This film is a throwback, almost an homage, to those early straight-to-video horror films of the 80's that used to run for months and months on Showtime and Starz and other cable movie outlets. The big selling point here, for most people too young to remember those films, is that Fred Durst of Limp Biscuit plays a secondary role as a small town sheriff's deputy.
All in all, "Population/436" is kind of odd yet typical, a strange combination. There's definitely an interesting plot here, which owes a debt of gratitude to Shirley Jackson's "The Lottery" and "The Steppford Wives" as well as all those old 80's horror flicks. The plot is pretty typical: New guy comes to a new town and discovers that the eccentric locals who live there are really up to some sinister shenanigans, usually based in some local mythology that has been in place since the days of witches in Salem.
The film begins with Census Bureau worker Steve Kady coming to the charmingly named Rockwell Falls, Illinois, one summer day to investigate a mysterious anomaly which finds the town having the same population, 436 people, over the past few decades. I think you can guess what happens next.
The cast creates the perfect amount of niceness and creepiness including Durst who actually displays some acting chops in his work. Kady is played by Jeremy Sisto ("Six Feet Under") and even though I have seen him in a few other films, he seems brand new here. He seemed perfect for this role, as if Tom Wopat and the late Tom Villard somehow had a bastard test tube baby who grew up to want to do horror films like his daddies did. The love interest, played by Charlotte Sullivan, however, looks too much like Jennifer Connelly's little sister and it gets distracting.
With special effects that waver from awful to bad, there is little to recommend for die hard horror fans. It's all taken seriously, but the seriousness only seems to help up the camp factor into the stratosphere. There is one cool aerial shot of the town which shows it to be isolated and rural (which doesn't seem to be an CGI effects shot) that is really cool and helps us believe the plot could actually take place in such an quarantined setting.
"Population/436" is one of those guilty pleasures that makes you feel ashamed for liking it a little. And even if the end just makes the film seem even seem more silly and over-the-top than it was before, in the long run, the fun factor far outweighs the shame.
Note:
Directed by Michelle MacLaren who is probably most noted as a producer on "X- Files" and of the "Moment of Truth" TV movies (which seem like they are probably Lifetime network fodder).
Filmed in Canada.
This film has been picked up by Sony who have not announced a release date to the best of my knowledge. The print I saw had the Destination Films logo at the front.
Almost every source I can find lists the title without the slash between Population and 436 but that is how it appears in the actual movie print that I saw and thus that is how I am presenting it here.
Back to POPULATION/436
