Toolbox Murders (2004) User Reviews

A watchable but failed horror

[lomelasz · 5/10 · 15 April 2005]

I thought this film was OK but nothing great. I mean, I thought Angela Bettis was brilliant in it and was pleased to see that she managed to keep the film from falling totally flat on its ass but that's the film's only saving grace (well, there's another one and I'll get to it in a second). It's certainly intriguing and how the victims meet their demise are slightly fun to see but said deaths are rather uninvolving and exist soley to titillate fans of gore. To me, the deaths were, although very inventive, dull. It did nothing for the movie whatsoever. As a horror, the film fails. Sure, it has cheap scares and plentiful of mystery but those who are bumped off...you don't feel any sympathy for them. Mind you, they're killed off that quickly and easily that it's hard to find any sympathy you may have for them. The only person I had sympathy for was Nell (a la Angela Bettis). Mainly because her character is only one in the film that is close to fully developed. Sure, we are introduced to others but what else?. However, there is another thing apart from Angela Bettis that keeps it going and that's the mystery of it all. When Nell decides to turn detective and investigate the history behind the building and those weird symbols, that's when the films jumps from being merely watchable to actually good. But it all backfires spectacularly when the boyfriend shows up and decides at that moment to save the day. This occurrence spoils the mystery plot line and the climax is just a clichéd stalk-and-slash (and the very Halloween-alike ending was a very bad idea). The mystery storyline is crippled at the end when the killer chooses not to kill Nell there and then because of the symbols on her arm. It was just too ridiculous really. Sure, the secret areas in the building was interesting but all because of black arts? Nah. The reason this element doesn't work is because it's supposed to be a horror/drama not sci-fi horror. Although the film does give early implications that the explanation for everything may be otherworldly ie the ominous music when Nell looks at the symbol near the start of the movie, it just doesn't work.

Overall, the film isn't a complete waste of time and doles out a few guilty pleasures to horror fans easily pleased, but for those, like me, who like their horrors well-done, this just isn't one of them.

I can only wish I enjoyed my work so.

[KingM21 · 6/10 · 2 September 2005]

This remake was surprisingly enjoyable, despite the low IMDb rating, and perhaps Tobe Hooper's best work since The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Mix some elements of Polanki's Apartment Trilogy with some from TCM, and throw in a few inventive, violent kills à la the original Toolbox Murders, and you have a rather enjoyable horror movie. Also adding to it is the good performance from up and coming horror starlet Angela Bettis. The killer was pretty cool too; I liked how giddy he was after sprinkling lye on some guy's face, held down by a vice, Casino style! I can only wish I enjoyed my work so. Of course, it's not a flawless movie. The plot maybe could have used a bit more work but if you just go with it, it's really a minor complaint. The DVD has two commentaries (one with Hooper!), deleted scenes (mostly more graphic shots of the kills), a short interview with Hooper, and some trailers, including the great one for High Tension! I'm glad I bought it, despite a hefty $20 tag.

A rather solid slasher remake

[Coventry · 6/10 · 20 March 2004]

Director Tobe Hooper once entered the horror-hall of fame at the top position back in 1974 with his undeniable masterpiece of imaginative terror, the Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Ever since that, his career only went downhill. In the nineties he simply…well…sucked with a repertoire of titles like The Mangler and Crocodile. The tide seems to be turning a bit now, as his version of the Toolbox Murders is surprisingly decent and well made. This is a remake of a vicious 70's slasher that is overall gory and disgusting (the original was even included in the `video nasties' – list of banned horror movies in the U.K) The plot and motivations of the murdering nut are slightly different in Hooper's version of the Toolbox Murders. The story is about a young couple that moves to Hollywood and homes in an old, spooky building. Inhabitants of this building – mainly wannabe actors and other scum – brutally die one by one…As the title implies, the butchering is achieved by hammers, drills, screwdrivers and a bunch of other tools. And I bet you can imagine how badly things can get messed up if you're using tools on people, no? Indeed, this films is rather gory and extremely violent with a few gruesome killing-highlights such as a (semi-)decapitation with a sawing machine! Angela Bettis, the girl who stole every horror fan's heart since `May', plays the screaming heroine who slowly gets to the bottom of the murder mystery. She receives good feedback from the beautiful Juliet Landau (Martin Landau's daughter) . The script and story-development isn't always logical and most of the interior shots are under-exposed. Also, the Toolbox Murders seems to give the impression we're guessing fro the identity of the killer initially…like a good old-fashioned ‘whodunit' slasher, but the mystery and detective aspects abruptly come to an end as the plot opens up a little more. Far from being an intelligent (or even clever) horror remake, Tobe Hooper's film is entertaining and perfectly suitable for an evening of scares and loud yells.

Tobe Hooper is Back, Baby!

[squeezebox · 2 November 2004]

After a fifteen year long string of awful horror movies and forgettable TV shows, director Tobe Hooper finally roars back to life with this fun, scary and intense horror thriller.

