Mangler 2 contains a great metaphor for itself. Midway through the movie, tensions run high, accusations fly, two female characters nearly get into a scuffle, and then we cut to fingernails dragging across a chalkboard
and they keep dragging, inflicting that irritating screech upon the poor helpless viewer.
Gone is the possessed laundry machine from the first film, replaced by an even more ridiculous unrelated premise: a private school receives a new state of the art security system which, in traditional horror fashion, goes haywire and starts killing everyone. Yes, a new security system that automates everything from the doors to the refrigerators to, presumably, the motion detector auto-flushing toilets. This of course means those darn "'puters" factor heavily into the narrative, which means the script requires the characters to interact with the computers, which translates to scenes of actors standing around monitors, reading information off the screen, and telling the audience what they're typing as they're typing it.
Note to filmmakers: while computers may provide fun and exciting direct interactions such as video games and other applications, there's few things as boring as watching someone else interact with them.
The protagonist, Jo, is a rich girl outcast who hates even her own little clique of stereotype horror staples, leading her smiley bodyguard to muse aloud, "it's kind of sad that I'm your best friend." Then again, said clique threatens to blame her for a website vandalism prank, prompting Jo to unleash the Mangler 2.0 virus upon them. Tight knit group, non? Now, I'm all for a bitter anti-social protagonist (especially one who goes all out and embraces her dark side). It's certainly more interesting than the typical PG13 heroine plaguing horror movies these days but if you're going to venture into those waters, go all in and make it a dark movie. Not long after Jo has stormed off at the brink of tears, she's sitting around the pool, chatting with those same "friends" who would rather make her their scapegoat so they can go to prom.
Yet, I might—might—forgive all of the above. That is until time comes for the first kill and we see Mr. Bob Fix-it working on a lawnmower, but he has the wrong wrench size. So he walks out of the room, across the hall, into another room to fetch another wrench. Personally, I'd have the toolbox next to me, but never mind. He hears some funny sounds coming from down the hall, goes to investigate, and it's just the French chef in the john. So, false scare over with, Bob goes back to his lawnmower and, again, wrong wrench size. Back out of the corridor, into the other room, into the toolbox, and he comes back with another wrench. As he returns to the lawnmower, we see a pair of garden sheers following him. And what's supporting these garden sheers? Why, a snake-like cluster of wires and cables. Goodbye suspension of disbelief, and goodbye any chance of overlooking premise/character shortcomings.
I hesitate to mention this, but clearly director Michael Hamilton Wright intended to pay tribute to the much superior garden sheer scene in William Peter Blatty's Exorcist III (itself, a much superior film, incidentally.) And so goes the long parade of ideas either ill-conceived (synchronized escape from the evil security cameras? the "snowflake" analogies? the "hip" slang and "Scream" explanations the Mangler 2.0 virus has picked up?) or ill-executed (a murder in the dark, illuminated only by the brief inadequate flash of a still shot camera? the murder by hanging that shows only bikini bottoms?) It all leads up to the underwhelming climax featuring an uninspired nod to Hellbound: Hellraiser 2 (reminding us, yet again, there are better time investments within the very same genre.) It's funny how when a competent director quotes another movie within his own, the attentive viewer will pick up on it and smile appreciatively. In the case of Mangler 2, it feels like Michael Hamilton Wright is physically molesting the memory of better movies.
Gone is the possessed laundry machine from the first film, replaced by an even more ridiculous unrelated premise: a private school receives a new state of the art security system which, in traditional horror fashion, goes haywire and starts killing everyone. Yes, a new security system that automates everything from the doors to the refrigerators to, presumably, the motion detector auto-flushing toilets. This of course means those darn "'puters" factor heavily into the narrative, which means the script requires the characters to interact with the computers, which translates to scenes of actors standing around monitors, reading information off the screen, and telling the audience what they're typing as they're typing it.
Note to filmmakers: while computers may provide fun and exciting direct interactions such as video games and other applications, there's few things as boring as watching someone else interact with them.
The protagonist, Jo, is a rich girl outcast who hates even her own little clique of stereotype horror staples, leading her smiley bodyguard to muse aloud, "it's kind of sad that I'm your best friend." Then again, said clique threatens to blame her for a website vandalism prank, prompting Jo to unleash the Mangler 2.0 virus upon them. Tight knit group, non? Now, I'm all for a bitter anti-social protagonist (especially one who goes all out and embraces her dark side). It's certainly more interesting than the typical PG13 heroine plaguing horror movies these days but if you're going to venture into those waters, go all in and make it a dark movie. Not long after Jo has stormed off at the brink of tears, she's sitting around the pool, chatting with those same "friends" who would rather make her their scapegoat so they can go to prom.
Yet, I might—might—forgive all of the above. That is until time comes for the first kill and we see Mr. Bob Fix-it working on a lawnmower, but he has the wrong wrench size. So he walks out of the room, across the hall, into another room to fetch another wrench. Personally, I'd have the toolbox next to me, but never mind. He hears some funny sounds coming from down the hall, goes to investigate, and it's just the French chef in the john. So, false scare over with, Bob goes back to his lawnmower and, again, wrong wrench size. Back out of the corridor, into the other room, into the toolbox, and he comes back with another wrench. As he returns to the lawnmower, we see a pair of garden sheers following him. And what's supporting these garden sheers? Why, a snake-like cluster of wires and cables. Goodbye suspension of disbelief, and goodbye any chance of overlooking premise/character shortcomings.
I hesitate to mention this, but clearly director Michael Hamilton Wright intended to pay tribute to the much superior garden sheer scene in William Peter Blatty's Exorcist III (itself, a much superior film, incidentally.) And so goes the long parade of ideas either ill-conceived (synchronized escape from the evil security cameras? the "snowflake" analogies? the "hip" slang and "Scream" explanations the Mangler 2.0 virus has picked up?) or ill-executed (a murder in the dark, illuminated only by the brief inadequate flash of a still shot camera? the murder by hanging that shows only bikini bottoms?) It all leads up to the underwhelming climax featuring an uninspired nod to Hellbound: Hellraiser 2 (reminding us, yet again, there are better time investments within the very same genre.) It's funny how when a competent director quotes another movie within his own, the attentive viewer will pick up on it and smile appreciatively. In the case of Mangler 2, it feels like Michael Hamilton Wright is physically molesting the memory of better movies.