Customer Reviews

Cabin by the Lake / Return to Cabin by the Lake

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

Cabin by the Lake:
Very original take on a guy with writer's block.
Stanley makes a living writing the common slasher flicks but his latest project has been a rather slow process, and in order to fix this he kills teen girls to get an inside look at what it's really like for them to be murdered, then he meets a fighter.
Mallory, afraid of water, is captured by Stanley, he takes her to his cabin and locks her in the hidden room to sort of get to know her and how she feels (there's a wall and a marker for writing on it).
So, it comes time to drown her now but thanks to Boone, the local policeman, and the people who are signed on to make the fake bodies for Stanley's new film, she survives and grows closer to Boone.
Without giving too much away, Mallory faces Stanley again...

The acting is really good and the directing was cool. Overall this was a really entertaining movie.

Return to Cabin by the Lake:
Definately not as good as the first, but entertaining nonetheless.
I think it could have been much better had the acting of the supporting cast been any better.
I love him on Charmed but Brian Krause is just, ugh, in this movie.
Aside from that...
Stanley, back for the sequel to his previous movie wants to be on set so he takes the place of an unknown producer and slowly takes over as director, changing the movie to his liking and killing the cast and crew as well.
He meets Alison, a girl who thinks she knows the real Stanley and understands the man behind the killer - she later learns she's been working alongside the real Stanley all along and becomes another target...

I'd definately recommend buying this for the original, but since they come together (and at such a low price for the two) you're getting 2-for-1, although the second is a bit... Well either way the first is truly worth it and the second is cool because it's more and if you're anything like me and sequels, then you're getting a good bargain. Just think of it as getting a good movie with an extra... lol

T his is the best to date made for tv movie with judd nelson i have seen. it is really good for a televized film. nelson stars as Stanley, a twisted writer who pens his novels that he actually commits, and stores his victims bodies in his " underwater garden" in the middle of a lake. very suspenseful, wish a third was in the works. an excellent performance by nelson.

This pair of movies makes for a nice evening's entertainment. They both center around Judd Nelson who plays a scriptwriter who goes overboard when writing a dead teenager script.

Nelson is excellent as a low-key psycho who kidnaps women and drowns them, keeping their bodies underwater as a garden. At first he seems very clinical, analyzing victims' reactions to better his screenplay. But slowly we see true madness creep in.

In the second movie, Nelson infiltrates a movie set where his screenplay is finally going to be realized. His own vision and that of the rewriter come together but his own madness can not be kept in check.

Of the two movies, the original is still the best. Nelsons acting combined with the visuals makes for a very original horror film. The second movie, while good, suffers from production values. Film formats change ever few seconds flashing between theater-looking footage and stuff that looks like it was filmed on COPS. This was jarring at first and I feel it really detracted from the feel and atmosphere of the film; two aspects that contributed so much to the success of the first film.

I havent seen the second one so i will reveiw the first:

I enjoyed Cabin by the LAke. It was refreshing to see a serial killer movie that didn't suck like those scream movies and clones. It is about a writer who is writing about a serial ckiller who drowwns young woman and keeps them at the bottom of a lake in his "garden." Then he "researches" it by actually *doing* it. It's kind of creapy and suspenfull at parts.

A great movie to rent with some friends. But i would reccomend renting it before you purchase it (unless you are made of money that is:)

I'm the only guy here that will say that i liked the sequel better than the original film... ive always loved movies within a movie, so i enjoyed watching the sequel for those reasons, and its great to see how the film makers in the film are tyring to make their own versions of the events from the first film.

i guess i can relate to it all because i am a film maker and writer myself, so i can easily understand the meanings behind the motives and the characters and how its all written.. most people will give it a bad review because they don't truly understand it... but reliving the events of the first film in the sequel was a pretty good idea.

i loved the acting, and i loved how it was directed (switching formats from cinema to noisy digital quality) i know alot of people don't really 'get that' but i loved it... it just added a bit of creativeness to it....

my favorite scene is when he ran the coke head over on the speedboat LOL...

This double DVD set is well worth the cost. The first "Cabin by the Lake" film was wonderful. I had absolutely no compalints. As far as TV movies go, this is definitely a winner. It was great fun to watch and an interesting idea.

The sequel was not as good as the first--it was actually rather bland and silly in comparison. It is still nice to see the movie here with the original as a companion piece of sorts. You can't go wrong with a two for one deal.

(this review is of COTL 1 only; i found it so bad that i couldn't even bring myself to watch its sequel.) where to begin? this truly lamentable TV-movie is a debacle all round. first off, it can't make up its mind what it wants to be: there are some truly chilling scenes (e.g. the "underwater garden") -- yet so many of the other cues in the film are screaming "comedy" (spectacularly unfunny forced humor about the film industry, stale caricatures without any idiosyncracies to distinguish them -- from fake bitchy agents (almost a straight lift from "Frasier"'s Bebe) to vapid blondes and effeminate film directors). the characters are paper-thin and you end up having no interest in whether anyone dies or the villain gets caught. its biggest failing, though, is really that it doesn't know what it wants to be. as a comedy it is an abject failure; and equally so as a horror movie, because the bad acting (with judd nelson's low-energy, utterly uncompelling villain as the main offender), atrocious music (penned by the gifted daniel licht, who has written some stunning gothic orchestral music in his time -- e.g. "soul survivors"), and comedic elements drain the film of any suspense. i was drawn to see this film because i was somewhat intrigued by the director's Jude Law film, "Immortality"; rest assured that this travesty has nothing in common with that film. avoid this one at all costs.

I've always been a huge fan of Cabin by the Lake. I have no idea why it's so expensive, why it's so hard to find and why netflix doesn't carry it. So, I bought it here so I could have it. I can watch movies over and over but NOT Return to Cabin by the Lake. Awful movie!! If you like the first one try and find a dvd with the first one and not the double feature, save yourself the money if you can.

Judd Nelson does a good job in both of these movies playing a demented killer named Stanley. The original movie is fairly sinister as we first meet the troubled writer as he is on a killing spree. The sequel is rather funny and more ridiculous, as Stanley puts on cheesy disguises to gain entry to the filming of the movie of his earlier killing rampage(from the first movie).

I have both of these movies in my collection and find both of them entertaining. If you can get them at a decent price, I think they are movies you would want to watch a few times. The scenarios that occur in each of the movies are rather fun to watch as they play out.

This is the first time I ever left any feedback so I hope I am doing it correct. This seller is "Wonderful and Great" to work with. I would order from this Store again - Thank you so much for making my Son's Christmas.

Sincerely,

Susie, PA