Cabin Fever (2003) Movie Information:

Cabin Fever (2003) Directed by: Eli Roth Cabin Fever (2003) Written by: Randy Pearlstein, Eli Roth Cabin Fever (2003) Cast: Rider Strong, Jordan Ladd, Joey Kern, Cerina Vincent, James Debello, Arie Verveen, Giuseppe Andrews, Christy Ward, Michael Harding, Julie Childress

Cabin Fever (2003) U.S. Distributor: Lions Gate Films Cabin Fever (2003) U.K. Distributor: Redbus Film Distribution

Our Rating: User Rating:  Log in to rate this movie

Cabin Fever (2003) Synopsis:

As a last hurrah after college, friends Jeff, Karen, Paul, Marcy and Bert embark on a vacation deep into the mountains. With the top down and the music up, they drive to a remote cabin to enjoy their last days of decadence before entering the working world. Then somebody gets sick. Karen's skin starts to bubble and burn as something grows inside her, tunneling beneath her flesh. The group is so repulsed, shocked and sickened watching their friend deteriorate before their eyes; they lock her in a shed to avoid infection. As they debate about how to save her, they look at one another and realize that any one of them could also have it. What soon began as a struggle against the disease turns into a battle against friends, as the fear of contagion drives them to turn on each other. The kids confront the terror of having to kill anyone who comes near them, even if it's their closest friend. The survivors have to find help before they're all killed by the virus, or by the local lynch mob out to destroy anyone who may have come in contact with it.

Cabin Fever (2003) Movie Review:

Do you remember those old “anti-drug” commercials with the frying pan and a raw egg? Well I have to compare the makers of “Cabin Fever” with that egg. Their brains were the raw egg when they first started making “Cabin Fever” but slowly the film cooked their minds. “Cabin Fever” is probably one of the most demented and frustrating films to come out this year.

Five friends have rented a cabin and journeyed into the backwoods for one of those “camping-party-romps”. The cabin is plain and delightful and the friends start to explore more about each other. Things begin to go horribly wrong when beautiful and innocent Karen (Jordan Ladd) is discovered to have a mysterious and deadly virus. The friends slowly see that their survival may depend upon giving up on each other. Survival can be inhumane but their surviving may depend upon even looking past that.

“Cabin Fever” definitely had the potential to be a harrowing and great psychological film. All the elements were laid out but instead what occurs is like nothing I have seen on screen before. These guys are probably the stupidest, ruthless and inhumane group of kids ever to grace the silver screen. Their actions and what they do to each other is so over-the-top and awful that it made me laugh. This film is laugh-out-loud bad.

There are some solid and perverse laughs encased in this film but for the most part it is just there to gross you out with heavy gore. I have liked some really infamously bad and bizarre gore-fests, like 1985’s “Re-Animator”, but this film just doesn’t have the logic or intelligence that it needs. The kids in the “Friday the 13th” films had more sense.

I enjoyed the performances from Rider Strong, Cerina Vincent and Jordan Ladd but Ladd especially. Ladd’s performance was the only one in the film that was believable. When she got the disease we all felt it. These three performances stood out in one of the most awful films of the year. Hope they go on to bigger and better things.

What was the film trying to accomplish with Twin Peaks-styled characters inhabiting the wooded area? Sure they are kooky and sort of funny but they seemed to be way out of context.

Maybe I just didn’t get it. It wouldn’t be the first time.

With a surefire indie hit like “28 Days Later” and a monster-gore-fest film “Jeepers Creepers 2” in theatres now, just skip “Cabin Fever”.

Our Rating: User Rating:  Log in to rate this movie

Cabin Fever (2003) review written by: Dean Kish