Pig Hunt is set in San Francisco where John Hickman (Travis Aaron Wade), his girlfriend Brooks (Tina Huang) & a couple of their friends have decided to go hunting in the great outdoors for the weekend, the four friends travel to John's dead uncle's cabin to prepare for the hunt. Two local Hillbilly brother's Jake (Jason Foster) & Ricky (Nick Tagas) show up & offer to act as guides on a Pig hunt, rumours of a huge 3000lb Hog nicknamed 'Ripper' & 'Hogzilla' are used to add interest. The hunters set out & venture deep into the forest where they find a marijuana crop, a group of lesbian hippies & discover that the rumours of a huge man eating Hog are in fact true...
Co-produced & directed by James Isaac I must admit that I am not a fan of modern low budget horror & I really wasn't expecting much from Pig Hunt but I was surprised to find an oddball exploitation horror film that certainly has plenty going on even if it doesn't quite know how to juggle everything with total success. There are lesbians, cult's, a weird Hog worshipping cult leader, Rednecks, car & bike stunts, Pig hunt's, drugs, nudity, gore, moral dilemmas, a giant mutant Hog monster & lots of backwoods brutality in a really odd mix of Deliverance (1972), Razorback (1984) & Wrong Turn (2003) that has so many things going on but the script doesn't really know how to bring them all together & the climax basically features anyone left alive in the same place with a giant monster Pig as it is finally revealed. Pacing is a bit of a problem in Pig Hunt, at almost one hour & forty minutes it could have done with maybe a good ten minutes cut from it, it just takes a little bit too long to get going & certain sequences just go on for too long. The character's are alright but I can't quite work out the Iraq war symbolism on show, from teens who aren't soldiers dressing up & acting like soldiers to hunt Pigs to John's uncle having lots of anti-Bush newspaper clippings in his cabin for no apparent reason. I assume the intention was to make a film in which hunting, shooting & killing isn't glamorised & have the Pig hunt represent actual combat in Iraq but the whole war vibe is completely ditched about halfway through as either the script or director forgot about it.
There is some decent gore here, a guy's knee cap is torn off, a Pig has it's head sawn off & is then gutted in a very gory sequence, a Deer is shot & killed, a Snake is shot & impaled with an arrow, more Pigs are shot, there's plenty of guts on show, a guy is shot in the head, someone is impaled to a wall, a guy has his head cut off, a severed hand is seen, there's an eye gouging, there's plenty of blood splatter & very little CGI which is nice. The giant Pig monster isn't seen until the last fifteen or so minutes & it's good old latex rather than CGI, even though the makers couldn't afford to make an entire giant mutant Pig monster since we only ever see close-up & tight shots of it's face & eye's. Set in the forest the film does have an isolated feel. There are a few car & motorbike stunts & your typical insulting horror film clichéd interpretation of Rednecks who are all inbred psychos with bad teeth. There's also a fair bit of nudity at the end as an entire cult of women walk around naked.
The IMDb says Pig Hunt had a budget of about $6,000,000 which I find hard to believe, there's no way this cost that much. The production values are nice, it's well made & the lack of horrible CGI is a definite plus. The acting is fine, the cast do a good if not amazing job.
Pig Hunt is an odd film, it's a Redneck backwoods brutality film, a giant killer Pig film, a slasher thriller film that has lots going on if nothing else. I liked it for it's mix of odd moments, styles & genres & the gore & nudity don't hurt either. Much better than I expected, not a masterpiece but an entertaining backwoods brutality exploitation monster flick. It could have been worse.
Co-produced & directed by James Isaac I must admit that I am not a fan of modern low budget horror & I really wasn't expecting much from Pig Hunt but I was surprised to find an oddball exploitation horror film that certainly has plenty going on even if it doesn't quite know how to juggle everything with total success. There are lesbians, cult's, a weird Hog worshipping cult leader, Rednecks, car & bike stunts, Pig hunt's, drugs, nudity, gore, moral dilemmas, a giant mutant Hog monster & lots of backwoods brutality in a really odd mix of Deliverance (1972), Razorback (1984) & Wrong Turn (2003) that has so many things going on but the script doesn't really know how to bring them all together & the climax basically features anyone left alive in the same place with a giant monster Pig as it is finally revealed. Pacing is a bit of a problem in Pig Hunt, at almost one hour & forty minutes it could have done with maybe a good ten minutes cut from it, it just takes a little bit too long to get going & certain sequences just go on for too long. The character's are alright but I can't quite work out the Iraq war symbolism on show, from teens who aren't soldiers dressing up & acting like soldiers to hunt Pigs to John's uncle having lots of anti-Bush newspaper clippings in his cabin for no apparent reason. I assume the intention was to make a film in which hunting, shooting & killing isn't glamorised & have the Pig hunt represent actual combat in Iraq but the whole war vibe is completely ditched about halfway through as either the script or director forgot about it.
There is some decent gore here, a guy's knee cap is torn off, a Pig has it's head sawn off & is then gutted in a very gory sequence, a Deer is shot & killed, a Snake is shot & impaled with an arrow, more Pigs are shot, there's plenty of guts on show, a guy is shot in the head, someone is impaled to a wall, a guy has his head cut off, a severed hand is seen, there's an eye gouging, there's plenty of blood splatter & very little CGI which is nice. The giant Pig monster isn't seen until the last fifteen or so minutes & it's good old latex rather than CGI, even though the makers couldn't afford to make an entire giant mutant Pig monster since we only ever see close-up & tight shots of it's face & eye's. Set in the forest the film does have an isolated feel. There are a few car & motorbike stunts & your typical insulting horror film clichéd interpretation of Rednecks who are all inbred psychos with bad teeth. There's also a fair bit of nudity at the end as an entire cult of women walk around naked.
The IMDb says Pig Hunt had a budget of about $6,000,000 which I find hard to believe, there's no way this cost that much. The production values are nice, it's well made & the lack of horrible CGI is a definite plus. The acting is fine, the cast do a good if not amazing job.
Pig Hunt is an odd film, it's a Redneck backwoods brutality film, a giant killer Pig film, a slasher thriller film that has lots going on if nothing else. I liked it for it's mix of odd moments, styles & genres & the gore & nudity don't hurt either. Much better than I expected, not a masterpiece but an entertaining backwoods brutality exploitation monster flick. It could have been worse.