Fever Lake (1997)

Very disappointing...

Simply A Masterpiece

Fantastic!

By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

You knew what you were getting into when you saw the cover, right? No? Caught it on late-night? I'm sorry to hear that...We can not blame the actors here. No, this is sloppy, horrific, editing and direction. The director it would seem had a hard time coaxing the best from his actors, who, while not overtly talented, could've been motivated and bumped to do better. Sloppy direction combined with useless editing (some of the worst I've seen), wrecked this movie from attaining B-flick status. Still...This is good for laughs (see the getting pulled over sequence) no doubt about it. From the goofy Indian (played by a white dude), to that mildly retarded wolf, over to the wretched make-up. The script is dreadful...and that's a good thing if you're looking for fun.I have, believe it or not, seen worse. Just look at any of Feldman's work circa '95.I don't know...rent it if you are a Haim or Slater fan, or just into awful productions.

Fever Lake tells the tale of six teenage high school friends, Albert (Corey Haim), Steve (Mario Lopez), Bobby (Randy Josselyn) along with Sarah (Lauren Parker), Danielle (Mary-Rachel Foot) & Christy (Mattie Samradek as Mathea Webb) who all decide to spend the weekend at a house by a lake, set up by Albert they all plan to party & have fun out in the sticks away from the big city. However once there they get a strange unnerving vibe from the local townspeople, they find out that the house & lake have several ancient legends surrounding them & that evil things happen there. The six friends aren't interested in such superstitious nonsense though & intend to have a good time. Unfortunately for them the legends are true as evil things happen once more in the house by the lake...Co-produced & directed by Ralph E. Portillo I hated Fever Lake, I guess it just about has everything I hate in a film. The script by Michael Edwards is as slow & boring as they come, after the obligatory opening (off screen) murder the next 50 odd minutes of Fever Lake introduces the six teenage character's & the fact that they are going to spend a weekend in a house by a lake which has Indian legends attached to it, seriously that's the entire first 50 minutes, nothing else of any significance happens at all. This thing is a complete total & utter snooze-fest, I've seen some pretty boring & uneventful films in my time but Fever Lake is right up there the absolute worst of them! If you can stay awake long enough to see the ending you shouldn't have bothered because personally I didn't think it made any sense, a conversation at the end suggests that only two females were found dead yet there should have been three, right I get that bit but so the hell what? What's the problem? Why the stupid close up on the woman's worried eyes? We never see where the third female went or why she wouldn't be dead & I just don't see what point the filmmakers are trying to make, I really don't. What about the guy in the back of the police car whose eyes start to glow bright green, isn't that meant to be the shock ending? Reading some of the comments on the IMDb I was surprised that many refer to the 'shock' or 'twist' ending, well I don't see any twist or shock ending at all, did I miss something? It was obvious who the kid with green eyes at the beginning was since it was 'his' house & he was an orphan. Anyway, I hate this film, it's slow, it takes itself way too seriously, the character's are awful & the story is both predictable & unoriginal. Interestingly Fever Lake was released the same year as Scream (1996) which revitalised the horror genre, comparing the two in terms of story & basic entertainment value Fever Lake feels like it belongs in the stone-age. Oh well, that's another 100 odd minutes of my life wasted I suppose...Director Portillo does nothing to liven things up, he directs at an absolute snails pace & Fever Lake really is one of the dullest films I've ever seen. It makes watching paint dry sound like fun. There's no scares, no atmosphere or tension & the horror elements are just lame. There's a distinct lack of bloodshed as well, as far as I saw there was an off screen axe murder at the start, a stupid bit when a woman is murdered but you just see her face with a few drops of blood on it & I have no idea how she died & a Friday the 13th Part 2 (1981) rip-off where two lovers are impaled, this time with an axe which in the scene in question at first goes right through both of them & lodges in the floor beneath the bed but when the murderer goes back to reclaim the axe a few scenes later it's only stuck in the guys back an inch or two. Overall Fever Lake is very tame & won't satisfy anyone looking for the red stuff.It's with an element of surprise that I report to you that technically Fever Lake actually ain't too bad at all & to give it some credit where it's due it's quite well made with some decent photography, it certainly doesn't look as cheap as some straight-to-video low budget crap horror films that I've suffered through. It's still a really crap film though. The acting is predictably bad, Bo 'I'll appear in any crap for rent money' Hopkins slums it as the local Sheriff while it probably finished off both Haim's & Lopez's careers, if they ever had ones to start with.Fever Lake is a really awful teen horror that has no redeeming features or positive aspects at all, I pretty much hated it & I'm glad I caught it on TV rather than have to spend any of my hard earned money on it. Do yourself a favour & give this boring turkey a miss. Apparently also available in an edited version known as Demon Kid, I have no idea why.

This is an over the top pilgrimage that also has the great acting skills of Mario Lopez. "Terror Weekend At Fever Lake" says it all. Okay, well maybe there is some Academy Award worthy acting and witty writing in this movie but Corey Haim's hair carries the film. Umm... they also must have signed a deal with Walmart because that's where the cast all got their clothes. I think these college students were too cool for school. So what the hell are you doing? Why aren't you watching this movie? If you liked E.T. you'd better buy this video.

Some people say if somethings bad, there's no need to go on about it. With Fever Lake, I respectively disagree.It all starts one dark night. (hmm ...) As a young boy watches from his house's attic as his mother is murdered by a man (possibly his father) who we see is possessed by the "evil" of the lake. (This is indicated quite clearly by the green, evil glow in his eyes.) Flash forward to sometime in the future. We're introduced to a college school setting and a quick intro leads into Corey Haim (yes one of the "Corey's") and Mario Lopez (of TV's "Saved By The Bell"). Seems Haim has a country home up in Fever Lake so he invites some male buddies, including an undersexed idiot, and a trio of girls, two airheads by definition, up for the weekend. Of course, they know nothing of the strange events that happened at this house in Fever Lake. Sure, right, whatever.Meanwhile the local sheriff has his hands full with Clear Springs. He's the local native American Indian (played by a white dude?) who knows the evil is coming back. He warns the sheriff again and again, but to no avail as naturally the sheriff thinks he's nutty. Plus he's busy tugging up his pants that seem to be weighed down by his gun belt (which seems to be a full-time job in itself). Not that it matters the sheriff is a classic cliché. By horror movie definition, sheriffs have to ignore any warnings especially those from faithful Indians who are quiet and deeply intelligent. Just wonderful.Most predictably, weird things start going down. Cars are acting oddly and there's an evil, foreboding grey wolf stalking the woods. Meanwhile Haim's having these mind trips into the evil of Fever Lake and the local townsfolk won't talk about "that stuff". Rack up another cliché. Of course, there's always someone willing to talk about it ... explain it to an audience that's assumed to be too stupid to put it together for themselves. Then they drop this "innocent" bit in dialog that tells us Haim's character is an orphan. Like before I was told that, I wasn't supposed to have figured out yet that Haim's character was that young boy from the beginning all along. Downright dumb.Hack, hack, scream, scream. A false scare or two, making out, then dying. Panicking, then dying. Running off and dying. Wiping down car windows (!!!) and dying. The evil gets stronger, the Indian's fires burn brighter, he screams, again more of the evil wolf and a "shocking" ending that's cheating on the part of the writers. Don't be deceived by the movie box either. It's not even scary. You'd have to watch the movie to find that out. Maybe now you won't.