CABIN FEVER (2002)

Studio:       Lionsgate
Director:    Eli Roth
Writer:       Eli Roth, Randy Pearlstein
Producer:  Eli Roth, Sam Froelich, Evan Astrowsky, Lauren Moews
Stars:     Rider Strong, Jordan Ladd, James DeBello, Cerina Vincent, Joey Kern, Arie Verveen, Giuseppe Andrews

Review Score:

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Summary:

Five friends find themselves trapped at a cabin in the woods when a deadly flesh-eating virus begins to spread.

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Synopsis:     Show/Hide Spoilers

Forest-dwelling hermit Henry returns to his campsite and discovers his dog gruesomely split in half from a mysterious illness.

Paul prepares for a cabin in the woods vacation with his childhood friend and romantic interest Karen, their friends Bert and Jeff, and Jeff’s girlfriend Marcy. The quintet stops for supplies at Priddy’s General Store managed by Old Man Cadwell and a gruff man named Tommy. Tommy’s odd son Dennis bites Paul when he sits beside him on a porch swing in front of the store.

At the cabin, Jeff and Marcy have sex while Paul and Karen share a kiss on the water. Bert takes his bb gun and explores the woods. Mistaking the hermit for a squirrel, Bert accidentally shoots Henry, but his concern turns to fear when Bert sees that Henry’s skin bears signs of a deadly infection. Henry begs for help, but Bert shoos him away and leaves the hermit in a ditch.

Berkeley skater Justin, who goes by the nickname Grim, happens upon the five friends as they relax around a campfire. Camping alone nearby, the friends welcome Grim after he produces a bag of weed. Grim and his dog Dr. Mambo leave after a short time.

Later that night, Henry comes to the cabin in search of help. When Bert warns his friends that the man is contagious, Henry recognizes Bert from earlier. Bert slams the door in his face and Henry tries to steal the group’s vehicle. The three men chase Henry out of their car as he begins spitting up blood throughout the vehicle interior and exterior. In the ensuing chaos, a combination of Paul’s torch and Marcy’s aerosol can sets Henry on fire and he stumbles into the darkness to die.

In the morning, Marcy goes off on her own in search of help. With their vehicle totaled, Bert and Jeff go in search of a mechanic or helpful neighbor. Paul and Karen remain at the cabin where Karen drinks a glass of tap water. Bert and Jeff find a woman who initially offers her help, but they leave abruptly when they learn she is related to the man they burned. Bert and Jeff meet up with Marcy at another home nearby, but they do not find anyone.

Deputy Winston Olsen arrives at the cabin to investigate reports of the previous night’s commotion. Paul explains things without mentioning Henry’s presumed death. Winston takes a liking to Paul and Karen because he sees them as young partiers and promises to send a tow truck before departing.

Later, Paul and Bert clean the car and the group discusses what to do next. Feeling ill, Karen lies down and Paul joins her in bed. He moves his hand under the sheets in a moment of passion only to discover that the lower part of her body is infected by the flesh-eating virus. Fearful of contagion, the other four friends lock Karen in the shed outside.

Paul goes in search of help and finds a house, but he becomes distracted when he looks through the window and spies a naked woman. The woman’s husband catches Paul ogling her and chases him off the property at gunpoint. Bert loses a bet with Jeff that they can drink nothing but beer the entire trip when he drinks a glass of tap water instead. The group has to frighten away a vicious stray dog trying to break into Karen’s shed.

The following morning, Bert is able to start the car. The group plans to leave when Karen spits up blood all over the car. Jeff is afraid to get into the presumably infected vehicle. Paul notices that Bert appears sick. Frustrated at the indecision, Bert drives off on his own, promising to send back a doctor. Fearful of contagion since Paul and Marcy insist on tending to Karen, Jeff runs into the woods alone with his beer. Assuming that death may be near anyway, Paul and Marcy have sex.

Bert goes back to the general store for help where he is bitten by Dennis. Angry that Bert may have infected his son, Tommy recruits Fenster and Andy to help him hunt Bert, who immediately flees in the vehicle.

Paul goes in search of Jeff and finds Henry’s charred corpse in a pond. Paul realizes that the pond is a reservoir that feeds the water supply. Marcy discovers that she is infected. She goes out to Karen’s shed, but is killed when the stray dog returns for a violent attack. Paul returns to find that the dog also broke into the shed and devoured Karen, but Paul is able to shoot the dog before it can attack him. Paul then finds that Karen is still alive and beats her to death.

Bert makes it back to the cabin. He and Paul stage an assault that ends up killing Tommy and his two henchman, although Bert dies as well. In a nearby cave, Paul finds Grim’s remains. Paul manages to escape in the vehicle, but it becomes disabled when he hits a deer.

