Following the wave of ill-advised food relation horror films such as 1978's Attack of the Killer Tomatoes, 2005's Gingerdead Man & others. ThanksKilling is one movie, you will not be giving thanks for! In my opinion, this movie directed by Jordan Downey is no feast to the eyes as the movie suffers from nearly poor-production. Made with a budget, less than 3000 U.S dollars, and filmed, in a couple of days, this shot-on-video flick was made by a group of friends in Ohio was marketing as, a "It's so bad, it's good', type of the film. The only problem with that, is that, unlike the other films in that field, the creators were too self-aware, that they were making a bad film. It's a lot easily to laugh at works from filmmakers like Tommy Wiseau & Claudio Fragasso, because of their naiveness. They actually, thought they were producing something good, and try their hardest to make the film, work. Since, these producers knew that they were producing crap, they really didn't give two f***, about their lazy production. It's really hard to laugh at, somebody whom that lazy, compare to somebody who took his work, a little more serious. I know that ThanksKilling is not meant to be taken serious; but honestly, how can an insane premise like a homicidal turkey axing off college kids during Thanksgiving break, turn out to be so unfunny? Somehow, this movie directed by Jordan Downey was able, to do that. They really failed to create a satirical spoof of the horror genre, due to the lack of clever comedy. There wasn't much to laugh at. The usual overused of clichéd unlikeable characters, over-the top absurd violence, and offensive & vulgar humor, makes this exaggerated caricature camp type film, more annoying than entertaining. For an exploitation film, nothing about it, was that attention-grabbing. Yes, it has nudity, gore, and drug-use, but it doesn't do anything new with these tropes. It's more tiresome, than anything else. The only reason to watch this film, is that the film tries to totally exploits the ridiculous gimmick premise that horror films somewhat employ, just to make a buck. Still, that reason alone, doesn't make the film any good. There are far superior films, like 2012's Cabin in the Woods or the Evil Dead series that use this concept a lot better. If you take away, the ridiculous concept, what do you have, left for this film; nothing. Yes, you got the bad acting, and even worst special effects, but you can't laugh at someone for being a bad actor or a bad sock puppet, when they're are intentionally acting poorly on purpose. Plus, it takes the fun out of complaining, when the really tacky & somewhat racism lines, pointless and offensive treatment of women, pet killing & bad violence, is all done on purpose, by trolls trying to troll you. Films within the Troma series, work a lot better, because the movie had some likability. This, not so much. I can care, less about the Jock, Johnny (Lance Predmore), ditzy Ali (Natasha Cordova), the fat redneck Billy (Aaron Ringhiser-Carlson), the nerd Darren (Ryan E. Francis), and the final smart & sensitive girl, Kristen (Lindsey Andersen). I wasn't even, a big fan of the Turkey puppet, Turkie (Voiced by Jordon Downey). I kinda wish, all the characters died. In addition of bad characters, the movie had way too much continuity errors. The film has several plots, subplots and character details whose inconsistencies are really jarring. I hate how issues, are casually dismissed and never revisited during the rest of the film, such as Billy's ancestors, being pilgrims. In addition, the audience never learns the details surrounding certain things like why Sheriff Roud (Chuck Lamb) having one of the books about the killer turkey legend lying around or how imagery food can blow your stomach open, or why there was a scene where the Sheriff dress up in a turkey suit to have a small chitchat with the creature. It's really puzzling that nobody can notice that the turkey is indeed a turkey. I guess, it's because the puppet looks like a vulture, more than a turkey. Anyways, they're little to care about this film, and it sucks. Its ruins the fun in finding unintentional humor in the film's poor dialogue and production. The film is followed by a 2012 sequel entitled ThanksKilling 3, which $100,000 budget was raised on the website Kickstarter. It's not worth exploring, more than that. Overall: Even with my rock-bottom expectations; this movie was still pretty horrible. I was deeply disappointed by this film. It's a turkey, alright, but it's too fowl to gobble up.
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