When I first heard Hooper was remaking TOOLBOX MURDERS, I thought he had hit a new low. The director of THE Texas CHAINSAW MASSACRE is making a remake of a movie that was in many ways a rip-off of CHAINSAW? I didn't think I'd bother.

Then I started hearing some internet buzz that the movie was actually pretty good, so I picked up the DVD at a horror convention. I was pleasantly surprised. It's a throwback to Hooper's earlier movies like CHAINSAW, EATEN ALIVE and THE FUNHOUSE, with a similar atmosphere of dementia and claustrophobic terror. The performances are excellent and the screenplay is very good (written by the same team that wrote Hooper's previous film, CROCODILE). Also top notch are the expressionistic cinematography and editing.

Hooper's previous movies reeked of TV movie blandness (possibly due to his having slowly moved into that realm over the years), but TOOLBOX MURDERS has a healthy dose of grindhouse grit to go with the slick, professional quality of his hired hand work. The result is a movie that is as technically well-made as SCREAM or WRONG TURN, but with the guts of a 70s drive-in shocker.

While the killer finds some creative ways to kill people with various hardware items, and the action takes place in a single apartment building, this movie has little to do with the original TOOLBOX MURDERS. It's actually more similar in plot to Lucio Fulci's HOUSE BY THE Cemetery. However, despite its remake status and its borrowing plot points from a few previous movies, it has a surprisingly fresh and original feeling to it.

I'll go out on a limb and say Tobe Hooper's TOOLBOX MURDERS is one of the better horror movies I've seen in quite some time. It leaves the CHAINSAW remake in the dust. It's better than most so-called horror movies I've seen in the last few years.

I highly recommend this to horror fans, but especially to admirers of Hooper who thought he would never crawl out of his rut. Well, he's back, and with a vengeance!

Totally lacking........

[stephen-pride · 2/10 · 4 August 2005]

I watched the original Texas Chainsaw Massacre and totally enjoyed the whole atmosphere that Tobe managed to achieve. I also watched the 2004 (non Hooper) remake and enjoyed that version too although I did find the polish made it a little bland. I therefore looked forward to taking home Toolbox Murders hoping for a repetition of that original experience felt when watching Chainsaw Massacre. The first major shock was that Tope Hooper doesn't seem to have moved out of the 1970's with this film, I honestly felt like I was watching a seriously dated slasher flick, the acting was wooden, the inbred/mutant/murderer was pathetic and the atmosphere just seemed to lack depth and claustrophobia Tobe Hooper managed to achieve so well in Chainsaw Massacre. I would realistically recommend that you do NOT rent this movie and if it is playing free to view late at night on your TV, have an early one!

Tobe Hooper's return to greatness...

[Jonny_Numb · 7/10 · 31 March 2005]

The original "Toolbox Murders" was a pretty shameful combination of "Halloween" and "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre," lacking the atmosphere, suspense, and gritty charm of those films. At the time of its release (1978), the concept of gory death by hardware (regardless of how peripheral it was to the 'plot') allowed for at least one lasting shock (a nail-gun murder preceded by a very memorable bathtub scene), but otherwise, the film is dated and dull by modern standards.

As is clear from the first frame onward, Tobe Hooper's stylish update of "Toolbox" is determined to take the material in a supernatural direction, and for the most part, is successful. Whereas many horror films of late have been drowned in unconvincing CGI gore and calculated orchestral booms designed to elicit cheap scares from the audience, Hooper's film retains the subtle implication of TCM (the villain remains masked/obscured throughout the film) crossed with a jigsaw-puzzle plot that becomes more engrossing as the movie progresses. As far as ambition is concerned, it definitely surpasses the original film's shopworn, "Psycho"-familiar story, and Hooper's assured direction helps greatly.

Angela Bettis leads a cast of lesser-knowns who give fine performances (the more grating, clichéd characters are dispatched promptly) and make the premise believable. Similarly, the photography creates fine atmosphere when needed, with the picture often looking like a cross between the colorful sets of "May" combined with the slight grittiness of Zack Snyder's "Dawn of the Dead" remake.

"Toolbox Murders" is a quirky, suspenseful, and sufficiently gory horror film. In the third act, Hooper re-affirms the genius of his seminal masterpiece by building the tension to an almost unbearable degree, whilst capping the film with a deliciously ambiguous ending.

Definitely recommended.

Absolute Crap!

[pilkingtons1 · 1/10 · 17 March 2005]

Anybody who thinks this movie is in any way good is on crack. I couldn't get through 20 minutes of this trash. Tobe Hooper has done some classic films. I don't know what the heck happened to him. This movie was something i could have made with a camcorder in my back yard. Anybody that claims to be scared of this movie should check himself into a hospital immediately. This movie was full of clichés and was just so poorly made. I have no idea how people could like this crap. Go see a horror classic. Movies like Nightmare on elm street, last house on the left, or exorcist are classics. This movie is cheesy and has no redeeming factors.

Great re-imaging of a slasher classic...

