Released: October 2017
Director: Evan Cecil
Run Time: 97 Minutes
Not Rated
Distributor: Dragonfly Films
Genre: Horror
Cast:
Sean Patrick Flannery: Ennis
Lindsey Morgan: Kit
Andrew Jacobs: Simon
Karen Grassle: Lillian
The slasher film is one of the most recognizable forms of horror in the genre. It generally involves a rather large body count with gruesome kills. The sub-genre has its beginnings going all the way back to Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho, released in 1960. While Psycho was not a straight-up horror movie, it did set the groundwork for films to follow decades later. Movies like A Nightmare on Elm Street, Friday The 13th, Sleepaway Camp, Halloween, Scream, and Laid To Rest all owe their existence to Alfred Hitchcock’s legendary masterpiece. Nobody goes to a movie like Friday the 13th for a groundbreaking, life-changing story. Oh, no. People go to films like these to see hapless victims get slaughtered in the most horrific way possible. The 1980s was the perfect decade for this particular kind of film, because movie studios were able to take chances on what they could get away with in these films, which was quite a bit actually. There was degree of mean-spiritedness and level of violence that you really don’t see a whole lot of in main-stream slasher flicks these days. A lot of slashers over the past few years have been fairly underwhelming remakes or sequels. It’s not very often you see a slasher film with a completely unique setting. That brings me to Lasso, directed by Evan Cecil.
Lasso follows a tour group of elderly folks, led by young tour guides Kit and Simon as they attend an annual rodeo filled with all sorts of fun stuff and games. During the actual rodeo, a one-armed cowboy, Ennis is tossed from his horse when the horse violently breaks its leg, and is forced to be put out of its misery. After most people leave, some of the entertainers and the tour group are kidnapped and hunted by the rodeo’s psychotic cowboys. What? You were expecting Shakespeare? Hmmm….a Shakespearean slasher film. That has remarkable potential, but that’s not why were here. This is a slasher film, through and through. Any semblance of a plot exists only to lead lambs to the slaughter. As I said, nobody goes to a film like Lasso for the story. That being said, the actual setup for the film is rather unique. Most slasher films deal with an unstoppable boogeyman or some kind of supernatural entity. Lasso has the benefit of being one of the few slasher flicks that takes something as simple as a rodeo and makes it incredibly sinister and violent. In all my years watching horror movies, I don’t think I’ve seen a slasher film quite like this. Make no mistake, it IS a slasher at its core. What makes Lasso different is that it doesn’t necessarily play by the same rules that your average slasher flick tends to abide by. In most cases, a slasher film kills its characters in a specific order, i.e. the boyfriend 1st, then the promiscuous girl, and so on and so forth. These are bog-standard rules that most slasher flicks are afraid to toss to the side. Lasso is fairly different in that regard in that the victims are completely random.
This being a slasher flick, it doesn’t spend a whole lot of time developing characters. Most of the characters in this film are basically cannon fodder, especially the elderly folks. Some people might consider that a little mean-spirited. Yeah, but that’s part of the fun, though, with these movies. You have to have a little bit of a mean streak if you want your audience to react to your film. A lot of slasher films these days are afraid to get a little non-PC when it comes to slaughtering victims. Lasso has no such compunctions about killing elderly people in particularly gruesome fashion. To be fair, most of the characters in this film are pretty disposable. There are only maybe THREE characters that I actually cared about a little bit: Ennis, Kit, Lillian, and Trish. Kit is played by Lindsey Morgan and she does a pretty good job at being the take-charge kind of girl. Karen Grassle plays Lillian, a fairly bad-ass old gal with an attitude. She was awesome. Trish is played by Skyler Cooper, who also comes across as pretty bad-ass. Sean Patrick Flannery is awesome as the one-armed Ennis. Ennis is probably the most difficult character to kill in cinema history, but Flannery is clearly having a blast. There’s not much to be said about the villains, as they are played mostly by stunt-men, but I do have to admit, these guys are incredibly intimidating. There’s one that’s usually on horseback, with a black duster, face mask and wields a whip with a three-pronged hook at the end. If I saw that sumbitch galloping after me, I’d be running my ass off too.
When it comes to the actual violence, Lasso is pretty impressive. I should tell you that as someone who has seen films like Cannibal Holocaust and A Serbian Film, that violence in the modern slasher film tends to be fairly tame in comparison. That being said, the kills in Lasso are fairly impressive and original. Some should be, considering that the film’s backdrop is a rodeo, which allows for some creative freedom when it comes to murder. The use of a…well…lasso was pretty interesting. It wasn’t something I had really seen before. There are all types of murder instruments here: a cattle brand, a two-man saw, a cattle prod and hay bale hooks. They are all used to some pretty good effect. That being said, however, some of the carnage does take place off screen, even though we do get to see some of the aftermath. For the film’s part, the blood and gore are mostly practical, with an occasional CGI blood-spurt. I’m okay with it as the film is pretty low-budget.
Overall, I have to say that I’m mostly impressed with Lasso. I was not expecting a whole lot going in, but what I got was a fairly impressive slasher film with a pretty unique premise. There were things done in this film that I really hadn’t seen before. Let’s face facts: Lasso is a slasher film and it doesn’t have a whole lot else going for it, but it doesn’t need anything more. What you see is what you get, and it’s pretty refreshing to see a horror movie that is as unpretentious as Lasso. It wastes very little time in getting to the good stuff and it doesn’t let up. It has some pretty likable leads in Lindsey Morgan, Sean Patrick Flannery, Skyler Cooper and Karen Grassle. The villains themselves are pretty vicious too, especially when they ‘roid up with horse steroids(although, I’m pretty sure that crap would kill any normal person). Despite some minor issues here and there, Lasso is actually a pretty damn good time. If you like slasher films with a unique backdrop, Lasso is a surprisingly pretty good and violent slasher flick. Just turn your brain off and you’ll have a good time.
My Final Recommendation: I’ll never look at rodeos the same way again. 9/10.