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Released by: Dustin Mills Productions
Released on: November 11th, 2014.
Director: Dustin Wade Mills
Cast: Bloodcountess Bathory, Erin Ryan, Jessica Cook, Josh Eal, Haley Madison
Year: 2014
Purchase From TLA Video
The Movie:
Dustin Wade Mills' Kill That Bitch begins with a scene wherein a woman lays on the floor, her face all banged up and obviously she's been attacked. She tries to make it to the door, presumably in hopes of escaping with her life, but the arrival of a knife wielding man in an eerie bird-like mask signals what we can safely assume to be her demise.
Cut to a nubile young lady in her birthday suit using her cell phone to make some plans with her friends for the upcoming weekend. She hangs up, puts on her clothes and then gets a text message saying 'I FOUND YOU.' She doesn't recognize the number and responds asking who the sender is. The response? 'CALL ME' and so she does, only to be surprised when the landline beside her starts ringing and that same masked killer from the opening scene arrives. He dopes her up and ties her to a chair and then essentially proceeds to torture her.
Another naked woman lays in bed. Her phone goes off and she looks at her text messages to see picture of what has just been done to the first woman. The same thing happens to yet another woman. Obviously these lovely young ladies are all connected, to either each other or to the masked killer, and some of these women will work together to try and sort all of this out before they too find themselves on the receiving end of his nastiness, but will they do so in time?
This might sound like fairly typical stuff and it does start off that way but if you're patient, the pay off at the end is pretty nifty. The plot unfolds slowly, deliberately even, and there are times where you're going to wonder exactly where Mills is trying to go with all of this and if this isn't really just an excuse to graphically brutalize pretty naked ladies on camera. There's no denying that this is certainly part of the film's aesthetic and for some, part of its appeal, but it would be unfair to leave it at that and summarize this as merely another slasher/gore picture that doles out blood and guts just because.
The performances here are good by low budget standards. Ohio indie horror regulars Erin Ryan and Haley Madison (both of whom recently popped up in Haunted House On Sorority Row) show up here and do fine work as usual. The Ohio indie horror community seems quite tightly knit as you see a lot of the same actors and actresses show up in these films time and again. This isn't an issue so long as they do good work, and in this picture for the most part, yeah, they do good work. The ladies are certainly brave an uninhibited while the few male cast members in the picture are fine, with Brandon Salkil creating a decent amount of menace as the killer.
As much time and effort as was obviously put into making the gore effects as slick and grisly as they are (and they are nasty), it looks like just as much, if not more time was put into getting the mood and atmosphere right. This is often a challenging aspect of filmmaking in the low budget realm but Mills' movie looks good. It's nicely light and plenty atmospheric and the camerawork is stylish enough to keep things slick but not so slick that this becomes an exercise in style over substance. There are also a lot of really strange details tucked away in here that, at first glance, might seem nonsensical but upon further reflection do mean more than you might have initially suspected.
Video/Audio/Extras:
Kill That Bitch arrives on DVD framed at 1.78.1 anamorphic widescreen. This micro-budgeted production actually looks quite good on DVD. The atmospheric lighting comes through well and black levels stay solid. A couple of minor compression artifacts pop up in the darker scenes but the picture is otherwise pretty pristine and detail is very good for a standard definition presentation.
The audio chores are handled by an English language Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo mix, there are no alternate language options or subtitles provided. Levels are well balanced and there are no issues with any hiss or distortion. Dialogue is easy enough to understand, no issues here, the audio is fine.
Aside from a static menu, the only extra on the disc is a commentary from writer/director Mills. Personally speaking, commentary tracks on low budget films tend to be more appealing and interesting than big budget tracks as those involved in 'smaller' films often times seem to be more invested in creating them. This commentary backs that trend as Mills talks about what went into writing the film, the effects work and some of the struggles involved in bringing that in with a small budget, working with the cast and crew featured in the film and quite a bit more. It's a thorough, interesting and fairly engaging track.
The Final Word:
Kill That Bitch doesn't play it safe in terms of its more extreme content but there's more going on than just surface level tits and gore and while the ending won't work for everyone, if you pay attention to the little things, it winds up as a pretty satisfying pay off. Nicely shot and well-acted, this is one that fans of indie/underground horror films should definitely check out and the inclusion of a solid commentary track on the disc makes for a nice bonus.
