Cold Storage (I) (2009) User Reviews

it's all right but doesn't kick into full gear till late in the film

[movieman_kev · 4/10 · 20 March 2011]

Clive, a deranged back-woods type, finds whom he believes to be the girl of his dreams. There's one little snag. She's dead from a car accident. So naturally he won't let this little thing put a damper on their happiness together and he'll do anything to make his budding love last. But here comes the deceased girl's sister, leave it to a broad to ruin true love.

This film was boring and a chore to sit through for the most part. It was reasonably well-acted, but 1974's "Deranged" was a much better similar film. Nothing to go out of your way to watch, but luckily it's on Instant Netflix so I didn't.

THERE ONCE WAS A MAN NAMED DAVE...,

[nogodnomasters · 6/10 · 17 April 2019]

Okay, in this movie it is Clive and if you are familiar with the dirty limerick then you know this story. A woman (Casey Leet) dies in a car accident only to be found by a hillbilly (Nick Searcy). Her sister (Joelle Carter) and boyfriend (Matt Keeslar) set out to find her.

What makes this low budget film good is that they bothered to create memorable characters instead of using just bodies to read lines. I enjoyed listening to whatever gems the town folk were going to come up with next. The problem with the story is that the plot dragged along too much. The ending needed to be stretched out and have a good hook. The title of the movie is a bit misleading as the "cold Storage" aspect wasn't utilized enough to make it the title.

No f-bombs that I recall. No sex or nudity.

Independent effort might have worked better as a Drama

[loomis78-815-989034 · 4/10 · 2 March 2013]

Melissa (Leet) discovers her boyfriend Daric (Keeslar) cheated on her so she joins a play in a small Tennessee town to get away. On the way there she has a brutal car accident and is found on the side of the road by Clive (Searcy). Clive is a mentally challenged man who lives in a shack by himself in the woods. Seeing Melissa as a gift from God for his extreme loneliness, Clive takes her up to the shack and begins a relationship with her, mostly in his mind. Melissa's sister Cathy (Carter) takes a guilt ridden Daric with her to the town to discover what happened to her sister. Director Tony Elwood working from a script by himself and Mark Kimray steers Cold Storage in several different directions. It's hard at first to tell if Melissa is seriously injured from the crash of out right dead. Soon you realize she is dead and Clive is moving around a corpse which is creepy in itself. Clive is so delusional and his loneliness so fierce, he is just thrilled to have another body with him. This is when this movie is at its best. Elwood makes Clive sympathetic even though his outward appearance his gross and you actually feel his loneliness. As mentioned, Elwood takes the story down different paths including dark and intentional humor which doesn't always work. There is a lecherous neighbor named Luther Spoole (Brett Gentile) that is stupid and unwanted. The movie never really picks up momentum. It just runs along until the end confrontation with Clive and the sister and boyfriend. There isn't much horror or suspense in the film until the very end when Cathy is captured briefly. Credit must be given to Tony Elwood for resisting the urge to turn this into low grade torture porn. Nick Searcy is strong and believable in the lead role of Clive. Unfortunately 'Cold Storage' doesn't move the meter in the horror department and may have worked better as a twisted drama.

A real gem

[searchanddestroy-1 · 23 December 2012]

Above all, I will insist on the fact that this film is surprising, very unusual, among all the horror and survival movies we can watch since so many years. It could look like an ordinary slasher, taking place in the lost Appalachian mountains or anywhere else in the American wilderness, with the usual red necks hanging around. Clichés among clichés. DELIVERANCE was the very beginning of all this.

Yes, I was very pleased to find at last a feature that could bring some fresh air to this kind of cinéma. Here, no real red necks, but ordinary people from the country side, who have weird habits - see the sheriff eating his egg yolks with a straw !!- and give us an interesting study of how they live.

The best thing I loved in this film was the lonely man's character. All along the film, he is presented as a poor guy. And he is. In many other movies, characters like him are kidnappers, bad guys who torture and kill lost urban tourists. In this flick, you feel sympathy for him. After all, he did not kill the girl deceased in her car accident.

