The Prey

The Prey has a lot of "meh" attached to it. Old reviews are down on it. New reviews are down on it too a bit with caveats out the ears. I'm a big collector, so I have to own all old slashers. I was really disappointed in "The Chill Factor" despite the release being spectacular. I feared The Prey would be the same. Slow, boring, and without much of a pay-off. To a small extent, the movie doesn't deliver the heavy heaping doses of gore and nudity. There are kills. They are effective. The pace is slow in parts. There's way too much nature footage going on. Yet somehow, it still works. I was engaged the whole time. The atmosphere saves this one more than anything else, and that odd ending. Very unexpected. I was surprised. I get why reviews are very critical of this thing. But once I watched it and had the experience, I was very happy I made the purchase. I don't feel ripped off. The Prey is underrated, and now, back and better than ever. Lori Lethin is awesome. Now there's a real scream queen. Liked her in Return to Horror High and Blood Birthday as well.

Arrow Video releases another stellar release! I’ve never heard of this film, but when I heard it was announced to be released from them, I did some research and knew I had to check it out! Might not be a slasher film that everyone knows of, but if your in the mood for a slasher flick to watch besides the usually franchise films, I’d recommend checking this one out. The features alone and restoration Arrow Video did for this release is incredible, & will be one I’ll revisit every now and then!

What a great tagline this film has huh? It couldn't be any better if it tried. Anyways I'm not gonna lie, The Prey isn't one of my personal favorites or anything, but I do like it quite a bit, and it would be nice to see it get a dvd release. So many other more unknown film have been rescued from obscurity, so why can't The Prey get a nice little release too? 6 friends decide to go hiking and camping in the woods. Overall they just wanna have a good time! But sadly their good time is cut short when a mysterious killer soon stalks the group. Who is the killer? Is it even human? The plot here reminded me somewhat of Just Before Dawn. Not that it's as good as that film or anything, but some of the ingredients that made that film so good are sprinkled throughout here too. It's got the overall non existent and extremely quiet score that suits the film perfectly and gives it the right atmosphere, and of course it has it's setting. The woods always tend to work in horror movies. And it works here very well. The movie is able to capture a place that is as far away from society as possible. A place that is quiet and peaceful one minute, to dark and frightening the next. It's easy to see why a setting like this was such a popular staple in the early 80's, and the director here does a very good job. Sadly though the film isn't perfect. I really wish it was, but it isn't. One of the main complaints you hear often regarding this film is it's pacing. Now I personally didn't find the film boring, but it was somewhat slow. There seems to be a whole lot of hiking, a whole lot of chit chat, and a whole lot of nature shots going on. I do see where the director was going with it (it's all about the atmosphere!), but a few less animal shots definitly wouldn't have hurt, and I do think we could've got one or two more suspense set pieces. It would've done wonders for the film. The acting here is a real mixed bag, but overall it's not bad. Jackie Coogan (The Addams Family) drops by, and former soap actor Steve Bond (who I read also maybe did Playgirl in the 80's? Which doesn't honestly surprise me. The camera does seem to like him, in particular during the water scenes towards the end) is one of the leads. Don't get me wrong, none of the acting here is great, but even in it's worst moments (cheesy dialogue and all) it adds to the film. Nothing wrong with a little bad acting in our favorite genre. It can add to the charm! The Prey is rated R. There's a couple scenes of gore (the effects look pretty good), and the film also has some mild sexual content and brief nudity. Overall I liked The Prey! Sure it has a few slow moments, and maybe a few too many animal shots, but it's still a good time overall! It's definitly not for people who don't enjoy the genre, but if you like slasher films from the 80's than it's worth a watch. Now where's the dvd?

Avoid the extended cut like the plague. It adds WAY too much extra footage of the gypsy backstory. Sometimes, less is more! The picture and sound are great. I've been waiting for this movie for a long time. Glad to see Arrow did a top-notch job on the transfer.

