I’ve had this screener hiding somewhere in my DVD shelf for weeks. I pulled it out last night hoping for some fresh excitement - you know, some undiscovered new talent. I had seen the trailer and was pretty excited. Yes, this is a film about a middle-aged serial killer cowboy who walks around spewing western clichés like it’s nobody’s business.

As is true with many indie films, this story had a lot of potential for me. I’m a die hard serial killer junkie and the weirder the better. You can tell that the writers and actors went into this wholeheartedly but were caught with their breeches down due to lack of experience. Paul Bailey is hilarious and fun to watch as the psychotic cowboy killer Roy Thompson. The funniest parts are watching him use western jargon in every other sentence and baffling us with his crazed cowboy logic approach to life. The directing is very good for first timer Jason Baustin and I can see potential in his career.

Thompson traverses a small town in his beat-up pick-up truck killing people randomly and stopping at bars and strip clubs for drinks. He engages in thoughtful conversation with most of his deceased victims, carrying on some psychotic fantasy where he is the hero. Nobody seems to understand or like him but that’s ok because he’s going to shoot you regardless. Soon a couple of cable guys start chasing him because he didn’t pay his cable bill. I thought he was just a stranger passing by but I guess he needs a place to call home, watch illegal cable and talk to himself. The cable guys are sometimes funny and sometimes you want to punch them in the face.

There’s a kind of interesting subplot where a jittery, low-life serial killer named Ernie is admiring Thompson’s work and wants to work alongside him. The friendship ends prematurely when Thompson realizes this guy is a spineless loser. But oddly He (Thompson) wants to be buddies with the town drunk and go on killings and strip club adventures with him. The drunk escapes and joins a couple of inept cops to get Thompson. They form some kind of loser’s lynch mob including the cable guys, a black youth and some strip club girls. Roy Thompson reaches the end of the road just after opening fire at a crowd in a dance club. The lynch mob find him and there is a final shootout but Roy is trapped and he goes down with guns blazing.

You can tell this movie was trying hard for a fun campy feel but some of the ingredients were unnatural and lacked substance. I have to give the filmmakers credit for including some excellent female nudity. The gore was average grade and could have been better. Paul Bailey and his madness in bringing this character to life was clearly the best part of the film. Everything revolved around this man. To sum things up this film was somewhat enjoyable and might be worth a look if your into serial killer flicks. Unfortunately the rest of the film doesn’t match up to Bailey’s performance and leaves us wanting more.

- Jorge Antonio Lopez