Covered in blood, Paul stumbles upon an underage booze party attended by Deputy Winston. Winston receives a radio call from the sheriff announcing to shoot Paul on sight as he and his friends are suspected of multiple murders and of carrying a contagious virus. Paul knocks out Winston and flees.

Paul is picked up by a trucker and taken to a hospital where the sheriff takes his statement. The doctor recommends transferring Paul to another facility so the sheriff gives Paul to Winston for transport.

Jeff emerges from hiding and returns to the cabin. Thinking he has survived, Jeff is suddenly gunned down by the sheriff and his men. Deputy Winston oversees as Jeff’s body is thrown into a pile for burning.

Two children are seen filling a cooler with water from the contaminated reservoir where Paul’s body has been dumped. Later, the kids use that water for a lemonade stand hosted outside the general store.

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Review:

Since making his feature film directorial debut with “Cabin Fever” in 2002, Eli Roth has endeared himself to the horror community with several critically and commercially successful projects, as well a near omnipresent availability for personable interviews, various commentaries, and assorted film festival appearances.  Simultaneously, Roth has indirectly inspired contempt from some vocal fans that perceive him as a blight on the genre, whether it stems from a hatred for mainstream success they feel is undeserved, or an unfavorable opinion based on rumors of an arrogant Hollywood sellout persona.

While nowhere near as controversial of a filmmaker as Uwe Boll, or as divisive as say Tom Six, there is still a love him or hate him aura clouding Eli Roth whenever his name is discussed.  No matter what side of his fence someone might fall on, it says something that he has achieved such talked-about status when he has only directed three films over a ten-year period.

That nebulous introduction is warranted when reviewing “Cabin Fever” over a decade after the fact because enough time has passed that any thoughts someone has developed about Eli Roth in the interim are likely to color a contemporary appreciation of his first film.  At the same time, it matters to consider the timeframe in which the movie was released as important in understanding its continued appeal.

2002 was post-Scream, yet pre-Cabin in the Woods, when self-awareness was hip, but had not yet evolved into full-on genre parody.  “Cabin Fever” reflects equal tweaks of spoof, homage, retro style, and wink-wink cleverness for a tone that is gruesome above all else, but relieved with enough quick pinpricks of humor to make for a mood of not-so-serious horror entertainment.  Eli Roth is having fun playing on and off of scary movie clichés, and the audience is always in on the joke.

The reasons to despise “Cabin Fever” as derivative are the same reasons to enjoy it as intentionally playful with typical tropes.  Five friends pack their jeep full of beer and head out to the woods for a hard-partying weekend of booze, bongs, boobs, and bb guns.  The down home good girl, materialistic sass mouth, preppy slickster, meatheaded joker, and generic good guy use words like “gay” and “retarded” as casual adjectives not to be unlikable louts, but because they are average college kids behaving like twentysomethings do.  The script is not trying to be offensive.  It is trying to be honest about how this story is expected to be depicted.

The core quintet runs across a backwoods shopkeeper, hillbilly hermit, and assorted other stereotypes for a movie that knows precisely how to wash recycled ideas in a fresh bath of post-modern perspective.  When a flesh-eating virus causes chaos for everyone in the cabin as well as a nearby town of country bumpkins, “Cabin Fever” descends into a meld of contagion calamity, redneck rampage, and don’t go in the woods terror that sends up the triteness of those concepts while respectfully using their advantages to craft a funny mix of ghastly splendor.

“Cabin Fever” has a “bring it on” attitude of pulling no punches with the way it embraces silliness without compromising its identity as a horror film.  The gore is unflinching.  Try not to grit teeth when the sexpot slides a shaving razor slowly across her infected shin.  Or when a conspicuously timed ladder rung collapse sends Rider Strong tumbling atop a charred corpse buzzing with flies in a contaminated water reservoir.  They may not be highbrow moments, but they are memorable.

The simplicity to it all is what makes the movie’s modern classic status questionable for future generations.  When attitudes completely calcify to the brand of entertainment “Cabin Fever” offers, and memory fades about what it brought to the genre at the time, it does wobble on hollow legs of subplots that reach a little too desperately.  Although for every unnecessary character like Grim or pointless Peeping Tom encounter, there is an equally pointless, yet immensely more satisfying, scene like mullet-coiffed Dennis screaming about pancakes while karate kicking in slow motion.

It should simply be remembered that “Cabin Fever” owes some of its success to arriving at a time when its stylish blend of joke gags, gore gags, predictability, and fearlessness fit snugly into a slot that had not yet been overfilled.  And Eli Roth was there to fill a void of new horror filmmaking icon when fandom was seeing its Mount Rushmore of Carpenter, Romero, Argento, and Craven age well into senior status.

Review Score:  75

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