Eyes of the Chameleon (2005)

Studio: CAV/Troma

DVD Release: April 13, 2005

Not Rated

Review by James Klein

On the front of the DVD cover of Eyes of the Chameleon, there is an exclamation saying: "Absolutely nothing will prepare you for what you are about to see". They weren't kidding. Eyes of the Chameleon is a laughable bore, a film probably made by friends who thought it would be cool to make a movie and somehow they were able to get it distributed. However, there is hardly anything redeeming with watching Eyes of the Chameleon unless you want to torture yourself or someone else into watching it.

The "plot" of the film is about a serial killer in Vegas who seems to be stalking a group of friends who work at a casino. Actress Annie Teal seems to be the main character as she wonders through out the film being stalked by a killer as people around her die. While this happens, Annie finds time to drink Jim Beam, smoke pot, snort coke, have sex with her boyfriend's brother, go to a sex party, have her clit pierced, and still get to spend time with her elderly parents for dinner. If this was played more like a comedy, maybe the film would have been more fun to watch. But alas, this is a "horror" film and it takes itself way too seriously to be enjoyable.

Director Ron Atkins needs to go to film school and if he did go to film school, he needs to retake some courses. His shots are puzzling and bizarre as characters have the camera smashed in their face so many times, you can see their make up drip under the blazing lights. He leaves too much headroom on certain shots and a lot of the film isn't even in sync! We get various cutaways of drinks being put down on tables and people's feet while they walk. There is also some un-intentionally hilarious lines of dialogue like, "We wanted to fuck so we fucked. Big deal." When a character says to her parents that she doesn't want to serve drinks all her life, her father replies, "But you are so good at it!" The acting is terrible at best, sometimes so bad that you are almost forced to hit the fast forward button. The special effects are even worse. One woman is slammed into a wall and the killer takes his knife and circles it around her face before the scene dissolves into the next day. One deli worker is stabbed in the chest and you can see the outline of his blood pack where the knife sticks into. It's obvious that no effort at all was put in the make up department. But that's fitting because no effort was put into this film at all.

Eyes of the Chameleon is bottom of the barrel garbage. The best thing I can say about it is that there are some nice boobs flopping around at times and the running time is 83 minutes. What was shot in Vegas should have stayed in Vegas.