I love it when a film starts off right away with killer music. I like a strong score or kick-ass song to draw me in and hold my attention. What’s even better is when that music keeps its control on me, and continues throughout the entire film. This is what happened with Killer Kate!. Thank you, John E. Hopkins!
Killer Kate! stars Alexandra Feld (in her film debut) as Kate, a woman who reluctantly gives in to her dying father’s wishes to get her to spend more time with her family. “I can’t live with a fractured family, Kate. I would like to spend whatever time I have left with my girls,” he says, trying to convince her that going to her estranged sister’s wedding is a better way to spend Halloween weekend than going on a date.
Kate is picked up by her sister, Angie (Danielle Burgess: The Sinner TV series), and her two friends, Sara (Amaris Davidson: Light as a Feather TV series) and Mel (Abby Eiland: Witch-Hunt 2017). After an unusual encounter with an intrusive and frightening man in a truck, the girls arrive shaken and a bit on edge at their destination, a secluded and cozy cabin in the woods. What the audience knows – and the girls do not – is that the people who own the cabin are plotting an attack. Poison, a bat wrapped in barbed wire… it seems that nothing is off limits to subdue and kill the girls as they start their pre-wedding activities. “I feel like I need to watch someone slowly die, for regular life experience. You know?” Tino (Preston Flagg: The Final 2010) asks his brother, Jimmy (Grant Lyon: Interview Date 2011), while they are trying to figure out how to poison a bottle of champagne while leaving the cork and gold wrapping intact.
As the night goes on, it comes out why the sisters were estranged, and why there is so much tension within the group. It isn’t long into their fun that Christine (Tiffany Shepis: Victor Crowley 2017) and crew show up to ruin their night.
There are laughs that play along well with the bloody kills and a small twist that will leave you satisfied. Directed by Elliot Feld (read my interview with him here), and co-written by Feld and Daniel Moya, Killer Kate! is Feld’s directorial debut, and while it has its flaws, it’s also so fine-tuned that you can’t even tell. I love the strong female characters. These women carry the film and do a great job doing it. It makes me eager to see what is up next for Alexandra Feld, because if she’s this good in her first film role, I can only look forward to how her career is going to develop.
Please be sure to catch Killer Kate! on VOD and Digital HD, available now.