All director/co-writer Edwin Brown and co-writer Summer Brown had was about ten minutes worth of story and a trunk load of stock footage nature video - but, by God, they were going to make a movie out of it. The result is The Prey, one of the worst horror films to ever see the light of day. I have to believe these guys actually attended film school at some point - they couldn't possibly have broken every rule in the book of good filmmaking without having learned what all of those rules were to begin with. This isn't just a bad film - it's bona fide torture. If we forced even a single terrorist in Gitmo to watch this film, you would have liberals protesting such cruel and unusual punishment all up and down California within hours. We're lucky this piece of cinematic sewage didn't bring the slasher film industry crashing down around it. Six young couples go camping in the woods, only to have their dreams of fun and fornication cut short by some unknown man or monster. That's pretty much the whole story; aside from the lousy ending, this is all follow-the-numbers stuff you've seen time and time again. With more padding than the sum total of all flat-chested teenaged girls on prom night, the filmmakers manage to string the ordeal out for over an hour and fifteen minutes. Every few minutes, a video slideshow of animals in the wild breaks out - bears, centipedes, snakes, you name it. There's so much of it that I kept expecting to hear a voiceover from Marlon Perkins. Still, that doesn't extend the film nearly long enough on its own. What now, then? I know - let's cut to a POV shot from the killer's perspective every few seconds, and throw in plenty of shots of his shoes as he walks. Still not enough? OK, campers have to relieve themselves, don't they? Whenever an actor needs to do his business, let's include that in the story. We'll call it realism; it'll be great. What? We need how many more minutes? OK, let's show a couple of minutes of the forest ranger tuning a banjo. Hey, it's either that or more stock footage of animals. And how about we give that same park ranger one of the dumbest stories any of us can think of and have him tell that story to - how about you just surprise me, OK? Now we get to the parts of this film that had me wanting to gouge my eyes out with a rusty spoon. Cue the night-time campfire scene. All six characters are talking a mile a minute, but you can't hear most of it - and that's actually by design. Unfortunately, the part we are allowed to hear involves the telling of the world's worst adaptation of The Monkey's Paw story. I could also make out a little bit of another character's mindless chatter, though - and lo and behold if I didn't hear it twice. Yes, folks, they actually recycled part of the same scene in an effort to further pad the film. I should have stopped watching at that point. Don't count on any blood and gore to make the film any more palatable, either - there ain't none. That's doubly unfortunate because you will desperately want to see every one of these annoying characters killed off as soon as possible. One of the actors is named Steve Bond, but I would swear he has a close familial link to the awful Timothy Van Patten. You have to feel sorry for Jackie Coogan, though; I admit his acting is horrible, but it's sad to see "Uncle Fester" go out like this - I'm pretty sure The Prey was his last film. At least he has some company in his misery, as he's joined by fellow The Addams Family alum Carel Struycken - I'll let you guess which part "Lurch" played. Bottom line: avoid The Prey like the plague - unless you're a bad horror movie masochist like me.

Whacky lost gem that gets the royal treatment from Arrow. Made for TV originally, but produced and acted well. Great fun slasher in the woods! 👍🏻

the only reason im giving this even 3 stars is because i thought the special effects were decent and thats all i found likeable about this film. Id say maybe 30% or more of the film is legit cutaways of nature,animals and bugs which just seems half assed because when we do actually get to see the main characters in this movie there almost ZERO meaningful dialog between them. Im not sure if the director had much in the script for the casts dialog but my god it just seems incredibly unfinished. This movie is pretty much a bad version of friday the 13th

Loved this early slasher! There are alot of animal shots and great color in this movie.

Good product as always by arrow video but not much of a movie especially the theatrical cut with all the animal and insect shots I tried the theatrical cut and the international version I just couldn't get into the movie into either version ,I love slasher movies and some of the lesser known ones but wish I'd never purchased this one , I'd read one review comparing it to Just before dawn but that movie is far better than this one , The Prey has the odd effective scene but overall the movies parts are better than its whole