The only villain on the film is killed by our lead.

Our lead who is finally considered by the other characters like the REAL bad guy. I like this kind of way to build a story. At the beginning of the film, you may think that this man is the evil, and then you see you're wrong, and after one hour and a half, you finally get back, but not in a proper way. You may feel ashes or bitterness in your mouth. Because the moral is not entirely respected.

And I am very fond of this. That changes.

Absolute Zero

[piratecannon · 3/10 · 26 December 2012]

Have you ever seen Weekend at Bernie's? How about Deliverance? Maybe even Wrong Turn? Tony Elwood's Cold Storage is mishmash of all of these films—a "movie medley," of sorts. One would think that, given the sheer entertainment value possible when movies such as these are combined (shlock though they are), the final product would be nothing short of a delightful little tale of mountainside gore and inbred shenanigans. That, however, is not the case.

Cold Storage is about an aspiring actress named Melissa who leaves her Charlotte area residence (woot!) to take on a gig in a rural (and I mean rural) Tennessee mountain town. On the way there, a bird crashes into her windshield and she somehow manages to fly out of her car and land on her head. Never mind the fact that the whole plot hinges on stray fowl: how did her car door open (without the automobile flipping over) and how did she manage to hit the blacktop in a "jackhammer" position? I know it's supposed to be over-the-top, but defying the laws of physics is an entirely different matter.

So, here's our starry-eyed actress, lying prostrate and paralyzed in the middle of a Tennessee back road. The next person to come along, of course, is a fella named Clive. He's a local who has delusions of courting a long-departed nurse who was kind to him in his youth. He scoops up Melissa and carries her home, and eventually his fractured mind assigns her the identity of the aforementioned love of his life. The problem with all this is that Melissa soon dies due to her injuries, and Clive seems to take no notice. He even parades her rotting corpse around town in his rusted out clunker.

This does make for some humorous moments, but the extreme nature of some of the funnier bits—such as when Clive "brushes his teeth" with a straight razor and pops a tick the size of a quarter with his bare hands —are oddly counterbalanced by what were supposed to have been moments of poignant reflection on the part of our anti-hero. These moments are so strangely juxtaposed that it makes the movie feel as if it's constantly teetering on the edge of oblivion. It just can't seem to make a clear statement about what sort of story it'd like to be, and viewers are left wondering if it's okay to laugh at scenes that could be taken as comical or pseudo-serious.

To add to the woes, the whole production is hampered by atrocious acting from the very beginning. Even though this is a goofy horror/thriller at heart, the characters still need to be at least moderately believable—as is the case with any piece of effective storytelling—to elicit some degree of concern from viewers. With Cold Storage, we're given something akin to a late night round of charades that's punctuated by badly delivered (and badly written) dialogue. At times, wincingly so.

There's also the stock characters of the incompetent Sheriff and the wizened local, both of whom are—strangely enough—friends (and both of whom advise Melissa's sister and ex-boyfriend to take different courses of action to try and locate said missing person).

Even though it's got a few humorous moments, Cold Storage is a mess. If you're looking for goofy laughs and horror films of the hillbilly variety, check out Wrong Turn. At least then you'll know that it's all very much tongue-in-cheek.

It's about time!! Something different...

[c-f-eller · 7/10 · 7 January 2007]

I saw this film at it's premiere and found it to be different from any movie I've ever seen. There were no car load of teenagers running from anyone in a mask. There was no hero with the goofy sidekick and there was no plot that I could predict. Very refreshing!! BUT...this is an odd movie and may not appeal to all. It's a dark story that takes place in a remote area of the mountains, yet, not so remote that it reminds you of "Hill have Eyes" or other films that occurs in the middle of nowhere. It just carries the implication that strange things can happen right under our noses, just around the corner, or a couple miles away. One minute the film has you in the safety of town, the next minute, you're locked in a cellar. The protagonist, though you won't forgive his actions, will actually gain your pity. I commend the writer-director for having the balls to put something like this to screen. It involves a subject that other films wouldn't dare touch. That alone takes brass. The film is well made and is shot in great locations. Nick Searcy is absolutely brilliant in the role of the simple minded mountain man. Anyone seeing him in the sitcom "Rodney" will not believe their eyes. Jeff Pillars was my favorite as Sheriff Bullock. Great job on a very interesting story. You won't forget this movie!!

