Microwave Massacre

An inept joke of a movie, Microwave Massacre follows Jackie Vernon’s sad sack Donald as he turns to cannibalism after murdering his wife. It’s ultimately difficult to understate the degree to which Microwave Massacre leaves the viewer cold, as the movie, which runs a short yet endless 76 minutes, suffers from a pervasively amateurish atmosphere that’s reflected in its various attributes – with, especially, the various actors delivering performances that would hardly pass muster at a grade-school production. Vernon’s passable work as the put-upon protagonist is effectively rendered moot by Thomas Singer’s simplistic and eye-rollingly silly script, as the actors find themselves forced to spout ludicrously stupid bits of dialogue that are about as far from funny as one could possibly imagine (eg “I’m so hungry I could eat a whore!”) Filmmaker Wayne Berwick seems to be going for a sketch-comedy type vibe – ie there’s a continuing emphasis on stand-alone set pieces here – but the ineffectiveness of virtually every scene in the picture ensures that this approach simply doesn’t work (and, worse still, results in a complete lack of forward momentum). Microwave Massacre is, in the end, far from the fun and goofy cult item promised by its title and premise, as the movie’s extreme incompetence ensures that even the most open-minded of viewers will find nothing worth embracing here.

1/2* out of ****

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