Fear Island (2009)

Dir: Michael Storey

Haylie Duff, Aaron Ashmore and their pushing-30-but-pretending-to-be-college-age friends take a boat out to a secluded island with no telephones, where they have a delightful holiday in the sun, then go home feeling rejuvenated and serene. What? No, I'm kidding of course! They get picked off one by one in a variety of imaginative ways, courtesy of a black-gloved killer who's lurking in the woods! Hoorah! There's not a high special FX budget sadly, so instead we have snakes in the cupboard, dogs in the hot tub, nails in the jam jar, nailguns in very much the wrong hands, impromptu premature burials and an ice-bucket o' blood. This is all told in flashback while an angry boneheaded detective works with what little he has (one traumatized witness and some sketchy evidence) in order to uncover the killer's identity. The mystery has a couple of holes here and there but it's quite lively and the final twist, while not a surprise, is entertainingly executed. "Fear Island" obviously isn't a great movie but for a made-for-TV teen slasher, someone's really put their all into making it about as good as it can get. It's very tame and daft as a bag of toy monkeys but it's colourful, fast-paced, occasionally even funny. You could do a lot worse for a Sunday afternoon hangover viewing. **1/2