Dating tips from western North Carolina

[charlytully · 8/10 · 16 January 2012]

This movie is less about being a horror splatter-fest, and more along the lines of "How to become a zombie bride." (In fact, the one person viewers KNOW is "really quite sincerely dead" by the end is the victim of the opening, Hedwig-induced car crash.) Otherwise, writer\director Tony Elwood provides a level of horror genre restraint almost on par with thriller classics from yesteryear, say Hitchcock's PSYCHO. Nick Searcy, as necromancing groom Clive Mercer, shows that he's ready to step into the Anthony Perkins role (hotelier Norman Bates) when the next PSYCHO remake is made. Particularly intriguing are Clive's dental hygiene habits. Brett Gentile nearly matches Searcy in his portrayal of Clive's nemesis, the even coarser Luther Spoole. While Jeffrey Pillars' caricature of a Southern sheriff is strictly by the book of Hollywood stereotypes, and Matt Keeslar joins Joelle Carter in being fairly bland as the clueless outsiders on the search for a missing loved one in the back country, bit players such as John W. Love, Jr. (Jerome), Rebecca Koon (Jewell), and Gina Stewart (Rhonda) shine in their parts with a light that often eludes even the leads in low-budget, little-seen horror flicks such as COLD STORAGE. Perhaps the producers' most questionable decision is to use Matthew Stewart's lament "Take Me" as the closing credits song, with lyrics such as "I'm prepared to prostitute my name; all I ask is 15 minutes' fame." Most of the people connected to this movie seemed to have a very opposite attitude; this is NOT Paris Hilton's HOUSE OF WAX remake (though it probably cost 100 times less).

Do not mess with those back wood inbreed mumble mouth Hillbillies.

[bbsalamander · 7/10 · 10 June 2011]

Do not mess with those back wood inbreed mumble mouth Hillbillies, being out of touch with reality can mess up your social skills to say the least. Our main man Clive (Nick Searcy) is one out of touch and crazy boy and he has love on his mind. Nick Searcy who plays Clive is 100% convincing as a twisted redneck freak and had me squirming in my chair and thinking this is one nasty foul smelling odd ball. When a missing young lady's wimp of a boy friend and bad to the bone sister go looking for her they find Clive in all his sick glory and the fight is on. Good low budget movie with a group of fine actors make this worth a look, heck you will be planing your next vacation around Clive's Bed and Breakfast.

Surprisingly effective little thriller.

[innocuous · 7/10 · 10 May 2010]

I'm not sure exactly what genre this film belongs to, but it's pretty effective at giving one the "creeps." (Is it a slasher film? Psychological horror? Action-thriller?) The basic scenario (treating someone who is dead as if they are still living, including trying to feed them and conversing with them) has been done hundreds of times, but "Cold Storage" gives us an above-average take on it.

I have to give the director a WIN for one aspect of the film and a big FAIL for another.

*****SPOILER*****

The WIN is for the smooth transition between life and death for the victim. She's clearly alive when taken captive, but she's clearly dead within 24 hours or so. When did she die? Could she have survived with proper medical attention? The director treats this with little regard, as it's really not important to the story. And he's right.

The FAIL is for the victim clearly moving after she is dead. In numerous scenes, the head bobs slightly and the hair moves. Now, if it's an actress in those scenes, I think they could have done a better job of keeping her still, as she's a bit of a distraction. If it's not an actress, they should have stabilized it to prevent unintentional movement. I might even consider that the director is trying to make us uneasy by suggesting that she may not actually be dead, or that the weird guy thinks she is moving, but I suspect that this is a bit too subtle.

