Christopher
Webster is probably best known as a producer on such renowned horror films as Hellraiser, Heathers and Trapped Alive. But in 1993, the prolific film producer got a
one-time shot at directing a film he could call his own: the wintery demonic
possession horror flick The Chill Factor. Not to be confused with the 1999 actioner of
the same name, this VHS era cult favorite is more or less The Evil Dead set in the Wisconsin snow season instead of northern Michigan
fall.
Unearthed
from obscurity by Arrow Video, this inspired little number tells that familiar
story of a group of youths on a weekend getaway who are picked off one by one
by dark, unearthly forces. The
difference here is the window dressing, offering a unique spin on Ouija boards
with some creatively gory death scenes and just enough carnality to awaken fans
from their drunken stupor. While nowhere
near the caliber of such legendary winter horrors as, say, The Shining or The Thing,
there’s just enough mayhem here to set itself apart from the pack.
After
a snowmobile race gone awry sabotages the college couples’ weekend and leaves
one snowmobiler named Tom (Aaron Kjenaas) near mortally wounded, the kids take
refuge in, you guessed it, an abandoned old cabin with no electricity or heat
but plenty of occult religious artifacts laying around to conjure up even the
sleepiest demons of Hell. While one
member of the group ventures back out into the blizzard for help, those left
behind keeping vigil over their injured comrade pass the time digging up and
playing around with said occult artifacts and naturally awaken a demon which
possesses (and heals) Tom before unleashing an all-out supernatural attack on
the kids.
Ouija
boards have become as ubiquitous of a mainstay in horror films as the Necronomicon
after Sam Raimi’s The Evil Dead, but
I can’t say I’ve seen one that looks quite like this one. A circular board with a Wheel of Fortune spinning dial with an eyeball poised in the
middle, this demonic summoning tool will probably only ever been seen in this
one little movie and nowhere else again.
Next is the wintry setting which includes numerous snowmobile races,
high-speed chases and snowmobile related deaths including an easy to miss line
of barb wire.
Performances
in this are less than stellar though Aaron Kjenaas has some fun hamming it up
when his demonic side replete with abnormally long fingernails kicks in. The voiceover narration of a gravely-voiced
old woman signifying there might be one survivor left to this story helps meld
things together but also tends to state the obvious. Prosthetic effects are pretty good for the
most part, with an icicle death sure to make hardcore horror fans giddy with
delight. The real standout here are the
snowmobiling stunts which reportedly involved a great deal of training to
figure out how to make the vehicles flip over and how to throw a stuntman midair
off of one without killing them.
The Chill Factor is frequently regarded
as a kind of absurd horror flick that treads a fine line between horror and
hilarity. It’s also something we’ve seen
before with some slight tweaks made to where and when it takes place. That said, I had a lot of fun with this one
and have to hand it to the stuntmen whose death defying acrobatics leave
viewers more shaken than any of the demonic horrors unleashed as all Hell
starts to break loose. It will give you
a swell time at your friend’s latest Halloween party!
--Andrew Kotwicki