The Attendant

You might think watching all these cheap movies is a rather perverse hobby but some of my favourite films were bought from £1 shops. However after watching 'The Attendant' i might have to agree with you, putting myself through this was a mistake.

Everything was looking quite promising to begin with, i mean the box art seems to suggest a simple slasher film, the synopsis tells of campers being done in by dark forces and the IMDB shows a respectable score of 7.6. None of this is at all accurate, i'm not even convinced the guy on the box is actually in the film.

From the off it's clear that the film cost tuppence to make, shot on video using a single camera. You can tell it's a single camera and that the cameraman has very little experience using it when the happy campers stop at a roadside diner. Everything is fine outside but then muggins forgets to adjust his white balance for the interior scenes. When one camper goes to the toilet she disappears into a sea of over exposed yellow fuzz.

So at the diner the locals tell them not to go to the nearest petrol station because the titular attendant is a little creepy but they do anyway. As they drive to the petrol station the sun starts to set and it seems the budget didn't stretch as far as lighting so from now on every scene is poorly lit and most are actually out of focus (tsk, tsk, Mr. Cameraman). The attendant turns out to be a bit weird but perfectly polite even telling them where the best camp site is, what a nice guy!

Cue some more driving and inane drivel disguised as dialogue as they make their way to the camp site, oh and one of them is a psychic or something i think that's supposed to be important. So they make it to the camp site and start setting up camp but the psychic one has a bad feeling about something or other. Everyone ignores her and settles down in front of the camp fire with a bottle of tequila. Now you might think this set up has taken maybe 20 minute, half hour tops. Well your wrong we are currently a whole HOUR in! An HOUR and nothing has happened! So now you might be thinking 'God this must be quite a long film, to waste so much time on set up.' Well no your wrong again, the credits are going to roll in TEN MINUTES. Unfortunately the sprint to the finishing line isn't really any more exciting than the leisurely stroll leading up to it. How can a film get its pacing so colossally wrong?

Turns out the camp ground is haunted by a little girl who very quickly gets all but one of our campers to kill themselves in a variety of ways (including a man fellating an axe, handle first, not really a way i'd have considered taking my own life but credit for originality) and then its over. Well there is some attempt at an explanation at the end but i don't know what the fuck it was on about.

I would rather pass a right angled turd than watch this again.