Umbrella Entertainment’s latest release features a suspenseful thriller, with competent acting and a quick paced story. The other movie is Kadaicha.
All jokes aside, Innocent Prey, even though billed as the second movie in the two feature DVD release is by far the better of the two movies. Kadaicha does have some highlights in regards to some of the murder scenes (that spider scene – eek!), and a bit of A Nightmare on Elm Street vibe with the dreams, but the story doesn’t stretch beyond the paper thin plot of houses being built over ancient Aboriginal burial grounds. Seriously, when will people learn to stop building over dead bodies.
The other feature, Innocent Prey is definitely the big reason to buy this set. This is most likely due to the strength of having Long Weekend director Colin Eggleston behind the scenes. The film stars Halloween and Carrie actress P.J. Soles, and even though she was cast banking on her success in the films above, she does a great job playing the unlucky woman who is always picking the wrong man to fall in love with.
Innocent Prey is a joint Australian/ US feature, which really just means that part of the film was shot in Dallas and the other part in Australia. What’s really interesting to learn is that if a film is shot in Australia, only one actor is allowed to be from the States or elsewhere. That is partially why some of Innocent Prey was shot in the US, so they could have a couple of American actors play certain roles.
Innocent Prey also has a couple of extra things going for it, and that’s some of the intense horror elements that pretty much start right away. Certain scenes reminded me a bit of Friday the 13th, which was also helped by having a pre-Friday the 13th Part 5 actress by the name of Debbie Voorhees playing a hooker and yes, the boobs look amazing. The flick does slow down a bit once the film shifts over to Australia, but thanks to a quirky and weird performance from John Warnock, the film still manages to keep things interesting. Way more interesting than Kadaicha, that’s for sure.
Umbrella Entertainment has released the flicks on a two feature DVD, with Kadaicha being sourced from U-Matic and Innocent Prey from 3/4″. Kadaicha suffers from tracking issues near the end the film, where it will make you at times think your DVD is freezing, but that’s just the unfortunate source that was used. Innocent Prey doesn’t suffer from any of those issues, thankfully. Nonetheless, if you compare the transfers with the included trailers, you can see how much better the films look.
As for audio, Kadaicha suffers from some hiss and distortion, but you can still hear everything. Innocent Prey once again comes out on top with a more even audio field.
Special features include the trailers mentioned above for each film and finally a 21-minute sit down with actress P.J. Soles, who reminisces about her time shooting the film and how beautiful Austraila was. It’s a fun feature.
Verdict
Kadaicha is the weaker of the two features, but Innocent Prey is so good, it makes it worth picking up the Umbrella DVD release. Also, even though the back says Region 4 and PAL format, I had no problem playing the DVD in my player.