Climate of the Hunter Movie Review

Released in select theaters on December 18th (VOD on January 12th, 2021)

“Climate of the Hunter” is an odd mash-up of a low-budget horror movie and low-budget indie/art-house movie. The place where succeeds the most in the ‘low-budget’ part. Now, some low-budget movies can be well made and interesting – wanting to tell a unique story in a low-key manner. But, with a misguided concept – this can go off the rails pretty quickly. This movie boards the Express Train to Weird and never makes a stop…

It is shown from the start that one of two sisters has severe mental problems. Alma (played by Ginger Gilmartin) is a woman on the edge of reality. Her sister Elizabeth (played by Mary Buss) is visiting Alma in a ‘Cabin By The Woods’ (to drop a horror reference). She is on vacation from her busy job in Washington. They plan on having a visitor in the next few days. It is man they have known since they were children. He is a writer named Wesley (played by Ben Hall) and he shows up to be mysterious and debonair. They have dinner and drink wine, and Wesley regales them with wonderful stories.

But Alma runs into a neighbor named BJ (played by Jacob Snovel) who thinks Wesley is too creepy. He points out some things to Alma that makes her think Wesley might not be human. Wesley’s son Percy (played by Sheridan McMichael) stops by and also joins in the dinner conversation. Percy is mad that his dear OLD ‘dad’ had his mom put away. He makes a nice salad for the ladies and for Wesley. But he neglects to tell him that it has Garlic. Poor OLD Wesley has an ‘allergy’ to Garlic. Just like a vampire, right?

Alma has weird dreams and gets even more worried about Wesley. Her talks with BJ get heavily into superstition and folklore and how Hunters would track down and kill a Vampire. Nice normal conversation, I’d say. Elizabeth becomes very attracted to Wesley, and flirts with him all the time. Alma’s daughter Rose (played by Danielle Ploeger) also stops by and has dinner with Wesley. Rose catches Wesley’s eye. And his eyes have some apparent X-Ray vision? He could turn out to be a real ‘Lady-Killer’, in more ways than one…

Before the movie turns into “My Dinner With Wesley”, the bad dreams and ideas in Alma’s head start to make her crazy. She totally turns against her dinner guest – Wesley – and she wants to prepare him a Steak. What’s that? It’s not that kind of Steak? It is just a wooden stake? Gee, I wonder what plans she has for that thing?  But all this time, is Alma only sinking ever deeper into hysteria and madness, or has she decided that she will become a ‘Hunter’?

“Climate of the Hunter” turns out to NOT to be a movie about the Climate, and it does not really deal all that much with being a ‘Hunter’.  So is a Horror movie? In some ways there are some unsettling ideas and images. But is it an Art-house movie? There are touches of some ‘arty’ type features. Such as breaking the movie into ’chapters’ identified with Roman numerals and some foreign phrase. And also a short overhead shot of each dinner that was prepared, with an off-screen voice saying what food was prepared.

The dialog is very forced most of times, and there are long ‘speeches’ given by Wesley at the dinner table. Much of the movie is shot in dark rooms and dimly-lit spaces. The characters have a very dubious manner about them. They float into and out of scene to explain some off-camera event and then drift off to somewhere else soon after. There are a couple attempts at special effects, and once in a while they look pretty good. Many times they do not.

The acting is a little weak at times, and most characters are not well-defined. Ginger Gilmartin (as Alma) does a suitable job, and Ben Hall does a good job at being creepy. But the main ‘horror’  is the writing and the directing. So the main culprit is Mickey Reece. Was he setting out to make a scary movie, A Horror movie? A knock-off of a Wes Anderson film? It is really impossible to tell.

“Climate of the Hunter” has enough wooden dialog and acting that it will supply several Vampire Hunters for the rest of our lives…

Released in select theaters on December 18th (VOD on January 12th, 2021)