Runtime:
94 minutes
Release
Date: August 13, 2015
Rating:
R
Director:
David Hackl
Rowan
returns to his home town after a stint in jail. He's the black sheep
of the family, see? After meeting a girl at the bar and taking her
back to his hotel room, she reveals she's a stripper and demands
payment. Like any woman would turn down James Marsden! Her pimp later
shows up and starts beating her up in the parking lot, so he runs
down to save her. The cops show up, and one of the cops, Beckett
(Thomas Jane), takes him to the side. It turns out that they're
brothers, but Beckett is the good son.
Into the
Grizzly Maze throws a bunch of characters at us all at once. Douglass
(Billy Bob Thornton) is an unscrupulous grizzly hunter who often
breaks the law when hunting. Kaley is Rowan's ex-girlfriend and a cop
on the local force. Johnny Cadillac, and yes that is seriously his
name, is a former friend of Rowan's who now hunts grizzlies. There's
also Scott Glenn as the head of the police force and Piper Perabo as
Michelle, Beckett's wife.
After
hearing some reports of wild bears spotted in the area, the police
force mans up. Unfortunately, Michelle went into the woods to take
some pictures on the same day. I say unfortunately because she's deaf
and apparently uses the ground movements to tell if there is a bear
in the area. That doesn't work out too well for her as she gets
trapped by a grizzly. Rowan just so happens to be in the area, saves
her, and they run off together. Beckett and Kaley head off into the
woods to find Michelle, while Scott Glenn sticks around to mobilize
the troops and potentially let Billy Bob loose.
I rented
Into the Grizzly Maze on the assumption that it would play like an
Asylum movie, and I ended up being pleasantly surprised. While it
does play like an Asylum movie you might come across in the middle of
the night on Sy-Fy, it's actually like a better version of one of
those movies. Even though everyone in the movie took themselves so
seriously, I lost count of how many times the BF and I ended up
laughing while watching it.
Rowan is
the black sheep of the family, and I can say that because they
mention it once every 10 minutes or so. They bring it up when he
comes back, when he goes to his father's old house, when his brother
learns he's with his wife, when he finds the wife, when they all
catch up together. We get the point, James Marsden is the bad guy!
Adam
Beach also turns up for a short period of time as Johnny Cadillac. I
think he's a great actor, so I have no idea why he ended up in what
was basically a cameo. Actually, I'm not sure how anyone other than
Jane and maybe Perabo ended up in this movie. It seems like there was
a chance it might get a theatrical run, but come on! Who thought a
movie like this would play in theaters anymore? Even sadder is that
it took over three years between the movie was announced and when it
finally came out.
Based on
my review, some might think I hated the movie, but I actually kind of
dug it. It's like someone came up for an idea for an Asylum movie,
got a little extra funding, and grabbed some big name stars without
changing the budget or script. Who wouldn't like that?
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