Movies
[DVD Review] ‘4/20 Massacre’ – Puff, Puff, Stab
I’ll be honest, when I heard there was a movie called 4/20 Massacre I did not have the highest expectations. (Highest, LOL). The movie is dubbed as the first stoner-slasher and that sets up, at least in my mind, the expectation of a stoner comedy mixed with a classic slasher and that’s a tough combo to pull off successfully. Stoner comedies and slashers are similar in that they either work really well or they’re extremely aggravating. Put two and two together and it because twice has hard to nail down. So suffice to say, I expected that 4/20 Massacre would quickly run dry and repeat the same joke from start to finish. I’m happy to report that I was wrong.
Five ladies head out to the woods for a camping trip over 4/20 weekend to celebrate a friend’s birthday. As they make the walk to their campground they run into a park ranger. This is a standard horror trope where we meet an authority figure that should be good but you can’t quite tell what his angle is. You can’t be sure that this park ranger is a bad guy, but he doesn’t seem all that good. He eventually takes a beer from the ladies so maybe he’s just a drunk? At any rate, he tells the girls to have a good time but warns to stay away from the mountains because an illegal weed plantation is set up there and those that run the plantation ain’t too kind to strangers. Whatevs.
Eventually, the group of ladies come across a costumed killer dead set on protected the weed and a battle for their lives breaks out. This road to survival contains a number of weed jokes, some better than others.
The absolute highlight of 4/20 Massacre and what makes most of the movie work is the portrayal of our five leading ladies. Each one is written incredibly well and given real character depth. A big problem with a lot of slashers, especially the indie low-budget variety, is that the characters are all cookie-cutter tropes, just there to serve as fodder for our killer. That’s the case here. Each girl has a different unique personality and their own issues that they’re trying to work through. One of the girls likes one of the others and isn’t sure how to approach her about it. There are some really sweet moments where she’s trying to determine the best way to go about this and seeking advice from one of the other friends. Some of the best scenes within the film are when the girls are together and just talking, setting up their campsite. It’s this likability that makes their impending doom matter. Unlike a lot of movies, you don’t want to see these characters die.
The kills do leave a bit to be desired. They’re not wholly originally and with a new slasher it’s always fun to get new kills. The effects are acceptable and a cut above what you see in a lot of low-budget slasher fare these days. They appear, at least to my untrained eye, to be a mix of practical and digital. I’ll take that.
The pacing could also use a little work. I would’ve liked the movie to be a little quicker and more fluid. It opens with a couple of guys searching for this weed plantation and when they find it they’re thrilled. Little do they know there’s a lunatic killer waiting for them. This is a solid little opening that pulls you in, but then it bogs down just a bit before the action picks back up.
All and all, 4/20 Massacre is a fun, little slasher filled with plenty of weed jokes and a good soundtrack (seriously, I’d buy this thing on vinyl). If you yourself are a pothead or have friends that are potheads, you’ll probably find this really enjoyable. If you’re Jeff Sessions and hate potheads, you’ll probably want to pass without puffing. And if you just like a good slasher, this one will do. Here’s to more films from writer/director Dylan Reynolds in the future.
4/20 Massacre is currently available on DVD and will be playing at the California Institute of Abnormal Arts in North Hollywood now through April 27th.
Judging from the unprecedented box office success of Kane Parsons’ Backrooms adaptation, you’ve likely already seen the liminal horror hit that managed to make audiences afraid of empty hallways and bad wallpaper. And now that so many of us have already entered the yellow labyrinth (some of us more than once), the time has come to discuss the spoiler-filled details that make the movie so fascinating in the first place.
And if there’s one element here that makes the Backrooms movie stand out from any previous lore/mythology, it has to be the genius addition of the Still Life entities. Warped recreations of real people that somehow wandered into the Complex, these misremembered creatures are responsible for some of the most disturbing imagery of 2026 – as well as laugh-out-loud memes created by one of the film’s very own concept artists.
However, true to Parsons’ word that the movie would rely heavily on practical effects, each of these distorted monsters was brought to life by real actors under heavy layers of makeup and prosthetics (with the occasional splash of CGI enhancements). While Anora and If I Had Legs I’d Kick You actress Ivy Wolk wasn’t among these performers, despite what Letterboxd might have you believe, the creature cast did benefit from veteran players with plenty of genre experience.
For starters, Alien: Romulus alumni Robert Bobroczkyi (who previously brought that film’s horrific Offspring to life during its most memorable sequence) plays the flick’s main antagonist, the Still Life version of Captain Clark. And though there was some obvious CGI involved in making the character’s peg-leg and nightmarish face more believable, Bobroczkyi’s monstrous performance and his natural 7’7″ frame helped to make that final chase sequence a clear highlight among this year’s genre offerings.
The film’s Texas-Chain-Saw-inspired “dinner” scene also features a freaky collection of less-aggressive Still Life creatures in the form of the Bearded Man, the Red-Headed Woman and, strangest of them all, the cheekily named “Archibald Leland Sutter Still Life” (who earned this title among fans and crewmembers as a reference to his apparent affinity for lamps).
While this was the first major horror outing for both Patrick Baynham (The Bearded Man) and Dana Mahmood (Archibald), Rhiannon Roberts has worked as a stunt performer in everything from Yellowjackets to HBO’s The Last of Us adaptation – which is probably why The Red-Headed Woman is the most active out of Clark’s impromptu “family.” That being said, the Archibald Leland Sutter Still Life is my personal favorite of the bunch simply because his anachronistic outfit suggests that the Backrooms phenomenon might be a lot older than the Async Foundation. I also love how hard he tries to be helpful with that little light of his!
That might be it for the Still Life entities, but I think horror fans will also be pleased to hear that the film’s Found Footage prologue stars none other than Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City star Avan Jogia as Naren Warne – and American Mary herself Katharine Isabelle also shows up in a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it cameo at Mary’s house party towards the middle of the story (though I have a feeling that she originally had a bigger part that was likely cut for time).
At the end of the day, Parsons’ Backrooms may have been an auteur-driven project motivated by the young director’s unique take on the classic creepypasta, but film has always been a collective artform, so it’s fun to see just how many talented performers it takes to bring this kind of supernatural nightmare to life in a way that connects with so many people.
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