Synopsis
An ordinary pizza delivery leads to a night of chaos when a murderous psychopath targets a young couple who might be harbouring a dark secret of their own. Atala Arce and Jake Taylor star as the young couple whose attack by a murdering psychopath is only the beginning of a very dangerous night.
Chop Chop was directed and produced by Rony Patel, from a script he co-wrote with Andrew Ericksen.
Review
When I first saw the trailer and promo shots for Chop Chop I was hyped up for another great psycho slasher, but this wasn’t that film, the film kind of unravelled in a different more of a psycho-thriller type of vibe with twists and turns which had me disappointed on one hand due to the lack of slashing but then on the other hand the psycho-thriller fan in me had me gripped to find out how the story unfolded.
In the opening scene we meet the pizza delivery driver (David Harper) seen in the trailer. Seen carrying a bag full of heads, straight away I thought “here we go” with another epic slasher, but pretty soon we find out that he gets killed and the whole dynamic of the film changes. Your head kind of does a 180 degree flip and your train of thought takes a different track.
Next we see a young couple (Ayala Arce and Jake Taylor) set to become the next victims of the “pizza man.” Now without chucking a spoiler in the works here, the two get the upper hand and kill their attacker. It is here where I found out that Chop Chop wasn’t going to be the slashing gore fest I was hoping for. Instead Patel and Ericksen take us on a completely different journey.
That murder starts a violent journey through the underworld with killings-a-plenty along with a good mix of gore thrown in. The couple escapes after bundling the psycho’s body parts into his car. Not too long in the journey, as they are parked up thinking what to do next, a policeman who has been tracking the psycho killer turns up after recognising the car.
Everything seems to be going swell until the policeman asks to look inside the boot, the only way out is for them to shoot the policeman and now (you think) they are serial murderers. At this point I kind of had my head in my hands but not through boredom, it was more of a “wait, hang on a minute” situation where you sit on the edge of your seat to look deeper into the screen.
Later on in the film we find the young couple at a house where they have been sent to pick up something in return for help disposing of the bodies. The house is filled with strange looking occupants one of which looks to be the original pizza psycho but we find out it’s actually his twin named Butch who is just as much of a psycho as his brother (what an upbringing!!!). It’s another brilliant brain twister to get your head around.
Towards the end, the film takes a darker more exciting turn when the couple goes to see someone to help them get rid of the bodies. This is where all the twists throughout the film come together, there are a lot of “oh that make sense now” moments. The gore and violence is cranked up a level here and not for the faint of heart as you get to see some pretty interesting methods.
The ending of Chop Chop comes into its own and ties up the loose ends of the story (without giving it away here), I did however get that feeling that they missed an opportunity with the bad guys and could’ve developed them more.
Verdict
Chop Chop is a good film but it just wasn’t the hacker slasher I was hoping for, it was certainly good in other ways and had plenty of twists and turns, some were confusing but it was still and enjoyable film to watch.
6/10
Directed by Rony Patel, co-written by Rony Patel and Andrew Ericksen. Starring Atala Arce and Jake Taylor.
Chop Chop is available to rent or own now from Amazon, iTunes, Comcast,Spectrum, Vudu and more
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