| Cabin Fever | |
|---|---|
Theatrical release poster |
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| Directed by | Eli Roth |
| Produced by | Eli Roth Evan Astrowsky Sam Froelich Lauren Moews |
| Written by | Eli Roth Randy Pearlstein |
| Story by | Eli Roth |
| Starring | Rider Strong Jordan Ladd James DeBello Cerina Vincent Joey Kern Arie Verveen Giuseppe Andrews |
| Music by | Angelo Badalamenti Nathan Barr |
| Cinematography | Scott Kevan |
| Editing by | Ryan Folsey |
| Studio | Black Sky Entertainment |
| Distributed by | Lions Gate Films |
| Release date(s) | September 12, 2002 |
| Running time | 92 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Budget | $1.5 million[1] |
| Box office | $30,553,394[1] |
Cabin Fever is a 2002 American horror comedy film about a group of college graduates who rent a cabin in the woods and begin to fall victim to a flesh-eating virus. The film was the directing debut of filmmaker Eli Roth, who co-wrote the film with Randy Pearlstein. The inspiration for the film's story came from a real life experience during a trip to Iceland when Roth developed a skin infection.[2][3] The film's title is a double entendre, referring both to the phenomenon, which is seen in the declining of the student's friendships, and also to the illness spreading through the cabin, although fever is not one of the disease's symptoms.
Roth wanted the style of his film to make a departure from many modern horror films that had been released in recent years.[3] One modern horror film, The Blair Witch Project, did inspire Roth to use the internet to help promote the film during its production and help gain interest towards its distribution.[2] The film itself, however, draws from many of Roth's favorite horror films, such as The Evil Dead, The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, and The Last House on the Left.[2][3] Roth was tired of what he called the "watered down PG-13" horror films of the studios, and refused to compromise on the violence or nudity, saying they were essential ingredients to an '80s-style horror film.
In February 2010, a newly restored director's cut was released on Blu-ray.[4]
Contents |
While walking in the woods, a man (Arie Verveen) comes upon a dog he believes to be sleeping. After poking it a few times, he pulls the dog up and notices that its flesh is rotted, spurting blood on him in the process.
Five college friends, Jeff (Joey Kern), Marcy (Cerina Vincent), Paul (Rider Strong), Karen (Jordan Ladd) and Bert (James DeBello), have rented a cabin in the woods. While driving to it they stop at a local convenience store for food. Outside the store, Dennis (Matthew Helms), a mentally handicapped young boy, bites Paul on the hand. At the cabin, Jeff and Marcy have sex and Paul and Karen go swimming in the nearby lake. Bert goes hunting for squirrels in the woods with a BB gun, but accidentally shoots the man who discovered the rotting dog, mistaking him for a squirrel. The man's face is badly rotted. Scared, Bert shoots at him again to repel him before running back to the cabin. Later, the friends hear a knocking at the door and discover it is the diseased man. Desperate for help, the hermit tries driving away in their car, but vomits blood inside it. After the man exits the car Paul sets the man on fire and he runs into the woods, dying in the lake.
A young deputy, Winston Olsen (Giuseppe Andrews), shows up at the cabin and tells Paul he will call a tow truck. Karen drinks a glass of water from the lake and begins feeling ill. That night she is quarantined in the tool shed once Paul discovers rotten spots on her thighs. Fearing that they will also become infected, the others argue about what they should do. The next day, Bert realizes that he is also infected with the virus, but does not tell the others. When Paul and Marcy insist on helping Karen, Jeff, wanting to avoid becoming infected, runs into the forest with the remaining beer, which is the only reliable drinking source. Bert drives off to find a doctor.
Paul finds Marcy alone in the cabin, lamenting that they will all get sick. Since they're "gonna be dead soon, anyway," Marcy seduces Paul and they begin having wild sex. Paul expresses his concern that they are not using a condom, but Marcy half-heartedly assures him that she is healthy and they continue. Paul is not convinced and after they finish, he secretly attempts to disinfect his penis by pouring Listerine over it. Marcy discovers suspicious red hand-shaped marks on her back where Paul had grabbed her in the heat of passion.
Bert drives to the convenience store that the group visited earlier, pleading for a doctor and showing increasing signs of infection. Dennis stares at Bert and begins yelling, “PANCAKES!!” He then grabs Bert’s hand and bites it, infecting himself. His father (Hal Courtney) comes outside, accuses Bert of infecting the boy, and tries to kill him. Bert speeds off and the father grabs two of his friends (Richard Boone and Tim Parati) who arm themselves with rifles before pursuing Bert.
