Format: DVD from East Moline Public Library through interlibrary loan on The New Portable.
Horror comedies are hard to do well. Most of them spend far too much time on the comedy and not nearly enough time on the horror. In fact, there are a lot of them that more or less forget that they half of their name is “horror” and end up providing horror moments that are neither very scary nor very funny. The Cottage attempts to do something different in this respect. It follows a path a lot more similar to a movie like The Frighteners in which the first half is essentially a comedy film, with the second half being a slasher.
The Cottage starts as a crime movie. Brothers David (Andy Serkis) and Peter (Reece Shearsmith) have kidnapped Tracey (Jennifer Ellison), the step-daughter of a crime boss. They have gone out to the middle of nowhere to make their ransom demand. We discover eventually that David is familiar with the criminal underworld while Peter is not. The ransom will be split by David and Andrew (Steve O’Donnell), Tracey’s stepbrother. Rather than money, Peter will get the undisputed claim to his and David’s late mother’s house.
