Boardinghouse (1982) Death Park: The Beginning (2021), Death Park: The End (2021)

Boardinghouse (1982)

Shot on video---VHS according to Indiewire, but that may not be true. They had U-Matic video back then which had a better picture. Camcorders didn't have flying eraser heads then, so they didn't have clean cuts between shots. So you had to edit which meant loss of image quality.

Because it was shot in somebody's house reportedly on VHS, I assumed it was terribly cheap, and it was. The estimated budget was $10,000 according to imdb.com, but that was over $30,000 today. They spent far more than that to make a tape-to-film transfer to release it to theaters.

Movies that cheap today are made today without paying anyone, so I was surprised by the amount of nudity. It doesn't seem like actors should do that for free.  

Horror movie, somewhat bloody, had a gore scene with pig's intestines.

Death Park: The Beginning (2021), Death Park: The End (2021).

Made for $180, according to IMDb. Another site said $680. I would quip that I wondered where all the money went, but that wouldn't be true. They had a large cast, a couple of topless scenes, quite a bit of presumably fake blood and a number of simple practical effects. I had the feeling it was made for Community Access TV, but there was nothing to indicate that.

Not much to it. People go into a park and a man in a Donald Trump mask murders them with a knife. 

They always cut to another shot before the stabbing. It goes from the guy beginning to plunge the knife in the victim's direction, then it cuts to a shot of the knife stuck in them. It's nice that the unpaid cast was never in any danger. Although I hear you can get workman's comp on unpaid volunteers, so an on-the-job injury could have been their only hope of being paid. There was a scene where a woman flees the killer but trips over a rope the killer stretched across the trail and this was also accomplished through editing. I'm at a stage of life where I would consider lying down on the ground a stunt.

So, it was all right. It seems like they could have taken greater advantage of the truly low budget. They were free to do whatever they wanted plot-wise. They had almost nothing to lose. 

All three movies are free on Tubi.