Fresh Meat

Though Fresh Meat is enticing with a number of trashy delights and its exaggerated, hyper-stylised form, it’s actually the equivalent of a sitcom rather than a proper trash flick. The majority of the film takes place in one setting and, despite the comic-bookishly overwrought elements, it stands entirely on the performances of the actors, who in this case do a fine job of balancing the genre stylisation of trash with sitcom affectation. Fresh Meat does not aspire to do anything more than give its viewers a bit of mind candy along the lines of ordinary television series, which it does flawlessly. The dramaturgy wrings the maximum out of the simple plot as it maintains the pace by regularly jumping between the individual motifs. It’s especially necessary to appreciate how the filmmakers manage to raise expectations and to create suspense, though not in terms of the horror or thriller genre, but at the level of voyeuristic pleasure of the lesbian romance, which actually becomes the film’s main attraction in the climax. (17.06.2013)

Unfortunately, the film tries to become something completely different in its second half, which is not at all like the first half. Suddenly, it is all too serious, which ultimately leads to a strange film schizophrenia. Not to mention that the screenplay is already so cluttered that it is impossible to properly watch it because it is just trying too hard. It's a shame because the initial idea (cannibals + home invasion) was not bad at all. (14.03.2014)