[LuisitoJoaquinGonzalez · 7/10 · 9 March 2005]

Throughout the seventies and early eighties, Tobe Hooper was widely considered as one of the greatest horror directors ever to grace the silver screen. If it wasn't for his 1974 video nasty The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, then we may never have seen movies like Slumber Party Massacre or any of the other slasher 'massacre' titles. We may not have even witnessed classics like Halloween. Sometime after his career redefining joint venture with Steven Spielberg (Poltergeist), Hooper fell into an awful run of consistently poor form. Later years saw uninspired efforts like Crocodile, The Mangler and Night Terrors completely ruin his almost peerless resume. It was somewhat ironic then that he decided to direct a remake of the 1978 gruesome slasher (The Toolbox Murders) at exactly the same time that New Line Cinema were renewing his very own masterpiece (Chainsaw Massacre).

The original Toolbox flick is a tough act to follow, let alone reproduce. What it lacked in style and quality, it more than made up for with brutality that has never been expressed in such a gratuitous fashion. Some of the gruesomely vicious scenes are almost impossible to forget and seeing a masked maniac use a nail gun to slaughter a naked teenager while he merrily hums away like he's changing a light bulb is a shock tactic has never been used as effectively since. I must admit I hoped for more of the same from Hooper and I knew that he had already proved that he had the quality to break the hex of extremely poor horror remakes.

The Lusman Arms is a run down hotel in Hollywood, which has stood since the early twenties. In the opening scene we see a young woman get brutally murdered by a hammer-wielding black shrouded menace in one of the guest-rooms. Her body is dragged into the shadows and it seems that no one notices her disappearance. Next up we meet Nell and Steve Burrows (Angela Bettis and Brent Roam), a young married couple that have only just moved into the Lusman Arms. Steve is a doctor and spends most of his time out of the house, which leaves Nell suffering with her noisy neighbours through the wafer thin walls. Having already mistaken two rehearsing actors for someone being slaughtered, the Local Police are less than impressed with the housewife's overactive imagination. But after hearing the dieing screams of her neighbour, she begins to realise that the complex has more to its history than first meets the eye. Nell eventually heads out to solve the mystery of the disappearing residents, and what she discovers is more shocking than she could ever have expected…

Toolbox Murders is something of an impressive return to form from Tobe Hooper. Slasher Movies are always easy templates to unleash some directorial flair and the veteran horror icon seems to lap up the chances to shine with relish. You can tell from the off that this is going to be something of a step up from the typical post-Scream lowbrow trash. Joseph Conlan's impressive score keeps the tension running on a knife-edge, and the set locations prove that the feature has been slickly produced. Hooper does a great job of making an ordinary everyday backdrop like an apartment complex feel as creepy as a haunted castle and the conclusion is as exciting as it is enjoyable. The two lead characters are fairly well acted, and kudos to the scriptwriter for giving the viewer the option to sympathise with the protagonist. There are enough mysterious suspects to partake in a reality TV cluedo marathon and each of them will give you a good enough reason to think that they could be the masked maniac. I especially enjoyed the stuttering manager, who describes a tin full of torn out human teeth that Nell found in her bedroom wall as, "Part of the building's charm and character!"

At the time of writing, Toolbox Murders has not yet been released in either the US or the UK on DVD, which is somewhat inexplicable. I'm not sure what kind of business this took at the box offices, but I believe that it does certainly deserve a bigger status. There are a few flaws that perhaps undermine Hooper's experience. The use of stereotypes is beyond belief; and as soon as a creepy toolbox-clutching handyman popped up as a hackneyed red herring, the movie lost a touch of credibility. At times the characters behave with a knack of ineptness that was totally nonsensical and perhaps underlined a lack of effort from the screenwriters. Victims leave themselves open to the killer's murderous advances in such a fashion that makes you wonder if they were suicidal, and the director fails to add anything remotely different to the conclusion.

Questions will be raised about the numerous plot holes that are scattered throughout the runtime, but personally I feel that they add an extra layer of mystery to the synopsis. Audiences don't always need to be hand-guided hand through a story. Gaps can be filled by a creative imagination and that is part of the beauty of cinema.

Toolbox Murders is not so much a remake of its 1978 ancestor as it is a complete re-imaging. Yes there's a nail gun murder and a similar masked killer theme; but this time around we have an intriguing supernatural sheen, which makes the movie a tad more interesting. All in all this is well worth picking up. Gory (one guy gets his head sawed in half ala Intruder), suspenseful (the final stalking scenes are brilliant) and well watchable to boot, this is Hooper almost back to his best. Let's just hope that he can keep up the good work with his latest adventure - Mortuary (another remake?).

Hooper needs to retire

[whytetrash39 · 1/10 · 24 March 2005]

Never has there been more compelling evidence that Spielberg had a major hand in the production of POLTERGEIST. Aside from the TV version of Salem's lot and obviously TCM Hooper has lost whatever touch he may have had. I never thought he could outdo himself in terms of sheer crappiness after THE MANGLER but he has with THE TOOLBOX MURDERS. Poorly acted, poorly lit, poorly directed and uneven in tone Hooper has managed to actually get WORSE at his job over the past 30 some odd years. I know some people will slam me for daring to criticize him but come on..direct to video release at this point in his career? He's just not good. That being said, Sheri Moon is sexy as all get out.

