LITERAL REMAINS

Stop me if you’ve heard this one before:  Two couples go into the woods for a relaxing weekend of camping and then begin disappearing one at a time.  I wish I could say Dead Wood had something more to offer on a familiar theme, but, other than an intriguing way of body disposal, it’s the same old path through the woods to Grandma’s house we’ve travelled a hundred times over.

Webb and Larri are taking a break form the hustle and bustle of city life for a couple of days of roughing in the wild.  They invite Milk, Larri’s cousin, and Jess, Larri’s friend, along on the excursion in hopes of sparks flying between the two singles.  Other than hitting a deer and Webb having to snap its neck to put it out of its misery, the trip to the countryside is fairly uneventful.  Once they begin their trek into the woods, the group discover some irregularities, such as bee attacks and junked out cars where there should not be any junked out cars.

The gang make it through the first night, only becoming scared at a scream from somewhere in the deep, dark, woods.  The next morning they discover a woman outside their tents frying up breakfast (she was hungry she explained, and it suited the four love birds, so that made it a good enough reason for me).  Her name is Ketsy and her boyfriend is missing; he stepped out the tent and disappeared into thin air.  It’s when Webb disappears that the gang begin to suspect Ketsy ain’t all she seems.

Dead Wood is credited with three directors (who also wrote); it feels like a movie torn between directions in which to go.  The cast seems to have come from a completely different movie that one of the three directors must have been working on somewhere else; these guys are not a happy lot, even the fun loving oaf is deeply dull.  There’s not a spark of life in any of the four main players; when the “evil force” impersonates them, they’re as wooden as when they were alive.

There is a neat idea in Dead Wood, but it is ignored in favor of standard window dressing and uninspired execution.

1.5 out of 5
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