Marcy admonishes Paul for being so rough when they had sex, though seeming to secretly suspect the sores on her back are really a sign she is infected. Paul leaves the cabin to search for Jeff. Soon after, the marks he made on Marcy's back devolve into scabby wounds, revealing she has long been sick. Paul comes upon the reservoir and finds the infected hermit's body floating in in. Marcy notices her legs deteriorating as she is shaving them. She runs out of the cabin in horror, only to be killed by a mad dog. When Paul hears Marcy's screams he returns to the cabin to find Marcy's body ripped to pieces and the infected dog eating Karen's face. Paul kills the dog with Bert's rifle, then kills Karen with a shovel to end her suffering.
Bert returns to the cabin, severely weakened by the disease, and meets up with Paul. They set a trap for the men from the store. Bert is killed after killing one of the hunters, then Paul takes out the other two.
Paul runs back to the hunters' car and drives into town, angrily massacring a group of campers who are partying with Winston. He collapses on a highway and is picked-up by a passing trucker and brought to the hospital. The sheriff and doctors interrogate him, trying to discover the source of the infection, but Paul is unable to answer all their questions. The doctors determine he should be transported to a larger, nearby regional hospital; his driver turns out to be Winston. Paul tries to warn him about the water in the reservoir but cannot speak coherently and only says, "water". Winston says he will take him to get water. The next morning, Jeff comes out of the woods and realizes his friends are dead. He is suddenly shot to death by the police; they add his body to the others, which are burned in a fire pit.
Unconscious and close to death, Paul is dumped into a stream where further down two kids are collecting water for their lemonade stand. They sell some lemonade to the sheriff, his deputies and more locals at the store. A natural spring water truck leaves the store with bottles of infected water.
Eli Roth co-wrote Cabin Fever with friend and former NYU roommate Randy Pearlstein in 1995 while Roth was working as a production assistant for Howard Stern's Private Parts.[5] Early attempts to sell the script were unsuccessful because studios felt that the horror genre had become unprofitable.[2] In 1996, the film Scream was released to great success, leading studios to once again become interested in horror properties. However, Roth still could not sell his script, as studios told him that it should be more like Scream.[2] Many potential financiers also found the film's content to be unsettling, including not only the gore, but the use of the word "nigger" early in the film.[2] The script was not produced until the fall of 2001, when Roth and Lauren Moews raised $50,000 to begin production with producers Evan Astrowsky and Sam Froelich. The rest of the money was raised during the shooting.
The auditions for the character of Marcy had been scheduled to take place on September 11, 2001.[2] The scene producers had chosen for the auditioning actresses was the build-up to Marcy's sex scene with Paul. In the scene, Marcy is convinced that all the students are doomed and despite Paul's reassurances, she describes their situation as "like being on a plane, when you know it's gonna crash. Everybody around you is screaming "We're Going Down! We're Going Down!" and all you want to do is grab the person next to you and fuck them, because you know you're going to be dead soon, anyway." After which, she looks over at Paul (the person next to her), followed by a cut to her throwing him down on the bed and having sex with him. Eli Roth and the producers tried to cancel the Marcy auditions, but the general chaos caused by the attacks made it impossible for them to reach many of the actresses who were scheduled to try out for the role. Consequently, the auditions went ahead and Cerina Vincent won the role. Roth has said that he chose her for her 'expressive eyes'.[2]
The film was shot on a small budget of $1.5 million. The original killer dog was so old and tired that all of its scenes had to be re-shot with a new dog. With no time or money to find a replacement, the producers cast a real police attack dog that was so vicious and unpredictable that no actors could appear with it on camera.[3]
Composer Angelo Badalamenti agreed to compose some musical themes for the film out of enthusiasm for the material. However, the bulk of the film's score was composed by Nathan Barr who has gone on to score both of Eli's Hostel films.[3] Actor Michael Rosenbaum was originally cast to play Justin aka Grim, but when Rosenbaum wasn't able to commit to the shoot due to another production, Smallville, that was taking off, the role was filled by the director himself.
Joey Kern sustained numerous unrelated injuries to his eye during filming, each one requiring a trip to hospital. His injuries disrupted the filming schedule and many scenes that were to be shot later were rescheduled at the last minute, so that minimal shooting time would be lost while Kern recovered. This resulted in numerous supposedly daytime scenes (mainly ones inside the cabin) being shot in the middle of the night.