If I had a Hammer...and a Nail Gun...and a Drill

[BaronBl00d · 7/10 · 3 October 2005]

While the name of Tobe Hooper does not carry the cachet it once did, he still deserves his place amongst the modern masters of horror with the likes of Romero, Argento, Craven, and Cronenberg. Hooper, having never been able to equal the raw energy and success of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre...and never being able to do so in the future...definitely has regained his form with this version of The Toolbox Murders. On the surface I thought I was going to sit through some lame rehashing of an older horror film, but I found myself pleasantly surprised with this high energy, suspenseful, stylish, well-acted film. Evil lurks in the old and dilapidated Lusman Arms, an aging apartment building in severe disrepair with renovation abounding all over. The film opens with a rainy evening and a blonde woman getting the point of the film hammered into her skull. Next, we meet a young couple moving into the apartment building. Beautiful and talented Angela Bettis plays the protagonist of the film as a woman who realizes people are disappearing around her and that the Lusman Arms has some major secrets as well as a demented killer hidden in its walls. Much of the film involves her unraveling of the Arms's secrets, though no full explanation as to how the black arts is incorporated is ever explained. The film is tightly woven from beginning to end by the consummate work of Hooper who knows how to use the camera and gets the most from a largely unknown cast. The actors are peppered with some movie veterans such as Rance Howard giving one heck of a good performance as a man that has lived there virtually his whole life, Juliet Landau as a running girl "headed" for trouble, and the wonderful Greg Travis as the guy in charge of the apartments. Travis had me in stitches with his dialog about the charm of old places like this, etc... Hooper works with some interesting, inventive, and implausible storyline, but he makes the most of it. Here and there Hooper plays homage to others, like the scene where Bettis and husband find old teeth in the wall. An obvious salute to Roman Polanski's The Tenant. While not a great film, The Toolbox Murders delivers. It shows just enough blood without going overboard and has just enough humour in it to balance the unpleasantness of the plot. I was pleasantly surprised on all counts.

Astonishingly Boring and Derivative

[maggie-67 · 2/10 · 3 November 2006]

I was extremely excited to hear that a new Tobe Hooper movie was coming out starring no less than Angela Bettis. I loved both the Texas Chainsaw Massacre and May, so I was really interested in how the pairing would work. Who would have guessed that it would be one of the most amateurish movies I've ever seen?

From the script up, the film is boring, silly, and derivative. Jace Anderson and Adam Gierasch, who between them have left a wake of terrible movies, put absolutely no effort into writing a halfway decent script, instead randomly referencing other, better films. There's a girl who's convinced the building is evil, but nobody believes her! Oh, right: Rosemary's Baby. And she finds teeth in the walls! Oh, right: The Tenant. Even Hooper's own Massacre is whored out here in the facially disfigured, nonverbal killer. And, sadly, the direction just does not pick up the slack left in the script. It looks like a TV movie, extremely workmanlike with entire sequences so badly lit, shot, and edited it's difficult to even tell what's going on.

I don't know how a film with such a well-known director and star ends up looking like an awful low budget first time director's work. I really wanted this to be better.

Hollywood Occult

[myboigie · 8/10 · 4 June 2006]

This is such a great horror-film, and it has some original-twists to it too. The story centers-around the "Lusman Arms" (really the Ambassador Hotel, once THE place for the Hollywood elite and the site of the RFK assassination), a decaying-Hotel in a seedy part of Los Angeles. It seems after recent-renovations to the structure of the building there have been some strange-occurrences: a workman hurt in an unexplained-blast, and strange electrical-surges. There is a constant-sound of hammering, even when the workmen are gone. Tenants have gone-missing, and a strange aura of oppressiveness has descended-upon the building. It seems the place has a reputation that the building manager (a concierge) doesn't want known. It's just a great film, with a bunch of oddball-characters, unlike the log-jam of boring, PG-13 pseudo-horror. The characters in this film feel real, and I like them. Because I like them, I fear for them, and that is what horror is about.

Enter Nell (Angela Bettis of "May") and Steven, two new tenants. We get to know them and some of their backstory, and the decaying-Lusman is literally filled with oddities. For those who have lived in a 1920s-era apartment building, a lot of the funny-parts about maintenance (or the lack-of) will be familiar! If you have ever lived in an old-building, you can attest to the impressions of the past within-the-walls. The ghosts of "old Hollywood" haunt this film, just like they do the films of David Lynch or Kenneth Anger. Let's face it, with the legend of the Black Dahlia (mentioned in the film), the constant-battle for the control of the water-supply (an engineer once controlled L.A. His name was William Mulholland, and designed the Owens Valley Acqueduct), the Manson Family, gangs, poverty, the desert air, all the Hollywood deaths and scandals, cults, Scientology, the Mexican Day of the Dead, Chinatown, drugs, the Ramparts scandals, decades of obscene-corruption--Los Angeles is creepy.

