Intro:

This movie surprised me. Reviewing non-mainstream movies can often be a chore, and when a movie comes along that is shot on video instead of film, and has a cast of only three people, (well, there are actually seven actors in the credits but four of the actors get less than one minute screen time combined by my estimation) and the set is an abandoned house it is perhaps justifiable to feel you are being subjected to something the film-maker put together just to say he had made a film.

 That is so not the case with this movie. The acting and dialogue, both elements which have been the downfall of many films with perhaps a hundred times this one’s budget are superb in this film. I don’t know that writing convincing tweaker rambling or acting like a dangerous, paranoid white trash stoner (when for all the audience knows you may be exactly that in real life) makes you a great screen-writer or a good actor, but all three main characters do an incredible job in this movie, and the masterfully written dialogue makes the viewer forget he is watching a shoestring budget film rather quickly.

Other reviews are making the understandable comparison between this movie and “Blair Witch”. I do not think there are really any striking similarities between the two films, “Blair Witch” bored me so badly I cannot even properly claim to have seen it – I honestly can’t remember at what point I lost interest and walked away. “Cookers” is not like this at all. I was not familiar with director Dan Mintz or actor Brad Hunt but having seen this film I will definitely be looking up other work by both of them.

Story:

Dorena, (Cyia Batten) a trailer-trash meth cooker and her boyfriend Hector (Brad Hunt) hole up in an abandoned farm house in the woods after stealing a large supply of raw materials and lab equipment to cook up a large batch of methamphetamines, sell them and move to the Caribbean to start a new life.

Paranoia sets in big time as the two, along with Hectors childhood friend Merle (Patrick McGaw) sample generous quantities of the goods and begin seeing ghostly apparitions in and around the house, as well as questioning one another’s loyalties and motivations.

Where this film shines:

Even if you don’t take into account the obviously moderate budget (rumored to be $400,000) the film (can you call it a film if it was shot on video?) this is still a pretty gripping movie.

The acting is excellent. There are major movie studio productions being released every day with worse acting.

I don’t know if it’s just me, I have a feeling this is not an unusual experience but in my life I have been forced to spend a lot more time than I wanted to around people who were abusing methamphetamines. I don’t have much sympathy for the tweakers (any more) and of course most of my memories of being in these situations are bad ones. People I have been close to have suffered greatly from using this substance. Because of it, I am no longer close to many of them. This movie captures the whole methamphetamine nightmare very well. Having never used, I was nevertheless taken back in time to these bleak periods of my life when friends and relatives were going off the deep end because of this drug’s effects.

Shortcomings:

Lighting: Like many things about this movie it’s hard to say what the creator’s intended, a lot of it, including the story itself is up to the viewer’s interpretation. There is a red-orange glow to almost all the indoor shots in this movie, presumably because it’s all candle and lamplight. It actually ads quite a bit to the tension of the narrative but at the same time the lighting itself is unnerving. I have heard that film would have softened this aspect of the visuals considerably, but I wonder if the effect may have been the creator’s exact intention.

Conclusion:

It's unclear to me whether the creators of this movie are trying to entertain or disturb, but nonetheless they seem to have pulled off both rather well. Throughout the movie I couldn’t help but wonder how the writer, who obviously had experienced meth addiction first hand, managed to clean himself up enough to write a whole movie and then get it made. Turns out the writer, Jeff Ritchie, is a former narcotics cop from Kansas. Go figure.