Van Movies: Creep Van, 2012.

Holy jumping! A van movie from the 21st century? This can’t be right. It seems it’s real and some sort of slasher film about a killer van perhaps in the vein of Christine or Maximum Overdrive or Duel. All I know is that Lloyd Kaufman makes a cameo so this has to be good. The production company has only made one other film (that I’m aware of) named Gag from 2006 which I think is some sort of torture-porn flick. I dunno, never heard of it until now.

The titular van, a 1975 Ford Econoline, appears within the first 10 seconds which is good but it looks pretty rough. A real shame to see. Some lady says that only bad people own vans which offends my sensibilities but it is quickly remedied by a decent kill. So far I am flip-flopping between thinking this will be awful and at least enjoyable. Will I be able to identify this as a Van Film? In a slasher, you’re usually rooting for the bad guy and in a van film the van sort of takes the life of a character like the Enterprise does in Star Trek. So if a the bad guy is a van, does that mean by default the van is now the main character, making this a van film despite lacking the other qualities of being about fun and freedom and being groovy? Truly a question for the philosophers.

There’s some good kills including but not limited to, being bisected by a window, crushing, death by Wilhelm Scream, nail-bomb airbag, interrupting the funniest sex scene of all time, and impaling with windshield wipers, muffler, and an antenna. Pretty good even if there’s a fair amount of mediocre CGI involved.

The music reminds me of X-Files which is excellent and instantly draws me in. Furthermore I find myself appreciating this film due to a fairly simple scene where the bus driver ignores him and keeps driving away. This is fairly mundane but the film takes place in Detroit and the one time I went there I experienced the same issue with the bus drivers. They were fucking ass-holes. Fuck Detroit bus drivers. For the simple fact of accurate depictions of Detroit bus service, this film should be considered a success. But please don’t think I hold it against Motor City. They have a great used bookstore (John K King Used & Rare Books) and the Coney Island on Lafayette (not the one right on the corner, the one next door) remains the best hot dog I’ve ever consumed.

The Lloyd Kaufman cameo is pretty funny and he’s joined by the film’s composer who’s worked on (not the main composer obviously) Alien 3, Home Alone 2, Jurassic Park, Braveheart, and one of my guilty pleasures, Howard the Duck. The kills happen often enough to keep me entertained. It would have been nice to have some more dirtbag characters that we can grow to hate before they get killed instead of the parade of seemingly random targets but I’m not complaining. There is sort of a diner – a little Mexican burrito joint but that doesn’t really count, no bar-fights but there is a mechanic fight which I’m going to allow, and the van is customized…to kill. There’s mechanic doodads that stab and bludgeon people but the van is pretty ugly. No shag carpets, no waterbeds, no fancy sound systems. It does pass the BBB test though with ample blood and a reasonable amount of breasts – nothing too crazy. I like the poster that replaces FORD with FEAR and the “Let the Bad Times Roll” tagline is pretty good. This is a weird one. I’m glad I had the chance to see a recent film containing a van but it’s not like it was good. I’ll go with One Thumb Barely Up Seal of Approval.