Nell notices a lot of hammering and other strange-phenomena, and eventually begins to probe the mystery of the Lusman Arms. This descent-into-hell is what makes this not merely a slasher, but an Occult-horror piece. The Lusman has a strange, esoteric architecture and a storied-past. It also has mysterious symbols covering it's walls in key-locations. The logical-sequence of room numbers are missing some rooms. Some have commented that the symbols are "Masonic", even calling the film "Masonic-horror", which is false and misleading. The symbols are ancient, and have been around for thousands of years, and most should be familiar. I noticed absolutely nothing "Masonic" in the film whatsoever, which is odd. I guess they were reviews by Nazi-skinheads.

The best-part of this story is that it connects the enigmatic-tale of Jack Parsons, an occultist Crowley-devotee who founded the Jet-Propulsion Lab, being an early rocketeer. It is said that Parsons claimed to have created an "homunculus", an artificial human-being, so there is a genuine-connection with L.A.'s strange-relationship with occultism here. Parsons blew-himself-up in an alchemical experiment in the late-1940s--exactly where the "Lusman-mythos" begins. Without Jack Parsons, there would be no Scientology: L. Ron Hubbard ripped-him-off in a business-deal and used the money to fund the publishing of "Dianetics". I think the occult-backstory of the killer was Tobe Hooper's idea, and it really draws-you-in. "Occult" comes from archaic-Greek, and merely denotes "hidden", nothing-more. There are many hidden-secrets at the Lusman.

The murderer in the film is great, and one could consider it Parson's homunculus in-a-way, though the "coffin-birth" masks this element. I actually thought the "coffin-baby" backstory was interesting, and had the ring of occult-lore to it. Frankly, I would have to agree with some reviewers--if you aren't familiar with occultism, you aren't going to get a lot of the premise here. So, get-familiar kids, study the occult, hah-hah. Nonetheless, it's still a film you can watch superficially, enjoying the many mysteries that Hooper and his writers treat us to. Also, the murders-themselves are pretty original and thrilling, some even gruesome in a way that would do Argento proud! Go-figure, reality isn't what you thought it was! Without giving-away too much, this is a tale of the undead, kept-active by sacred-geometry in the structure of a building. It is a story of the darkness and mystery that surrounds-us, and a story of magic and curiosity. There are so-many incredible images of horror in this film, it is just excellent and intriguing. With a budget of less-than $1 million, Tobe Hooper has created a new classic horror that is likely to be imitated. It is surely "better" than the original film, and is simply his and his writers' take on the source (with major-revisions and additions). It is a re-imagining. The score by Joseph Conlan is very good, and atmospheric, hitting all the right marks. It makes the film feel larger. Toolbox Murders has a lot on-offer for such a little film, and is a great return-to-form for Mr. Hooper. Here's to more from him.

So much better than you'd expect, given Hooper's recent track record.

[ThrownMuse · 7/10 · 26 April 2005]

Nell and Steven move into a run-down Hollywood apartment in the middle of being renovated. They soon realize that the landlord, maintenance man, and other tenants are a strange bunch. Nell finds herself delving into a mystery of the building when one of her neighbors goes missing. This is an excellent and unique slasher. Considering the last movie I saw by Hooper was about a CGI crocodile, I think it is fair to say he is back in the game. Unfortunately, there are plot holes galore that should have been worked out, the pacing is somewhat uneven, and the ending is a big let-down. But the murder scenes are nasty, the atmosphere is creepy, the set is awesome, and the jump scares are worthy. The "city of broken dreams" theme is effective even though most of the film takes place within the claustrophobia of the apartment building. The performance by Angela Bettis ("May") really anchors the movie. This lady brings a sense of dignity and classiness to the horror genre and I think she could become a real genre pioneer. All horror fans should check-out this movie.

My Rating: 7/10.

the original was better, and that wasn't really good to begin with

[movieman_kev · 4/10 · 29 August 2005]

This version of "Toolbox Murder" is more akin to a re-imagining as opposed to a straight remake. This features "May"'s Angela Bettis as Nell Barrows along with her hubby, Steven, as the two newest residence of the the worn down Lusman Arms apartment complex. Weird stuff begins to happen which frightens her immensely, she can't confide in her hubby, as he's out working at a hospital all the time So she's glad when she befriends Julia Cunningham (Juliet Landau), her new neighbor, but when Julia disappears suspiciously, Nell takes it upon herself to figure out what happened to her. Alas the apartment has a great many deadly secrets, and Nell might not be too thrilled to find them out.

Let's face it the original film, while good, was hardly a classic, so I was hoping this version could easily surpass it. But nope, stock character's that you never really care about, some really crappy acting (was that really May I was watching? How could that actress be so good in that one, and come of as an over-the-top, overacting shrill in this one?), and a hack eyed pointless supernatural plot twist in the middle of the film that NEVER pays off, all combine into a rancid concoction that I just couldn't swallow. In the way the gore scenes were lit didn't help matters one bit. This was supposed to be a return to true form for poor Tobe Hopper after Steven Spielburg defanged most of what he wanted to do with "Poltergeist", but as it turns out this film is only marginally better then "The Mangler"

My Grade: D+

DVD Extra: Commentary with director Tobe Hooper, and screenwriters Kace Anderson and Adam Gierasch; Second commentary with producers Jascqueline Quella and Terence Potter, and Journalist Calum Waddell; 5 deleted scenes; footage from a Q&A with Tobe Hooper; Theatrical trailer; and trailers for "Riding the Bullet", "May", "Crocodile", & "Haute Tension"

Craftsman

[ryannemetz · 8 August 2004]

I recently saw this remake last weekend in LA, during which it was being shown on a limited sneak peak basis. Apparently, it's still in limbo on weather to go as a theatrical release or direct to video.