*****END SPOILERS*****

A worthwhile movie for most horror fans.

Outstanding Movie!!!

[armadillyz · 9/10 · 7 May 2011]

We have always noticed Mr. Searcy, and love him in Justified. But this movie is the absolute best performance lately by anyone in any genre. The story was presented beautifully for a horror movie, and kept us guessing. Loved the townspeople, who performed outside the normal stereotype of southern hicks. Cannot believe that a movie released years ago we finally see on cable, and it is fantabulous! For any true horror movie fan - who loves everything from the 1930's to now, serious and campy, this is one of the best movies ever. Not even sure you can call it horror, more thriller and suspense. The most horrible part of the movie, we agree with another reviewer, is the Sheriff sucking eggs through a straw! A masterful creation by writers, directors, cast, and crew. You should all be very proud of this production!!!

Underrated low budget horror movie of 2010: Cold Storage

[lake_patrick · 8/10 · 13 July 2010]

Low-budget direct-to-DVD indie horror movie Cold Storage is unexpectedly rewarding. Independently made in 2005 for around 1 million, it won DVD distribution in 2010 with a May release. Watch it soon because it deserves appreciation. (The director made 2 previous micro-budget features that had some exposure on cable, which I haven't looked up, and this looks like the height of his movie making career so far.) -Minor spoilers ahead- Cold Storage begins when a pretty blonde lady, Melissa, leaves her philandering but contrite husband. Her wish to start over draws her towards a nearby rural town, where a summer theater acting gig awaits.

Melissa's journey takes her down a dark wet country road. She's thinking about her new start, when something flies out of the night and shatters the windshield, and everything goes spinning. Seconds later, her car is a wreck and she lies paralyzed and helpless on the lonely road, a heartbeat from death.

By chance, a driver in a creepy old car happens on the gruesome scene. Instead of leaping to help, he ominously backs in with unknown intentions. He's a mentally challenged hillbilly, who tenderly takes Melissa's barely breathing body to the passenger seat, and tows her car to hide it where nobody should ever find it.

From this point, the first half of the movie becomes the story of Clive Mercer, the child-minded loner who has always hidden in his desolate shack on the outskirts of town. It drags a bit with only one active character, before it branches out when Melissa's husband and sister resolve differences to team up and find her. The movie seems headed for boringville at first, but Clive's scenes really help it cook later on, because they win genuine pity for his loneliness (a minor feat of cool writing). He becomes a sympathetic monster while he gives a horrible kind of love to his special secret friend. Despite his disgusting role, he's not the nastiest character in the story when it unfolds with more than it seemed to hold at first. It's also cool that the character who might slay the monster is hardly better: it's the town's cloddishly dumb, mustachioed and bejowled sheriff. He can barely be bothered to search for a missing lady, because he's dumb and doesn't care for city slickers. In one notable scene, he slurps egg yolks through a soda straw in a way that's grosser than the worst gore in this movie.

The movie's best asset is the way it relies so little on action, cheap scares, or effects (not that it's afraid to go for a few hilarious gross-outs), and branches out through it's characters in a humorously off-kilter way. Even incidental characters with just a few lines help reveal a small town full of stories, such as the faded glamor queen who runs a thrift shop where Clive dares to buy something odd for his special secret friend. The movie draws from well known genre sources and combines them with it's own personality. It doesn't sit in one genre (horror, suspense, black comedy), it does things it's own way (even when it's clunky), and it mines entertainment from taboo. You can tell it has personality by the way the titular situation is only a very brief part of the plot (in other words, maybe too unique to easily market.) Unlike crappier horror movies, it's a book you can't judge by it's cover, and it's probably 73 times better than other much more financially successful ones.

I'm not saying it's a flawless classic, but it makes me hope the creators make more and better (some of the actors have already had success with recognizable TV parts). It's worth the attention of people who appreciate underrated, creatively creepy movies. Netflix has it, and you should give it a try.