It was once almost universally true that any film that went straight to video was bad. The obvious reasoning was generally sound: If it were any good, it would have played in theaters.
But over time, movies have gotten easier and cheaper to produce, which means more of them are being made, which means it simply isn’t feasible to release them all theatrically. This has led us to the current situation, where many legitimately entertaining films are premiering on DVD rather than at your local multiplex. The only hard part is identifying them, since a lot of garbage still goes the straight-to-DVD route, too.
The Burrowers, a tense Western-horror hybrid, is a fine example of a DVD premiere that doesn’t deserve the DVD stigma. It has an R rating and no major stars, and it isn’t a sequel or remake. It has no stringy-haired Japanese ghost children crawling out of bathtubs. It would be slaughtered at the box office. It is an utterly fantastic hidden gem.
When Irish ranch hand Fergus Coffey comes calling on his beloved Maryanne on an isolated homestead, he finds the men of the family butchered and the women and children missing. The locals suspect that Indians are behind the rampage and they put together a posse, including two experienced “man” hunters named Will Parcher and John Clay, to chase the kidnappers down. Acting as a translator, Parcher is informed by the Indians they manage to capture (and torture) that the family was not attacked by Indians but by something much more dangerous: the titular Burrowers. These monstrosities (possibly a subterranean branch on the human evolutionary tree) poison and bury their victims alive; only coming back later to devour them. These creatures pre-date the Indians and feed on humans now because the white man killed off the buffalo — it’s nature’s revenge in its nastiest form.
Pushing farther than even his own script is writer/director J.T. Petty’s guidance of its complete arch. He has an instinct for the whens and the hows of revelation, perpetuating an instinct for the craft of illusion first tested in S&Man and now proven to marvelous effect in the film. The creature design alone is outstanding, exposing no gaudy seams between the digital and the practical effects, a feat made even more impressive when one steps back and remembers the setting. Petty, his special effects team and his cinematographer are harmonious in their caper, hiding questionable limbs in the shadows as the creatures approach, holding nothing back in their prime time revelation.
Much of the movie’s running time is devoted to the search for the missing party and these sequences — men on horseback riding through long grass and rugged mountainscapes — are expertly filmed and lit by DP Phil Parmet. It’s haunting stuff, these bleached out images of desolation overlaid with Joseph DoLuca’s simple score, and it gives the film a dreamlike overtone. But Petty also delivers the gruesome goods that fright film fans will be looking for. The Burrowers themselves are meticulously designed (and thankfully non-CGI) and enjoy a healthy amount of on-screen time. Unlike many monster movies of the past — where the titular beastie only shows up in the last ten minutes and is caked in darkness — Petty brings these creatures fully into the moonlight. The effect is very Lovecraftian in its “cosmic horror.”
I really try not to use the phrase too often, but the final showdown is nothing if not riveting. Playing coy is out of the question. Petty shows everything in a balls out wonderment climax. This is no quick cut, shaky cam showdown either. Petty’s is a lengthy ordeal satisfying to the very end. Even what happens after the exhausting culmination of man vs subterranean beast is a riveting final knock to the chest.
When I first saw this movie, I was in a bit of funk, and was hoping a decent movie might dislodge me from the rut. I wasn’t expecting to be blown away. I can’t recommend The Burrowers enough.