What I got was a well crafted horror remake that drifted away from the original. Yes, it's a remake, but Tobe (Texas Chainsaw Massacre 1&2) Hooper makes this picture all worth while. As we address the title of the film, all is implied with a hammer, a vice, a nail gun and a drill. Those tools are to just name a select few. The story takes place in LA, where a young couple move into an old run down apartment complex that is also rented out to tenants that are wannabe actors and sleeze bag drug users. One by one, they fall victim to our Toolbox Murderer.

It's not my favorite Hooper film, but it's a lot better compared to "Crocodile" and "The Mangler." I particularly am pleased with the gory death scenes, as well as the style of Hooper's directing. That apartment complex that was used was just awesome. Overall this slasher flick delivered in such a way that I'd like purchase it for my horror collection.

8/10 Way to go Tobe!!

Terrible

[Antagonisten · 3/10 · 23 November 2004]

I saw this film at a midnight showing on the Stockholm International Film Festival of 2004. It's become a tradition for me to at least see one or two midnight horror movies at the festival every year. What has unfortunately also become almost a tradition are the constant disappointments with these horror movies.

Toolbox Murders is a pretty standard-fare slasher flick. A couple has recently moved into a strange old building where renovations are being made. Strange things happen and someone is running around murdering people with different kinds of tools (hammers, drills etc.). The woman in this couple starts investigating the strange happenings and discovers that the building is special.

After seeing only fifteen minutes of this film i already thought "My god, is stuff like this still being made?!". I felt like i was transported back to the 1970's when slasher flicks like this were top fare and every movie looked like this with campy acting and cheap effects. Basically all of the actors are over-acting, and most of the characters are about as deep as cardboard-cutouts. This is not necessarily a problem in a slasher flick, but there are so few forgiving elements here that it does indeed become a problem. Also, constantly the characters act completely without logic, like turning away from the killer to speak to his last victim, while he is still in fact charging at them to kill them too!

The gore effects are somewhat disgusting, and made in a way that more makes you laugh than anything else. The story feels wasted and it feels like the director didn't really know what kind of movie he wanted to make. It starts out like a b-movie from the 70's, then almost turns into a Ghostbusters-ripoff before it turns into a complete mess in the end... Clichés can often work to your advantage, especially in the horror genre, but someone should tell directors of today that you don't have to use EVERY cliché there is.

I'm afraid that not even Tobe Hoopers alleged "cult" status can save this train-wreck. This is not funny, not scary and simply not entertaining. I rate it 3/10.

Making good use of every tool.

[lost-in-limbo · 7/10 · 19 February 2019]

Not really a remake of the 1970s THE TOOLBOX MURDERS, yet alone a sequel. This entry goes in totally a different direction with only a couple things that look like they were taken from the original concept; choice of location, the killer using all manners of tools on his victims and hiding his appearance under a ski mask. Tobe Hooper is in the director's chair and presents a grimy little picture on a minimalist budget. The backdrop for this horror takes place in a rundown, if history-laced apartment building situated in the heart of old Hollywood, where there's an assemble of indie actors portraying a varied bunch of stock characters. Other than Angela Bettis, no one else gets much to work with and are outperformed by the complex. Here we follow Bettis' character. A new resident that just moved in along with her husband, as she tries to settle in with her neighbors, but something about the apartment doesn't feel right and people seem to be disappearing.

The first hour is all about the character quirks, and interactions between the apartment inhabitants centered on a solid Bettis' performance. This is used as a tool to make her character feel like an outsider, who needs to learn the inner workings of her surroundings before making rash conclusions. Over time the mystery and oddities of the building becomes the focal point of the story. Sure, there are a few meaty death set-pieces thrown in early, but it's not until the backend when that comes into its own. The building's charms make way for horror and unease, as it begins to (although not convincingly) shed light on its looming secrets and the mysterious phantom killer. The by-the-book tropes are there with the central character trying to convince others, with no luck that something menacing is happening in the building. It even tries to throw you off with a predictable red herring or so, but they don't add up make it effective enough. Come to the third act it moves away from a straight-forward mystery-slasher hitting over-the-top Grand Guignol territory by ratcheting up the intensity and cruelty of its visuals. The killer gets out the big boys to inflict torturous punishment e.g. circular saw, vice grip, acid and bolt cutters. There even seems to be a little "Texas Chainsaw Massacre" homage involving meat hooks.

