Directed By: Gregory Dark
Starring: Glenn Jacobs, Christina Vidal, Michael J. Pagan
Tag line: "This Summer, someone is raising Cain"
Trivia: This film's star, Glenn Jacobs, is a professional wrestler who goes by the name of Cain.
See No Evil was financed by the WWE, and the sport's high-octane influence is almost immediately apparent. Before the movie even crosses the 4-minute mark, a young cop lies dead, and another is seriously injured, his arm severed at the elbow. The assailant, a giant of a man, was himself shot by the injured cop, and a young woman (Zoe Ventoura), already at the scene when the police arrived, is missing both her eyes. So, as you can see, See No Evil is not a subtle film.
Flash ahead to four years later. Frank Williams (Steven Vidler), the cop who lost his arm, is now working at a Youth Correction facility. In the hopes of giving some of the kids a second chance, Frank heads up a weekend outing, during which a group of incarcerated youths will clean up a burned-out hotel that's being transformed into a homeless shelter. In return for three days work, the young men and woman will have one month reduced from their sentences, but what they don't know is they'll be a lot more to deal with in this hotel than just rats and roaches. Hidden away on the top floor is a homicidal maniac, the very same one that Frank shot through the head four years ago. Armed with a meat hook, the killer sets to work almost immediately, leaving a trail of carnage everywhere he goes.
There are aspects of See No Evil that simply don't work, and chief among them is the story. As if it's not enough of a stretch to accept that a group of delinquent kids, all of whom have criminal records, would be released from jail to spend a weekend cleaning a hotel, we learn that this particular hotel is filled with hidden passageways and two-way mirrors, providing the kids with more hiding places and escape routes than they know what to do with. Throw in the added subplot of a long-forgotten safe, which supposedly holds a small fortune, that's hidden somewhere on the premises, and you have a film that gets off to a less-than-credible start.
Yet despite all the improbabilities were asked to swallow early on, See No Evil does pick up some steam once the killer, played by pro wrestler Glenn Jacobs (aka Kane), gets down to business. A veritable monster, Jacobs is very intimidating in the role, and his character's expertise with a meat hook leads to some very bloody encounters. This, along with the unusual habit of pulling out his victim's eyeballs with his untrimmed fingernails, make him one of the most interesting psychopaths to come along in recent years.
In the final analysis, See No Evil has more weaknesses than it does strengths (aside from the story, there's a twist towards the end involving one of the characters that I honestly saw coming from a mile away), and even though the film boasts a fascinating killer, I can't recommend it for everyone. Gore hounds may find enough to their liking in See No Evil, but all others will want to steer clear.