As slasher movies go, Curse of the Forty Niner is pretty damn good. It feels like an 80s film, kinda similar to the tail end of the Friday the 13th series. Instead of resorting to splatter to scare, Forty Niner uses a lot of suspense to bring in the scares.

This works to its advantage. Many low budget films are hamstrung by bad effects or scares that would only shock newbies and wimps. I've lost count of the amount of horror movies, high and low budget alike, that I've sat through without even flinching. Forty Niner made me jump out of my skin at least twice during its short 80 minutes.

Scene veteran John Carl Buechler has always known his stuff, and his 80s heritage (Buechler was involved as a director/special effects head with the Friday the 13th and Nightmare on Elm Street series') shows right through this taut movie. His trademark splatter effects take a back seat to jarring suspense and uncomfortable moments, making the movie a pared down exercise in shocks and creepiness, unlike his earlier effort Deep Freeze, which kind of lacked anything aside from a few gross effects. It's basically a return to form for Buechler.

It isn't perfect by a long shot though. Certain effects shots are unfortunately badly goofed, like a woman who gets set on fire where you can see the protective fire-retardant face gear in plain view of the camera. This jars you temporarily out of the film's atmosphere, which is pretty unwelcome.

Also the acting is very hit and miss. It has to be said, it's of a far better calibre than many other movies of it's ilk, but some of the characters are so one dimensional that if they turned sideways they'd disappear. This rubs up against the other characters who do a good job of their lines.

Personally though, this was a lot of fun for me, and probably anyone else who misses the horror of the 80s. Fans of stuff like Jeepers Creepers and the new Texas Chainsaw will probably find a lot to enjoy too. On a final note though, the movie is not for the faint of heart, as a few sequences are pretty horrific, particularly a segment involving a woman getting pickaxed in the chest, which was pretty harsh (and not in a 'rubbish splatter effect' way) and some other fairly meaty bits of violence.

So, if you like horror and miss movies like Friday the 13th and Halloween, you owe it to yourself to check this out. However if you don't know those movies, check them out first then try this.

Well, this 2002 movie titled "Curse of the Forty-Niner" (aka "Miner's Massacre") is a movie that I hadn't even heard about before now in 2021, 19 years after it was made, as I happened to stumble upon it by sheer random luck. And yeah, of course I sat down to watch it, as it is a horror movie that I hadn't already seen. Sure, I wasn't harboring much of any expectations for the movie, so writer Antonio Olivas and director John Carl Buechler had every chance to impress and entertain me.

And while "Curse of the Forty-Niner" was a watchable movie, it was hardly an outstanding foray into the horror genre. Writer Antonio Olivas seemed to build his storyline and plot around things that have been done countless of times before this movie, so he was sort of playing it safe I suppose. A gamble perhaps, but one that ultimately dragged the movie into mediocrity.

I had no idea that it was actually Vernon Wells that was playing the part of Jeremiah Stone, the undead miner. But then again, of course he was covered completely by prosthetic make-up.

The acting in the movie was adequate, but it was actually nice enough that they had managed to get the likes of Richard Lynch and Karen Black to show up in the movie.

For a horror movie then "Curse of the Forty-Niner" just didn't cut it. There was nothing scary about this movie whatsoever. I kid you not. This movie wasn't even remotely scary. Sure, if you are a complete newcomer to the horror genre, then perhaps you'll find an ounce of scary stuff here. But for a life-long horror veteran, this was a mere walk in the park.

The special effects in "Curse of the Forty-Niner" were adequate and served their purposes well enough. However, do keep in mind though, that the special effects will not knock you over from your seat. This was not a grand spectacle of special effects.

All in all, "Curse of the Forty-Niner" was watchable, but it was not an outstanding or memorable movie to grace the horror genre. It is the type of movie that you will watch once, and then forget about it and never return to watch it a second time.

My rating of "Curse of the Forty-Niner" lands on a less than mediocre four out of ten stars.

Director and FX man John Carl Buechler doesn't have to do much in order to terrify me; the sight of his name in the credits alone is enough to strike fear into my heart.

His lamentable straight-to-video output in the 80s sat on the bottom shelf of the horror section at my local rental shop; twenty years later, and his DVDs occupy the same space. It seems that the more things change, the more they stay the same. You can rely on old JCB to serve up dreck, whatever the format and regardless of advances in movie-making technology.

In this contemptible offering, a bunch of friends travel to a remote town where they discover the secret treasure hoard of Jeremiah Stone, AKA the forty-niner—an evil, claim-jumping, cannibalistic miner who caused havoc in the mid-1800s. Before his death, Jeremiah cursed anyone who should find his gold, and it's not long before the pick-axe wielding killer is back, bumping off the hapless treasure seekers.

With its dreadful script, unimpressive make-up effects and Scooby-Doo style villain, 'The Curse of the Forty-Niner' is par for the course for Buechler. Only genre stalwarts Keren Black, Richard Lynch and John Phillip Law lend this movie any credibility whatsoever, with the rest of the cast giving performances ranging from bad to awful (although I'll forgive Alexandra Ford, who is a complete hottie).

Even fans of bad schlock horror will be disappointed since most of the women keep their clothes on, and a lot of the deaths occur off-screen (which is probably not such a bad thing since the on-screen deaths are pathetic).

'The Curse of the Forty-Niner' is another in a long list of duds for John Carl.