Roth originally wanted Cerina Vincent to show her naked butt during her sex scene with Rider Strong. However, Vincent, who had previously played a nude foreign exchange student in Not Another Teen Movie was afraid that exposing too much of herself would lead to being typecast as a nudity actress and vehemently refused to bare her butt in the movie. At the peak of this stand-off between actress and director, Vincent told Roth that if he wanted the shot so badly, he would need to re-cast the role of Marcy with another actress. But they managed to reach a compromise - Cerina would bare one inch of her butt on camera, no more, no less. Eli Roth brought a ruler along to the filming[6] and measured Cerina's butt crack, to be sure he got his one inch. Bedsheets were then taped to Vincent's backside at the designated level and the scene was filmed. Only the second (behind-the-back) shot features this one inch, in the first (over-the-shoulder) shot, the bedsheets cover Cerina's butt completely.
At one point, during a break in filming, Strong went exploring alone in the forest. He had been filming one of his more gruesome scenes and his face was covered in bloody make-up. He stumbled upon a group of schoolgirls on a field trip. The girls were initially horrified by Strong's appearance (not realizing it was make up), but then someone recognized him as the actor from Boy Meets World, and Strong soon found himself trying to escape from a mob of starstruck girls. When he eventually found his way back to the film site, he vowed never to wander off between takes again.[7]
Priddy's General Store, built in the 1890s in Stokes County, North Carolina, was used for a scene. Rebecca Clark of the Piedmont Triad Film Commission showed the store to Roth, who said, "This is perfect." Years later, the movie's fans still visit the store.[8]
Grossing $33,553,394 at the box office worldwide,[1] the film was marked #3 and the highest grossing film released by Lions Gate Home Entertainment in 2003. Critical response to the film was mixed to positive, with a rave review from the New York Times and Film Comment magazine. Rotten Tomatoes, which compiles reviews from a wide range of critics, gives the film a score of 63%, with the consensus "More gory than scary, Cabin Fever is satisfied with paying homage to genre conventions rather than reinventing them."[9]
Peter Jackson loved the film, and gave a quote to use in the advertising. Quentin Tarantino cited Cabin Fever as the best new American film in his Premiere magazine interview for Kill Bill Vol. 2, and called Eli Roth "The Future of Horror." The film was also #28 on Bravo TV's "30 Even Scarier Movie Moments"[10]
Roger Ebert, however, scorned the film, stating "The movie adds up to a few good ideas and a lot of bad ones, wandering around in search of an organizing principle."[11] The film received a "Two Thumbs Down" rating on the television show Ebert & Roeper. Richard Roeper called it an "ugly gorefest" and said "Cabin Fever is a particularly disgusting and brainless version of this all-too-familiar horror film". Ebert said "Director Eli Roth is trying do about four things at once, to make a horror film, a comedy, a satire and a political parable about infectious diseases and none of them work", summing up the movie as "a mess". He ended the review with Roeper suggesting to viewers "don't bring snacks, if you insist on going to this movie, don't bring any food into the theater because you'll be losing it on your way out."[11]
Cabin Fever over time has grown to be a cult classic, and Roth was nominated for several Saturn Awards, and an Empire Award for Best Newcomer. It was voted Best Horror Film by readers of the website Bloody Disgusting in 2004.
Cabin Fever 2: Spring Fever is directed by Ti West (The Roost, The House of the Devil) from a screenplay by Joshua Malkin, story by Randy Pearlstein and Ti West. Rider Strong briefly reprised his role as Paul and Giuseppe Andrews reprised his role as Deputy Winston. Larry Fessenden and Alexi Wasser also star.[12][13]
Producer Lauren Moews has expressed interest in producing a Cabin Fever 3. She says if she finds the right director that she feels is worthy of filming it, then it will be green lit for production. No dates are known at this moment.[14] The third movie, which will be released in 2013, is titled Cabin Fever: Patient Zero, which is about the virus spreading on a cruise ship in the Caribbean Sea, and a fourth film, which will be released in 2014, is titled Cabin Fever: Outbreak. The fourth film will be about a family who travels to a Caribbean island and has to deal with the same virus.[15] No director has been been hired for either and both are being shot back-to-back by the companies Indomina and Hypotenuse Pictures.