What I'm Watching: Dude Bro Party Massacre III
Hey look, I'm back already! And I am back with a very, very INTERESTING movie, as I'm sure you can tell from that title alone.
I heard about Dudebro a number of years ago, before it came out. I meant to give to the Kickstarter, but time ran out before I got back around to it. I also lost track and forgot all about the movie. Then the other night, I was checking out what was going to be airing this week on Showtime Beyond, and the name rang a few bells!
I remembered how fun the movie looked, thought it would be a blast to share with friends, and so I did that Saturday night...and again Sunday afternoon. This should tell you a lot about how I feel about this movie already.
Straight up front, this movie is a comedy. But it's also a horror movie. Even though it sticks closer to the comedic side of things, it has plenty of gore and death and scares. It's not quite Shaun of the Dead style, as that's a funny horror movie, and is instead a horrific funny movie. Does that make sense? Eh, moving on.
The plot revolves around a frat house that has been struck twice already with two massacres - the events of which are depicted in the nonexistent other two movies. But they do recap them nicely at the start of the movie for anyone, i.e. everyone, who didn't see them.
And now, it's starting all over again, as the dudebros commit their latest senior prank (another event from a previous movie, that plays hugely into this one) and head off to their vacation frat house on the shores of the lake they created.
This is a classic setup for a horror movie, and they run with all the tropes, use them amazingly, and run into places I'd never expect. There's other plots going on, lifted from college frat movies, and it all comes into this amazing mashup of genres.
On top of all THAT, this is also an 80s throwback movie, AND a movie perpetrating to be a lost movie only existing on a home recorded VHS. And I have seen very few movies that have nailed the 80s look and style, AND the look of a VHS tape that has been recorded over, and the stop/start of pausing during commercial breaks, like this movie. The only other one is WNUF Halloween Special.
"SIZZLER!!"
This movie is hilarious and absurd, packed with jokes, and while it does fall into the trap of letting some jokes go on too long, and a few bits of awkward, wincy humour, for the most part it's all great.
And despite being absurd and over the top, the plot underneath it all actually makes sense, and is astonishingly well done. The attention to detail is mind blowing, and stuff that is laid down at the start of the movie genuinely comes back up at the end, including stuff that you would never expect to come back. I applaud how much they did and paid off with the movie.
It even holds up to repeat viewings, as you can pick up things that you missed the first time through. There was one thing I saw the second time through, that doesn't make sense UNTIL you've seen beyond that point, and I nearly died laughing.
Dude Bro Party Massacre is an absurdly brilliant commentary that is surreal, makes the best use of being a 'video tape' recorded over I've ever seen, in doing things I've always wanted to see a "vhs movie" do. The acting is great and has a ton of familiar faces, I love so many of the characters (even ones I hate) and this universe they built in one movie, is so complete and lived in, that it feels like those first two movies are real, because without them, this movie wouldn't exist or make sense.
If you love 80s movies, horror movies, frat movies, comedy movies...all of those and more, you need to check this out. This was the most fun I've had watching a movie in awhile, and it was such a delight coming across it yesterday. You owe it to yourself to follow my lead and watch this fun, fun, movie.
