Review by Amanda Reyes
Starring Antonio Sabato Jr., Kostas Sommer, Kelly Curran
Directed by Michael Feifer
Written by Michael Feifer, Wood Dickinson, Christopher Ryan
Since Henry was all about confessions, I thought I’d start my review with one: I am a pretty voracious true crime nut and I’ve always been drawn to films about the “superstar” serial killers, such as Dahmer, Bundy and, you guessed it, Henry Lee Lucas. Like good ol’ Ed Gein, Lucas has inspired a tale or two about his supposed rampage across the country. I say supposed because Lucas confessed to a few hundred some odd murders and then rescinded most of them.
He became most famous to casual crime followers when the excellent horror film Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer enjoyed a small theatrical release in 1989. John McNaughton’s shocking film was only loosely based on Lucas, but was such a searing character study that the true events were not needed to get its point across. Even before Portrait, Confessions of a Serial Killer (1985) attempted to capture Lucas’ revolting murder spree. To this day, I’m not sure I could tell you which film I found more disturbing. Confessions follows the life of Lucas much closer, and while it pulls no punches, Portrait really drags you into the narcissistic world of a serial killer in a way few films ever have.
In an attempt to capture Lucas’ dark and complex spirit, director/co-writer Michael Feifer essentially combines these two earlier films, giving you the true story of his life while also fleshing out the killer’s complex nature – and that is where the similarities end. In an odd turn of casting Feifer enlisted an ex-soap star (Antonio Sabato Jr.), along with several other model types, filtering them through a fairly sterilized retelling of Lucas’ adventures. Starting from his childhood Drifter actually squeezes in a lot of information that the other films omitted. Now you’ll get a look at Lucas’ notorious mother and his abusive upbringing. Aside from the fact that these backwoods hillbillies have perfect teeth, plucked brows and hot bods, Feifer also misses the darkness within Henry, instead opting to make him a little sympathetic, a riff on Monster with Charleze Theron (another true crime movie I disliked). Aside from a nice scene featuring a decent doctor helping a young Lucas with his new glass eye, Drifter tries way too hard to make you fearful and somewhat sympathetic of Lucas.
The rest of the film deals mostly with Sabato in overalls - but still being really hunky - acting all scary and removed. In another attempt to humanize him, they have a scene featuring him talking about wanting to go to Venice and ride in a gondola (or gone-dole-ah as he pronounces it). Sabato’s makeup is effective, helping to eschew some of the actor’s pretty boy looks, but he’s surrounded by too much beauty. Lucas’ BFF, Ottis Toole is played by Kostas Sommer – I mean even his name is gorgeous – and the love interest is played by an actress named Kelly Curran who is exquisite but comes nowhere near resembling the real 14 year old girl named Becky, who was mentally retarded. Or any 14 year old girl for that matter.
Watching Drifter reminded me of a scene in the recent lackluster remake of Last House on the Left. Towards the last third of the film, after a day of debauchery, the band of rapists/killers head into the guest house for a night of rest and a decent bath! What struck me about this event was that the characters in the original version seemed to thrive in their own filth. They were so dirty and so grimy that it was the audience who needed a shower! Modern horror is just too clean (literally!) and seems rather caught up with the blandly attractive in place of anything resembling realism or, more importantly, terror, which distances the viewer from their road trip through hell.
Drifter also loses itself in its own slickness, maybe trying to borrow something from Natural Born Killers, while dropping all emotion in the process. This film lacks any of the grit and grime that is needed to capture the miserably depraved Lucas, despite decent performances from the cast. Ultimately, Drifter is nothing but fluff disguised as technical prowess and it’s also totally forgettable.
Rating: (2 out of 5):