Die Blu ray Veröffentlichtung von Arrow ist wie immer Top, schickes Retro Cover, gute Bildqualität, es gibt nichts negatives. Arrow ist wie eh und je eine Top Adresse für Sammler von Klassikern. Im Grunde sollte man auch dankbar dafür sein, dass es ein Film den wahrscheinlich kaum jemand kennt überhaupt auf Blu Ray geschafft hat, Ohne Arrow wäre das wahrscheinlich kaum passiert. Die Liste mit 80ziger Slashern ist unendlich lang, viele Filme habe es nie nach Deutschland geschafft, der harte Kern sind vielleicht 100 Filme, darüber hinaus gibt es noch hunderte. Wer weiß schon genau was sich für Perlen oder für Rohrkrepierer dahinter verbergen. Ich persönlich freue mich über jede VÖ. Allerdings zählt „The Prey“ zu den ganz schlechten Machwerken. Leider! Schlechte Darsteller, miese Tricks, schlechter Soundtrack, null Spannung. Lediglich ein paar schöne Naturaufnahmen gibt es zu bewundern. Ein paar Nostalgie Punkte gibt es für das 80ziger Flair, ansonsten ist der Streifen nur ganz hartgesottenen 80ziger Fans zu empfehlen die gern sammeln und vielleicht manchmal mehr Wert auf die Qualität der Veröffentlichung legen, als auf den Film selbst.

Cover e custodia completamente distrutte. Una vergogna.

Even though my advancing years have altered my brain to think more about mortgages and what I might be having for dinner, I still hold a soft spot for the much maligned slasher subgenre from my youth. Sure, most of them were never any good - but for every 'Madman' or 'Final Exam' you always had a 'Halloween', 'The Burning' or 'Friday the 13th Part 2' - so even in its up and downs, they still managed to keep my (then) teenage brain engaged. Which brings us to this; 'The Prey' - one that had initially got away from my mid '80s VHS renting self but now with the advent of Arrow Video's blu-ray release, was time to give the old fella a spin. When teenage couples Nancy and Joel, Bobbie and Skip, and Greg and Gail arrive at North Point, Keen Wild national forest in the Colorado Rocky Mountains - they think they are going to spend a fun time hiking. However, when they are systematically hunted down by a crazed, deformed maniac whose only intention seems to murderize all and sundry, they soon learn their vacation plans may have to alter in order to stay alive. Cue the usual genre staple of horny teens, untrustworthy authority figures (yup, that really is ‘The Adams Family’s Jackie Coogan as a ranger) and diabolical lunatics (with an axe!) as the rest of the movie plays out pretty much exactly as you think it will… Being an annoying self appointed slasher know-it-all, I wasn’t aware of producer/director team Edwin and Summer Brown, but it seems their previous forays into cinema revolved around titles like ‘A Thousand and One Erotic Nights’ and ‘For the love of Pleasure’ - which, y’know weren’t my usual tipples so going into ‘The Prey’ I didn’t quite know what to expect. To be fair, its well shot with strong cinematography from Joao Fernandes (he of a slew of later Joseph Zito/Chuck Norris flicks) and the locations are certainly memorable. There’s no point in taking apart the lacklustre screenplay - which is typical of the genre but what really hurts the movie is the slow plodding pace that feels like an age to get anywhere, with little urgency or invention. The bread and butter of this genre are the kill scenes and although deployed by the late John Carl Buechler - they too aren’t especially evocative or interesting. Sure, its an okay movie but on the basis of it potentially being some long forgotten ‘gem’, you may need to look elsewhere… Luckily, the fine folks at Arrow have given ‘The Prey’ a right royal treatment with a wonderful 2k restoration which truly looks stunning (it always amazes me how low budget, older movies look great when added to blu-ray whereas new flicks shot on digital cameras always look so fuzzy with ‘strip light’ style colour palettes). Alongside this we get a brand new audio commentary tracks with Summer Brown, fans Amanda Reyes and Ewan Cant followed by all new retrospective interviews with the cast, which are in-depth and fun but I would have preferred them to be cut into one documentary if honest - the piece meal nature of the interviews slows down the flow of information and feels very flat in terms of presentation. You also get a Q&A from the 2019 Texas Frightmare Weekend, a trip back to the shooting locations with fan Ewan Cant and lead Debbie Thureson, VHS trailers and an audio interview with director Edwin Brown. Rounding out the presentation is the International cut featuring the ‘infamous gypsy' sequence and a composite cut of this and the theatrical cut. All in all, its a stellar release and kudos again to Arrow for a fine release all wrapped up in a very nice package. Sadly, its another case of ‘great release, but subpar film’ and strictly one for devout horror fans who absolutely have to every slasher movie in their collection. Others should be sufficed with a one-shot watch. 1 for the movie, but a solid 4 or 5 for Arrow’s attention to detail.

once of the best horror movie of the 1980