Hell Hole is a movie I wanna like. It’s a low budget creature feature that is clearly trying… but also failing. It has some genuinely fun (and funny) moments but they are constantly backstabbed by too much dialog, too much down-time, and a seriously underwhelming finale.

It’s a Shudder Original about a bunch of oil workers in Serbia who dig up a tentacular parasitic creature that makes its home in our bodies.

The tentacular parasitic creature is a mix of a kind of corny practical puppet and a lot of CGI squiggly arms. It’s kind of fun when it bursts out of people and squiggles… but it doesn’t do that enough or quite as effectively as I’d like.

The actors are a mix of Americans and, presumably, Serbians for whom English isn’t their first language. The result being some dubious acting which, hey, not exactly their fault (presumably). But it results in a mix of corny, unintentionally funny, and overly serious dialog.

The filming locations get by on a lot of crumbling found locations… probably factory ruins and debris from neglect, time, and wars. Its certainly a low budget production taking advantage of the natural world and a lot of unfortunate history.

There’s some good gore and splatter with a decently fun creature. It’s too bad there’s not enough of it. The iffy script and acting doesn’t help nor does a weirdly out-of-place rock soundtrack. Those things can make for some cheesy fun and I was with it for brief moments. It’s possible someone less persnickety than me could really dig this corny, splattery B movie.

Score: 68