Holy crap if I ever find myself anywhere near Wisconsin I’m going to have to visit the town where this movie was filmed! Hayward Wisconsin has a giant fish, a fiberglass Muskie, that you can go inside of. It was amazing and, it was featured in a few parts of this film. This movie, as one might expect judging by the title, is centered around fishing and fishing culture. In a town where there is a giant fish, you know you’re going to have a fishing culture there. This entire movie was filmed on location in Hayward and that culture runs deep in it.
Being a fan of B movies means that you’re going to have seen a lot of weird stuff in your film-watching history. I have to say that an epic battle with two fishing rods is something I never expected to see. Yes, this film included that. There was also a unique scene where the killer was putting his victims on a fish stringer. Of course, he then had to clean them as you would a fish. This whole movie centered around fishing. Another odd thing I liked was this strange metal lift that was used to go down the mountainside to the dock. I suppose that some of the cabins or houses were on steep cliffs perhaps? There was a railing that resembled a roller coaster track going to the water with what looked like a mining car to ride in. This would take you down to the pier to go out to the water. I’ve never seen anything like that before in real life and I thought it was super interesting. I wonder what they are doing in this town currently for access and if some of these lifts are still around? That’s something I’ll look for when I visit Hayward, WI.
This was a super strange little slasher movie. Of course, it had the standard 1980s Friday the 13th formula to it. You had the unknown killer, shots just showing the killer’s hands, and the strange backstory explaining things. Another big similarity to F13 in the story was that it all happened to some friends going to stay in a cabin by the water. I don’t know that I will watch this one again but, I did enjoy it for sure. I am certainly glad that it is on my “have watched” list.