A slow and particular beginning eventually transpires into a bloody whirlwind. In the plot's attempts to explain what's going on, the occult and black magic, I found it to be rather lacking and muddled in making sense of it all. There wasn't anything really there to connect these pieces, leaving me with more questions than before. Some contrivances and logic lapses (rotting corpses hidden in the walls, but no stench?) keep popping up, but I did enjoy old school shocks and aesthetics oozing dirt and grime in such a confined space. Visually it doesn't hit you, it's beyond drab and causally photographed, yet Hooper's workmanlike handling did a marvelous job crafting out atmosphere and character from the age-old apartment building. While it might take awhile to come out first gear, when it does, Hooper goes down the excessive route with a climax that really leaves you hanging.

OMG probably the worst movie ever

[melcw592 · 1/10 · 10 February 2007]

HA, I have to admit, I've seen some dumb slasher movies. This was the worst one I've ever seen. The plot was so dumb, and it didn't make any sense. Some masked ninja dude starts killing everyone and the police are too dumb to even look for the missing victims. All but 3 people that were at the apartment were killed. The main character girl was a horrid actress; so was pretty much everyone else. Oh yeah, and the murderer was impossible to kill. They shot him, hung him, stabbed him, pushed a wall on top of him, and he still didn't die. He didn't even have a name. He wasn't even a character. Oh yeah and another thing! How could you have like 100 dead bodies in a building without anyone noticing they were missing?? Yeah well there were like a thousand skeletons everywhere, which, by the way, looked SO dumb and fake. I didn't understand the movie at all!! DO NOT EVEN WASTE YOUR TIME WATCHING IT!!

Uneven horror movie

[Verona · 6/10 · 14 October 2005]

I like bad horror movies. But at the end of this film I was left with a "huh?" resounding in my brain. Just unanswered questions:

1.) The old guy, Charlie (?). How did he know about the killer? Why was he allowed to live?

2.) The killer- okay so he "clawed his way" out of his mother's body. Then what? He was in a fire? He drank Ponce de Leon's fountain of youth juice? Whats with the face and the homicidal tendencies?

3.) Why was Ned and Byron allowed to live so long?

4.) Did Saffron eventually die, nailed to the ceiling? Or was she finished off later on?

5.) If there was no apartment 4 on any floor, why did they make their attempts to "hide" that so obvious? Why not just make the former #5 apartments #4's?

6.) Why doesn't Angela Bettis eat?

I just wish we had more of an understanding of the killer, instead of some quickly thrown in nonsense about a "pagan" spell (and once again spreading the negative stereotype of the pentagram). And what did the symbols have to do with anything? It seemed that she was following a map, but it looked to me like she was just finding the symbols and looking at them.

A load of crap

[Aetheraeon · 1/10 · 15 October 2004]

This movie sucks. It's not scary and it's not funny.

I love a nice horror movie, but this is not even supposed to be in the thriller section. The way the murders are committed is stupid and we don't even get to see anything.

What's worse than the effects is the story in itself. 2 People move into a new apartment (whoop-dee-do) and some people get killed. The only problem is that we don't get to know the people other than their names which doesn't make me care that they get killed. Same goes for the main characters, I only know what their name is so I don't give a crap about how viciously they are killed...

The "bad guy" is a total Silence of the Lambs/Ed Gein rip-off and once again we don't get to know anything about him either. We don't know who he is, how he got in the building and how he got to be like he is.

Ready through my review I think I might have fallen asleep and missed something. I, in my right mind, can't understand why anyone would give out a bunch of crap like this.

Hooper's best in a long long time

[jluis1984 · 7/10 · 30 December 2005]

It's hard to believe that the man who 30 years ago gave us what is probably the best horror movie ever done, the powerful Texas Chain Saw Massacre, went through 30 years of movies with mixed results. Fortunately, Tobe Hooper returns with a decent movie that finally manages to live up to the enormous fame of his legendary debut.

Reimagining an obscure 70s movie, Hooper sets his story in present day Hollywood, where a young married couple moves to the Lusman, an old building. Angela Bettis, the actress who surprised the world in "May", stars as Nell, who is not happy with his husband choice of moving to the Lusman. She'll find a contrived plot and gory killings as Julia, her neighbor and new friend suddenly disappears without a trace.

Bettis carries the film with grace, and power. This young woman definitely has a bright future in films. While the rest of the cast is average in their performance, Hooper's direction is the star as he turns the building into another character. The locations are awesome and the atmosphere Hooper uses is very creepy and filled with tension.

The movie flows well as a mixture of a "whodunit" mystery and a gory slasher. The gore is an important factor here, and it is well delivered. Probably he is not a great director, but Hooper knows how to pull up great murder scenes from his actors.

The flaws of the movie lay in the script, it is filled with enough plot holes to be a problem. Fortunately, it's creepy atmosphere and the high tension it creates almost make up for this big flaw, although it is still noticeable.

