Machete Joe (2010)

Summary is that this movie isn't worth watching. But the really bad thing is that it could have been good if they taken the same care throughout the whole movie. The camera-work was decent and showed that they cared enough to try. Others have said the acting was terrible, but there I disagree. I found the actors believable, it's just that their dialogue (1) didn't tell me anything to get interested in them so that they were all generic characters and (2) the script had the characters doing unbelievable things and didn't flesh out the story of Machete Joe at all. He's just sort of . . . there.If the script had been written so that the characters had something to say and were doing things that were believable it would've been interesting. As it is, it's not worth a rental.

But then, anybody who decides to go ahead and watch this will find that out. As a devoted watcher of horror movies of all budgets, I would have liked to have enjoyed this one a little more. Overall, it's just way too routine to really work, and any moments that could conceivably be pinpointed as the highlights are few and far between. A pity, because this is the first genre film that I've seen since 1990's "Def by Temptation" that had a predominantly black cast (with a few token white guys on hand here). Written by Gordon Greene, one of its actors, it tells the story of a deformed murderer who as a child had seen his mother, a prostitute, slaughtered by a john. This same individual then makes life miserable for a film crew attempting to tell his story. Unfortunately, it's too hard to really care for many of these characters; by the end, one can start liking them a bit more, but by then it's too little, too late. The makeup effects and gore are decent enough, so if the prospective viewer is a gore junkie, they at least can get some entertainment out of this. The cast does feature some familiar faces, but they're basically just picking up a pay cheque: the great Ernie Hudson is reduced to a thankless cameo role as the local lawman, who flirts with his sexy young deputy but who doesn't do much else. One will also recognize character actor Art Evans, as the aged driver Sammy; he's been in such things as "Fright Night" and "Die Hard 2". As for the other actors, they're tolerable at best, but one good thing is that some of the ladies are quite attractive; too bad there's no sex or nudity in this thing. This is particularly tough going in its first half, which mostly consists of the characters arguing and fighting with each other. The horror quotient finally picks up in the second half, but the final body count may be too small for some tastes. The killer, played by Paul Campbell, just isn't that interesting overall. This is the kind of thing I couldn't really recommend to anybody, unless they're die hard horror fanatics willing to try out anything they see in a store, and even they might come away disappointed. Proceed at your own risk. Four out of 10.

I haven't written a review for a film in quite a while but after watching this movie I feel compelled to do so!! I have NOTHING good to say about this movie at all!! The big stars of this film are Art Evans and Ernie Hudson but they only appear in this film a TOTAL of about 5 minutes COMBINED. The acting is horrendous, some of the worst I've EVER seen and I've seen MANY bad-acted movies. I would even put the movie "The Room" above this one in terms of better acted bad movies. There are NO redeeming qualities about this movie so I'm going to stop now because I just realized that I'm wasting my time reviewing a film that ALREADY wasted my time!!! Just stay away from Machete Joe!!!!

I saw this movie on Netflix Canada and very much enjoyed the stylish great opening scene and the movie-making-within-a-movie theme.As a fellow low-budget horror b-filmmaker, I enjoyed the scenes of a sleazy Caucasian filmmaker character bringing his bimbo-type girlfriend for a horror movie role, and witnessing the discussion of of his worries (to a fellow producer) of the white Mid-west USA audience not buying tickets to see a black person chopping up white folks...gold! The actors know how to act. Great Sets. Great music fx and filmic visual fx. I very much enjoyed the fact that the cast was ethnically diverse, as it's impossible to believe that all white casts exist in the real world. The art vs. commercialism battles were real smooth. Oh, and there is also a good, suspenseful gory horror movie there too...but I just wanted to make my point; as a fellow artist. Also, I enjoyed the fact that although this movie is shot very professional; that these aware (real-life) Canadian filmmakers also make fun of their amateur roots cinematography-wise with film some film shots (by the filmmaker characters' biographer w/ a mini-cam), to show we cinephiles that they (the real filmmakers) know what audience expectations are up against ( since b-movie usually look very amateur) & that they know how to make a great looking film (that looks 3 times the budget) & the problems actors and filmmakers have with each other....Oh, did I also mention this is a good horror film?... Machete Joe is one gruesome mutha-shut-yo-mouth!