(The Beastery, Heartstopper, The Lost World, Rogue)
Producers:
Kate Harrison and Lewin Webb
Screenplay:
Warren P. Sonoda and Vlady Pildysh
Music:
Eric Cadesky and Nick Dyer
Cast:
Sara Wexler: Meredith Henderson
Walter: Nathan Stephenson
Chambers: James Binkley
Dr Hitchens: Michael Cram
Sheriff Berger: Robert Englund
Nurse Grafton: Laura DeCarteret
Dr Drayis: Scott Gibson
Ms Wexler: Lori Hallier
Trina Foote: Celine Lepage
Triage Nurse: Amy Lalonde
Heartstopper
is clearly a film that's jumping on the Freddy Krueger bandwagon in order to justify its
existence. Let's see...
Teens in peril - check!
Mass murderer put to death who then comes back to life - check!
Robert Englund in the cast so let's make a big deal out of it by putting him on the cover - check!
Chambers (James Binkley) is a very bad man - so bad in fact that this convicted killer is
sentenced to death by electric chair and once we see the corpse's melted face it's clear that that's
the end for this personification of evil... Well, for now, at least. On the way to the hospital, in order
to put the serial killer to the morgue, they come across teenager Sara Wexler (Meredith Henderson),
found sat in the middle of the road.
Alas, the serial killer manages to come back to life by ripping out the heart of his first victim
post-incineration, while lying on the mortuary slab, and thus he's back to his old self again,
ready to continue his reign of terror.
Sara's the only one who knows the truth about the killer, following an incident in the ambulance,
but since she's a bit of a freakazoid a school, no-one believes anything she says.
Just what is the killer's connection with the girl? You will find out, but is it anything to make this
movie stand out from amongst the slasher crowd? Not really.
Of the main cast, Robert Englund plays a Sheriff Berger, determined to stop Chambers when he
goes back on his rampage, out-of-state coroner Dr Hitchens (Michael Cram) is brought in because
he specifically deals with serial killers, Walter (Nathan Stephenson) is a young lad who's brought
into the hospital as a stab victim and
5ive Girls hottie Amy Lolande shows up
again here as a triage nurse.
Who will live and who will die? You'll spend literally seconds worrying about that one inbetween
hearing cheesy one-liners from the killer since, unfortunately, Heartstopper shoots its bolt
early on in terms of who gets offed too early. Overall, this leads to a film that's badly written,
badly acted and with something that cries "late-night TV filler", making it a wonder it was
ever made as so many better films have gone before it.
The 1.85:1 anamorphic widescreen print is a clean and clear one, with nothing particularly standing out
as everyone's rushing round the same dark hospital corridor for the majority of the time. The sound is
in Dolby Surround only, which makes you wonder why they couldn't stretch to a Dolby Digital 5.1 soundmix as
it would've benefitted the times when it's at least trying to scare you with Chambers going crazy-ape bonkers.
The extras are a brief trailer (1:40) in letterbox 1.85:1 and standard Q&A interviews with Robert Englund
(15.14) and director Bob Keen (11.55), the only thing of note about these being that they're better-chaptered
than the film with one per question in their short time, rather than a meagre 12 across the entire movie.
The disc comes with English subtitles and the menus are a silent and static affair. After putting the DVD
in, you'll see it opens with a trailer for 2001 Maniacs, but why isn't this part of the DVD content
itself and not stuck at the front like a VHS rental trailer?
DVDs reviewed by the editor are watched on a Panasonic TXW32R4 32" widescreen TV
connected to either a Creative Dxr2 DVD-ROM player or Microsoft Xbox and
played through a Sony STR-DB930 amplifier.
PC games reviewed by the editor are on:
Since Nov 2005: Intel Pentium D 830 3.0Ghz, 1Gb RAM, 128Mb nVidia GeForce 6700XL, Windows XP
Since Aug 2003: Intel Pentium 4 2.66Ghz, 512Mb RAM, 128Mb GeForce4 MX440 graphics, Windows XP
Since May 2003: Intel Pentium 4 2.6Ghz, 512Mb RAM, 128Mb ATI Radeon 9600TX graphics, Windows XP
Since Jun 2002: Intel Pentium III 600Mhz, 384Mb RAM, Windows 98 SE, 64Mb ATI Radeon 8500LE
Since May 2000: Intel Pentium III 600Mhz, 384Mb RAM, Windows 98 SE, Voodoo 3 3000 AGP
