Juliet Landau co-stars in this awful horror collage of slasher references--it's a badly executed homage party which may or may not be tongue in cheek. No one cares.
Before discussing Hack! in too much detail, it goes without saying that horror movies will often borrow, "pay homage" or flat out steal from other horror movies. But all horror movies, and this one is a key example, need to stop declaring themselves "a love letter" to the greats of the genre and thereby giving themselves carte blanche to rip off left and right, with no worries about being even slightly original. And most of the time, to add insult to injury, those "tongue-in-cheek" jabs are so poorly done it's difficult to decide if they're doing it on purpose.
Stale, Stale, Stale
Scream gave modern slashers the gift of self-awareness, and it can occasionally, even today, be funny and cute. Scream also had some genuinely scary moments (mainly the opening) and had a lot more going for it than the empty references found here. Far too many movies since have been trying to pull off the postmodern nod, this one even going so far as to call itself Hack!, as the murderers in this film kill each twenty-something (or, uh, bordering-on-forty, whatever) in the fashion of a different horror film.
Drinking May Help the Plot Go Down Easier
A group of students, supposedly chosen at random, end up on a desolate island with their film teacher in order to study and work on a biology project while staying in a couple's home. And the rest of the film continues to make just as much sense as that statement itself. The stereotypes are all there--the jock, dweeby girl, slut, gay Asian boy, black guy, the paint by numbers set-up is too tired to be anything but a yawn, whether or not it's trying to be cute. It's really, really not.
A little more coherent than most horror flicks (now that the Black Christmas remake has lowered the bar for eternity), it still doesn't bother to make excuses for lame plot points or a weak story. As mentioned above, it may infact have one of the weakest plots ever attempted. Sprinkle that terrible plot with groan-inducing names for everyone, like Mr. Argento for a film teacher (sigh) and soon, all these little things that don't really matter start to grate regardless. Putting in zero effort will actually grind your audience's nerves.
Laughing At It, Not With It
Some horror movies are even watchable for the Mystery Science Theatre 3000 factor--so awful it's a joy to rip apart. Even this viewing was prompted by an especially biting Rue Morgue review in which John Bower bemoaned the naming of characters after horror icons as just "more rancid mayo on a shit sandwich." Movies that bad must be great to laugh at, right? The movie's not as terrible as it's written up to be in his review, but sadly it doesn't even merit an MST3K viewing--every move it makes is so tired it's even hard to be fresh when making fun of it.
Honestly, Hack! isn't completely worthless--it's passable slasher camp, plus the dweeby girl is played by little Danica McKellar (of The Wonder Years) and she's more than cute enough to pass the time. It's a safe bet the film is trying to be bad in a fun way, but whether or not it pulls off the self-awareness, the movie neither trusts its audience's intelligence nor respects them enough to aim for anything fresh. It's a good thing it's on the short side.
