I can’t tell if the color timing, with its super-crushed blacks and gauzy cream highlights, is intentional or not. It’s hard to tell who exactly is responsible, but the visual presentation of CABIN FEVER 2 is seriously messed up. ![]() West takes the opportunity of major studio funding to shoot on 35mm film, amplifying his cinematic conceits with the panoramic 2.35:1 aspect ratio. West’s producer and mentor Larry Fessenden shows up as Bill, a tow truck driver whose graphic death in a diner alerts the townspeople to the presence of the flesh-eating disease.ĬABIN FEVER 2 marks the first of several collaborations between West and cinematographer Eliot Rockett. Michael Bowen plays the toupee’d, disgruntled principal while Mark Borchardt of AMERICAN MOVIE (1999) infamy and 30 ROCK’s Judah Friedlander make memorable appearances. The true highlights of this film, however, lie in the supporting cast and cameos. Alexi Wasser plays Cassie, the popular girl with shades of geekiness of her own. You could see him being the type of nerdy dude who comes into his own in college, but with this disease running rampant, prospects that he’ll even make it far that look pretty dim. As John, Segan is handsome in a geeky sort of way. It’s the first of many red flags in the film, because you know you’re in trouble when the biggest name actor the film has is killed off in the first minute. I won’t even mention Rider Strong’s presence-he’s in so little of the film he was better off staying home. As such, it can skate by with a cast of unknowns to save a couple bucks. There’s nothing original for West to play with, so he tries injecting a great deal of humor into the proceedings and embracing the inherent absurdity of his premise.ĬABIN FEVER 2 makes no bones about what kind of movie it is: a disposable adolescent gross-out flick. As far as teen horror goes, the story has been done to death. Now, John must fight to save himself and the girl he likes from a certain, gruesome death that they can’t begin to comprehend. Meanwhile, the skin-eating disease quietly spreads amongst the population until prom night, where it rages fiercely inside the contained school grounds. John (Noah Segan) is your typical, nerdy virgin character who wants to ask his crush to the prom. The only problem is his crush, a girl-next-door type named Cassie (Alexi Wasser), is part of the popular clique and already has a boyfriend. The flesh-eating disease upon which the series centers itself around spreads from a rural camp setting to a local private high school. His only other option was to publicly disown the film, so it languished on Lionsgate’s shelf until it was quietly released in 2009 to critical pans and dismal box office performance.ĬABIN FEVER 2 takes place immediately after the events of Roth’s original film (which I never saw, so I have no idea what transpired there). ![]() ![]() However, because he wasn’t a member of the DGA, he wasn’t privy to the same Alan Smithee privileges that a more-established director would have. Subsequent re-edits sullied his original vision, so he campaigned to have his name removed from the credits altogether. But then, something went seriously wrong in the editing stages, and these same executives unhappily ripped the film out of West’s control. It happened to director Ti West when Roth, his friend and the helmer of the first CABIN FEVER in 2002, personally nominated him to direct the sequel and helped to set West up at Lionsgate with his first major studio gig.Įxecutives loved West’s unconventional take on the concept, which had already seen two rejected screenplays previously, and when shooting began in 2007, he was more or less left to his own devices. Because of this single-minded drive for profit, a lot of filmmakers get burned when they work with them. It explains why Lionsgate is such a successful studio- they have a theoretically great business model, but their movies are devoid of soul or any real cultural value. ![]() The movies that came out of Lionsgate at the time were juvenile, uninspiring works of commerce whose story elements were coldly calculated by the marketing department to wring the maximum amount of money from fiercely loyal niche groups. I only mention this because it was my experience with Lionsgate and approach to filmmaking that gives me some insight into the subject of this essay. On my first day, I had a lot of downtime, so I delved into the script library and, out of pure boredom, chose to read director Eli Roth’s early draft of CABIN FEVER 2: SPRING FEVER. My first job out of college was as an administrative assistant at Lionsgate Entertainment in Santa Monica.
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