (