Jenn Wexler’s The Ranger may not be the best indie horror flick in recent years, but when you put it next to movies like Ryuhei Kitamura’s dismal Downrange, or even the previously-reviewed Sequence Break by Graham Skipper, it’s downright dynamite. It’s a simple setup for a satisfying slasher with an antagonist that’s kind of… not? The Ranger isn’t quite Smokey the Bear vs. Punk Rockers, but it gets as close as it can muster.
The short pitch is as follows: A group of punks are on the run after a police raid goes way south, but thankfully one of them had an uncle with a place way out in the woods. As promising a solution as that sounds for their getaway, they didn’t take the local forest ranger into account, and he takes his job seriously. Mix his rigid sense of righteousness and strict adherence to state park rules with a curious connection to leading lady Chelsea (Chloe Levine), and you have the recipe for some violent deaths that these roustabouts may or may not have totally had coming.
At a tight 80 minutes, I have no problem recommending The Ranger to anyone looking for something modest and crunchy to digest this month.
Halloween 2019 Movies:
1. Sequence Break
2. Deadtime Stories
3. Hell House LLC
4. Body Bags
5. Pumpkinhead
6. Friday the 13th Part III
7. Child’s Play 2019
8. Ghoulies II
9. Satanic Panic
10. The Texas Chainsaw Massacre
11. Demons
12. You’re Next
13. Frankenstein
subhumanzoids 