Deadwood Park DVD Review

The prosperous Midwestern town of Eidolon Crossing was torn apart by a series of child murders over a period of 35 years. After corpses of the town’s abducted children were discovered at the once popular amusement park, Dogwood Park, it was abandoned, dubbed ”Deadwood Park“ and the town fell into ruin.

Now a successful business man in the city, Jake Richardson (William Clifton) returns to Eidolon Crossing, the town of his childhood, to escape his own demons. His brother was the last of the town's children to be abducted nearly 30 years ago. The local sheriff (Bryan Lane), warns Jake in no uncertain terms about meddling in the town's bleak past, but the Sheriff's daughter, Olivia (Lindsey Luscri), has other ideas. She has been doing her own research and offers to help Jake solve the macabre mystery of his brother's disappearance. The ghosts of murdered children lead Jake to Deadwood Park and the chance to finally discover the truth.

Not shy about courting controversy, Wickel Pixel Cinema are synonymous with hard hitting cinematic brutality, SCRAPBOOK in particular pushed the boundaries with it's graphic depiction of human cruelty. DEADWOOD PARK is Eric Stanze's return to the director's chair after several years busying himself with other people's films. His other earlier works; ICE FROM THE SUN, I SPIT ON YOUR CORPSE, I PISS ON YOUR GRAVE and CHINA WHITE SERPENTINE (co-directed with Robin Garrels), are all fine examples of what can be achieved with talent, imagination, and very little money. This latest offering is something of a departure from Stanze's oeuvre and will surprise those, who like myself, were expecting roller coasters full of entrails. DEADWOOD PARK is a slowly simmering cerebral story, beautifully written and directed. The cinematography is quite stunning. It's without a doubt one of the very best looking independent films that I've ever seen. I often lower the benchmark when talking about indie movies and judge them on their own merits, rather than make comparisons with mainstream, big budget films. Eric Stanze has managed to straddle the chasm between the two with DEADWOOD PARK; the photography, editing, screenplay and choice of sound track are far superior to what I would expect from a film of this budget.

The acting is, on the whole, very good. William Clifton impressed me as the troubled protagonist and the very lovely Lindsey Luscri is convincing as an innocent yet bright small town girl. Jason Allen Wolfe, Jason Christ, and Julie Farrar pop up in small roles and don't disappoint. Even if she’s only on-screen for a few seconds, I was very happy to see Emily Haack in a nurse's uniform.

The locations really take this film to another level; the wonderfully atmospheric, deserted amusement park, the run down family home, and the attention to detail, impressively evoking the different timescapes in the flashback sequences, all add up to make this one of the best films I’ve seen in quite a while.

Whilst I hope Eric Stanze re-visits the extreme, uncompromising film-making we’ve come to expect from him, DEADWOOD PARK bodes very well for the future of Wicked Pixel and I can’t recommend it highly enough to anyone looking for a finely paced film with real substance.

Deadwood Park. 2007.

Directed by Eric Stanze.

Eric Stanze talks in depth about Deadwood Park HERE