The third and final movie in the Bunnyman trilogy (which i couldn’t even import on DVD, and i’m not using a VPN because Amazon didn’t licensed it on Amazon Video for my country), according to the IMDB description, and so far this is still true. I think it’s safe to say we can all move on after this, and i will not have to review Bunnyman Takes Manhattan in 2021. Hopefully.
So yeah, the final one, the final Bunnyman movie, though the title confuses me.
On who he’s taking vengeance on? All his family members and “friend/masters” died… oh wait, they did. And they didn’t. Apparently Bunnyman returns home to his family to find them running a haunted house attraction, they welcome him back, but realizes they can’t tame the animal he is.
I’d usually complain about the synopses of the movie on IMBD being made by people that didn’t really pay attention or watched the movie, but in this case Carl Lindbergh himself wrote the storyline summary above.. so. XD Yeah, guess, he had another family of cannibal-murders, one day said he was going out for smokes and never came back to them until now.
Still doesn’t explain the vengeance part (he did start kinda having some second thoughts in the second movie, but it didn’t stop him from killing anything he encountered), but who cares, chainsaw answers anything. Almost anything, because the flashback in the beginning seems to retcon the continuity, so we can give Bunnyman an origin story, make him remember a different family of abusive murderers, and take revenge on them.
But i guess it’s a sequel, since he also …. “flashback-remembers” some of the events from the previous 2 movies. Some of them, the cannibal family of the first movie is completely sponged, so this feels more like a remake/redo, since this time they explain why he’s a skinless freak and why he went around in a bunny mascotte costume to begin with. Also, apparently he’s named Michael. Subtle. It could be a coincidence, but i’ve seen a Chop Top knock-off character in the first movie, i’m not ruling it out.
It’s better structured than the previous two movies, it utilizes more the fake 8mm old home movie footage for flashbacks from Bunnyman’s past, it actually gives his main character has an arc and some semblance of motivation, there is some logic and sense to the narrative, and some story to it instead of random scenes that don’t really go anywhere. It’s better staged, it’s definitely better paced, production values are still quite low, but it’s definitely more presentable overall, acting is still not good but it is a tad better. Heck, even the gore effects have improved a bit.
It’s still garbage, it is, there are still obvious audio issues, the main bulk is still about him and his “family” killing and abducting random campers.. and there is still not a small amount of padding, often thanks to the “fake home movie” footage being reused a lot, but it’s not as bad as before, where things could be resolved in 30 minutes instead of 80, and the whole “haunted house attraction” thing helps.
Even if a good bulk of the movie is Bunnyman and “family” killing and/or abducting campers or passerbys… for the hell of it. I assumed they were cannibals, since this is still a Texas Chainsaw Massacre knock-off at heart, but no, they just kill people and have this “haunted house spooktacular”… which they use to kill even more people. And these are some dumb killers, as one murders a blood soaked survivor that escaped the “kill carnival”… by shooting her in the face at point blank. In front of dozens of witnesses. And they still blame “Michael Bunnyman”, the cretins.
They could just do the haunted house tour without killing people and it would probably be more profitable. Then again, it’s never clear why they went to get Bunnyman back, or how they were able to precisely pinpoint his location to conventiently come to his rescue AND mow down a police officer just in time. Maybe they were just lucky he didn’t went to Haddonfield, because this movie is clearly shot in the same location or general area as the first two movies. It is that obvious, even if you live in a completely different part of the world like me.. you can tell the scenery feels familiar.
And of course, the bunny suit is the same, you can tell, and Lindberg makes it clear he’s fully aware that it looks like ass and just isn’t effective in any way, given a specific, but fairly obvious line. He knows.
The best part of the movie is the random dream scene at the end of act 2, a psychotronic mess of random shit, which includes a glowing crotch with legs, a teddy bear massacre, the moon looking like a Emile mask from Nier, motorcycles, space, a cardboard cut on strings and more, with music that makes the whole segment look like a Rob Zombie music video via Rammstein, since the track playing in the background is “The Machinist of Joy” by the band Die Krupps,
It’s the definition of grindhouse exploitation garbage, and it’s really entertaining, fun exploitation garbage, even if you’re not gonna see the movie, at least go to Youtube and watch this 5 minute scene. I wish it was longer, honestly.
Unlike the two previous movies, there is something to this, even if it’s not.. good (or even mediocre), but there’s something, and the low budget look kinda helps, instead being a hindrance that can’t be removed due to the obvious monetary limits, shame there’s not much that uses this to any potential. Regardless, you can tell that Carl Lindberg improved on pretty much everything seen in the first Bunnyman flicks, and i’m glad he did. I’m not being sarcastic, at all.
While there could be sequels, the ending clearly implies the characters has been put to rest, so i feel Bunnyman Vengeance will remain the final film in the series for a long time. Even if Carl Lindberg did put out a revised edition of the first Bunnyman 2 years later, he announced to be working on ohter two movies, one called Nowhere Girl, and the other, Blood Angel, the latter being about a time-travelling nazi on a quest to resurrect Adolf Hitler in the present day.
As said in the intro, i probably won’t have to review another Bunnyman movie anytime soon. Which i’m not that happy about, i’ve become kinda attached to this little trilogy of low budget slashers. Again, i mean it.
But if it ends here, it’s not the worst, it’s bad, yet it’s watchable for the terminally curious cinema buffs, and it’s easily the best film of the series.
Wise Cafe (International) 