Tobe Hooper may be an uneven director who had a very lucky debut with "Texas Chainsaw Massacre", but here he gives us a very entertaining movie that really makes up for the 30 years of average movies he did. A very pleasant surprise. 7/10

Tobe needs a new toolbox

[jklein8787 · 2/10 · 22 March 2005]

Someone needs to tell Tobe Hooper to retire. It started with that Spontaneous Combustion movie. Then it went to Night Terrors. Then he went to "drama' with Apartment Complex. Then he tried to re-make Eaten Alive with Crocodile and now he remakes Toolbox Murders. Toolbox murders is a step up from these films but that's like saying, "Well that mentally retarded child just peed in my mouth when he was originally going to poop in it." Toolbox is terrible. After a promising opening of a woman being terrorized in her apartment by a killer and having her head bashed in with a hammer, we have a young couple (is it me or does every horror movie now have actors under the age of 45?) who move into this crummy apartment with lots of funny and quirky characters. (aka: annoying and not funny) The killer once in awhile springs up to kill a few people (one he kills thru an elevator which we never see. Guess he forgot his toolbox for that one) The killer even has acid in his toolbox! Who caries that? I know Adam Suess carries huge sub sandwiches in his but not acid. The history behind the killer almost makes zero sense and when there isn't a killing, the movie stops dead and is more boring than watching man glaze dry. There is no suspense, the gore is edited (its added as "deleted scenes" on the DVD with a stupid time code running thru the whole scene) no boobs or broccoli bush, bad acting, and the ending is a complete rip-off of Halloween. The movie is better than Drowning in the Haze however. Rent the original Toolbox Murders otherwise stick a screwdriver up your butt.

Tobe Hooper makes an excellent comeback...

[delfim_santos · 10/10 · 12 March 2005]

I saw this film in a room that's designed to play Horror films and that's all you can see there. This film was made with little money and Tobe hooper's skills show throughout the movie, his ability to play with us, to make our fear rise, our heart beat faster. I thought the atmosphere was great! Basically the story is: Every year thousands of people go to L.A. to pursue their dreams, some succeed...some not. Some end up in the Lusman Building.. The Lusman Building was once a luxurious building, with classy, rich residents. Today, it's an old, spooky and sinister building where you would not want to live and if you did live there, you would want to leave...but could you? It houses a supernatural evil. It's been subdued for decades - but when renovations start, a series of murders take place.

This film becomes a mystery as our heroine Nell(Angela Bettis - see her in "May") tries to unravel the secret of the Lusman Building and its residents...it keeps us guessing cause almost everyone is a suspect and Hooper doesn't need big special effects to keep us interested, the story is fast paced and the killings are inventive and gruesome.

It's not that kind of film that spends millions of dollars in special effects and scares us only with sharp and loud sounds and tricks like that, no! This film shows a great director, some good actors and a good sinister story that will really scare you in a way that only really good horror movies can...this is no cheap trick or horror movie for 16 year old boys with cheerleader type actresses that show off their assets...this movie is far more interesting and scary than most of the so called horror movies that go to theaters.

Like I read in bloody-disgusting.com, " Toolbox is a strong film likely to boost Tobe Hooper back into the top rung of horror directors along with names like Craven, Carpenter, and Romero."

Go see a master of horror doing his thing...you will not be disappointed!

Pretty darn good

[jseger9000 · 7/10 · 22 January 2008]

I'm not much a Tobe Hooper fan. Aside from The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Salem's Lot I haven't liked any of his movies (unless you want to give him credit for Poltergeist). I therefore wasn't expecting much when I picked up his remake of The Toolbox Murders.

I haven't seen the original, so I can't say how this remake compares, but on its own, this movie is a winner. A young couple moves into a rat trap old building in Hollywood. He's an intern and is gone most of the time leaving Nell Barrows with too much time on her hands. She finds out some strange things about the building's history and unbeknownst to all, somebody is murdering the tenants.

Right from the beginning when the camera is filming through a sheet of plastic in the rain, it manages to give off a downright unsettling atmosphere. A fantastic job was done lighting the creepy old building, making every shadow seem threatening. Everything feels old, grimy and unpleasant. The music is surprisingly good. There is the usual 'string swell' to make you jump, but otherwise it works well to ratchet up your nerves. The whole movie is an exercise in tension.

Really the only bad part about this movie is the whole 'toolbox murders' gimmick. The story really stands on its own and is good enough without the different tool for each murder shtick. If the killer just used a knife or something, that would have worked just as well. It felt like they needed to throw in the unusual murder weapons to keep the name.

Still, this was a pretty good movie. I'd recommend it to fans of old fashioned '70's and '80's horror movies. They don't make many like this any more.

worst horror ever

[lildoodie2004 · 1/10 · 30 March 2005]

This was by far...the worst....horror movie ever written. There is absolutely no plot at all. The movie follows one character around, who is Heartbroken(!) by learning a friend is missing after meeting her one hour before. Instead of leaving this crap-hole apartment, she decides to solve the mystery. She learns of a curse, 15 minute before the movie concludes. The killer is no one introduced in the movie, at the end we find out, he is a mummy figure. The movies ends, plot less, with the killer escaping after being hanged out from 14 stories through a window. Awful...god awful. I advise someone to see this only (!) if they don't anticipate seeing a good movie.