Ritchie (Dorff) is a professional thief who is sent to Russia to steal an antique cross which is locked up in a skyscraper. However, things go terribly wrong when Ritchie and a load of hostages get trapped on the mysterious thirteenth floor and realise that something is hunting them...
This starts off very averagely, with quite a few dodgy accents and acting and unfortunately as a result, this doesn't give the film a positive outlook from the beginning. However, the turn-around is intensely surprising and the film just keeps getting better and better as it carries on.
It starts with a little back-story and introduction to Dorff's character which is all very standard stuff, it's once the characters get stuck on the thirteenth floor that the film really picks up the pace. The situations that everybody gets into make for many humorous and exciting events to pan out and once the film gets going, the pace doesn't let up.
This is because what may seem like a very simple premise is handled with such a different outlook by writers Derek Boyle, Raymond Friel and Eamon Friel, and is presented with such manic energy and verve by director Kit Ryan that it all seems so fresh and original. It really is a totally thrilling mix of real belly-laughs, suspense, action and all-out gore, it's just impossible to be bored throughout the movie.
What is also interesting is that as far as I know, most of the actors playing Russians are English, which makes for great fun spotting all the actors and actresses from other non-horror films and television. Easily the most surprising and ingenious casting decision is that of Geoff Bell, who plays Boris. For in two of his most well-known roles in Green Street and The Business he plays a cockney thug, but in this he plays a bungling Russian soldier. Whenever he's not on screen, you find yourself waiting for him to appear to see what he does next, because he's absolutely hilarious. It's also nice to see Stephen Dorff in something good for a change after Alone in the Dark, which was not a good decision on his part. However he lends some star power to the film and as a result, hopefully this film will reach a larger audience.
As for the gore, this film is chock full of gory decapitations, skinnings and other things that I won't ruin here. It's all played for laughs and it certainly delivers, with some of the funniest parts of the film being the gore gags. It's worth mentioning also that the main killer is a bit of a campy disappointment when he first appears, but he definitely grows on you as the film progresses and the film's treatment of him certainly fits with the tone of the rest of the film.
This film really is a strange one, with a simple plot but a giant handful of new ideas, that provides some of the biggest laughs I've had in a horror film for a while. It's also a blast from start to finish and never slows once it starts going. The one down point with the film is that it didn't have a bigger budget, as a result the set design is not too effective but it still looks a lot more expensive than I guess it cost to make. This doesn't effect the quality of the film to any extent to make it noticeable however, and it shows that you don't need millions of dollars to make a great, original horror film like this, compared with the expensive looking but stale, rehashing of most modern studio horror.
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ALTERNATIVE TITLE: 13, Botched - Voll verkackt!
MOVIE YEAR: 2007
DIRECTOR: Kit Ryan
WRITING CREDITS: Derek Boyle, Eamon Friel, Raymond Friel
GENRE: Comedy, Crime, Horror, Thriller
CAST: Stephen Dorff, Alan Smyth, Sean Pertwee
COUNTRY: Germany, Ireland, UK, USA
RUNTIME: 91 min
RATING: 8/10
Botched Website/IMDB Click here
Botched Trailer
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