I I'll admit it… I liked Scream. I like horror movies with a dash of humor and smart characters. With that idea in mind, I headed into Club Dread thinking I would get a taste of the funny stuff mixed with a bit of grue. What I got was a listless comedy with some silly kills thrown in to break up the tedium.

At the remote resort "Pete's Paradise" run by an aging rocker, Coconut Pete (Bill Paxton), the employees cavort and sex up the various guests. Unfortunately, a serial killer is in their midst. He's knocking off the employees (one murder takes place inside a live, interactive Pac-Man game!) and using the drug induced lyrics of one of Pete's songs to guide him.

The comedy troupe known as Broken Lizard unwisely chose this lackluster and muddled genre effort as their sophomor(ic) feature. I'm guessing that this group has never seen a horror movie, or at least not a good one, and figured that slicing the bellies of several uninteresting characters would bring in the horror crowd. I'm not against horror comedies, which have been suffering a backlash from other die-hard genre nuts, but I am against stupid movies. At least Scary Movie proudly announced it's idiocy to the world and made no apologies for it. Club Dread attempts to play off the jokes with a more subtle tone, but it's so subtle as to not be detected at all.

Brittany Daniel is just screaming to be cast in a decent movie.

That's not to say it doesn't have its high points. Bill Paxton is great as Pete, the Jimmy Buffet wanna-be who gets angry when someone mistakes his pop song "Pina Coladaberg" as "Margarittaville." And Brittany Daniel manages to avoid the bimbo stereotype with a refreshingly sweet portrayal of Jenny. Otherwise, the cast don't embarrass themselves but it's not really a resume catcher either.

At least this 20th Century Fox DVD doesn't skimp on the extras. Besides releasing the extended movie version not shown in theaters, there's commentary, deleted scenes and the usual fun stuff. Too bad such care went into a movie that frankly isn't worth it.

If you're hard up for a mind-bending genre spoof, I'd suggest picking up the excellent out-of-print classic Pandemonium. I'd even go so far as to recommend seeing The Mutilator because it's better to be so-bad-it's-good than so-bad-it-just-sucks.

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