Good movie but grossly overrated

There are moments in this movie where the great movie it could've been peek out... They're fleeting, here, but they're worth savoring, and they happen often enough to make it worth your while.

The film's masterful storytelling did its job. The message was clear. No need to overdo.

It’s sentimental, ridiculously long and only occasionally funny

Hot-tempered macho jerk Charlie (the extremely annoying John Batis) and his more amiable easygoing buddy Steve (likable Dean Russsell) go hiking in a remote forest. Their wives Sharon (pretty brunette Tomi Barrett) and Teddi (lovely blonde Ann Wilkinson) also go camping in the same exact woodland area. They not only run afoul of crazed cannibal hermit John (well played by burly B-flick perennial Gary Kent), but also encounter the ghosts of his slain adulterous wife (a memorably bitchy Jeanette Kelly) and his children Jennifer (cute Becki Burke) and John, Jr. (future "Silver Spoons" TV sitcom regular Corky Pigeon). Competently directed by Don Jones (who has a small role as a friendly forest ranger), with solid acting from a capable cast, a deliciously cheesy flesh-crawling synthesizer score by Richard Hieronymus and Alan Oldfield, nice dollops of ghastly gore, rough, grainy, but pretty polished cinematography by Stuart Asbjorsen, a steady pace, a good deal of tension (the opening murder set piece is especially strong and suspenseful), several corny soft-rock songs occasionally blaring away on the soundtrack, engaging well-drawn characters, an eerie tone (the offbeat and inspired supernatural element greatly adds to the overall creepiness), and stark and unflinching outbursts of raw violence, this film does the trick as a really enjoyable backwoods horror item. Familiar character actor Stafford ("Cleopatra Jones," "The Alpha Incident") Morgan briefly appears as one of John's victims. Fans of slice'n'dice body count movies should probably dig this one a lot.

~Spoiler~I watched two forest-themed slasher movies this weekend: Don't Go in the Woods and this one, The Forest. They were both equally bad, but one of them was fun. This one was just plain stupid. The Forest is your usual dreck with campers getting offed one by one by a demented backwoods killer. Unfortunately our demented backwoods killer (played by Gary Kent) is one of the least threatening characters ever! The guy just wants to eat. Can you blame him? The killer in The Forest would be a victim in a movie like Madman or The Burning. That's how menacing he is. On top of that, there is a supernatural angle with the ghosts of his children keeping him company and helping out the campers. Weird. There are plenty of great forest slashers out there; No need to see this one.

It's a ghost story. It's a cannibalism story. It's a revenge story. It's a very poorly done film with a lot of violence. I suppose it follows cheaply along the lines of every slasher movie you've ever seen. It has the usual isolated place, the cocky campers, heading off to the wilderness. Granted, there are some pretty intense scenes. It's just so dull. Bad editing and the whole works. There are ghost children who sound like they are talking into a wastebasket. I'm not really sure what rules the ghosts and the psycho with the seed cap are playing by. It also has the gross out scene where a man eats a piece of meat which is actually what's left of his wife. A friend of mine once asked me why it is necessary to show this kind of gratuitous, sick violence. I fear that it's just another step in our desensitized evolution. Three is no cleverness here, no tongue in cheek, only a sad waste of time. Lots of blood; little plot.

A friend and I went through a phase some (alot of) years ago of selecting the crappest horror films in the video shop for an evening's entertainment. For some reason, I ended up buying this one (probably v. v. cheap).The cheap synth soundtrack is a classic of its time and genre. There's also a few very amusing scenes. Among them is a scene where a man's being attacked and defends himself with a number of unlikely objects, it made me laugh at the time (doesn't seem quite so funny in retrospect but there you go).Apart from that it's total crap, mind you. But probably worth a watch if you like films like "Chopping Mall". Yes, I've seen that too.