And, we're back. Killer B's on DVD has been on hiatus for the last month so I could concentrate on contributing to all the Halloween shenanigans here on Cinematical. If you're like me and it's always Halloween at your house, then feel free to check out some of that cool scary content right here. Now though, it's time once again to get our collective B movie groove on. See Jane Run is a recent DVD release from Cinema Epoch, and like Mad Cowgirl, the last disk I reviewed from them, this new flick deals with madness and a passion for eating meat.

Joe Estevez's career hasn't been quite as stellar as that of his brother Martin Sheen or nephews Charlie Sheen and Emilio Estevez, but he's an actor who works regularly with such recent credits to his name as Zombie Farm, Sigma Die!, and San Franpsycho. His performance here is restricted to a pre-credits sequence in which he places a makeshift marker on what appears to be a grave and is then decapitated by a shovel. Nice work if you can get it. According to the audio commentary with producers Jennifer Clary and Kevin Haberer, this footage was shot six months after principal photography had wrapped. The sequence has little if any bearing on the rest of the film and exists solely to inject the movie with whatever star power Estevez can muster.

The film proper opens with Four young people taking a road trip through rural Texas. It all started as a romantic getaway for Randi (Samantha Bianchini) and James (John Rodriguez), but James invited his snarky little buddy Neil (producer Kevin Haberer) so Randi countered by asking her glassy-eyed vegetarian wallflower friend Jane (producer Jennifer Clary) to tag along as well. Things are pretty tense in the car, and you just know things will go from bad to worse when they offer to give a ride to a stranded motorist named Tyler (Jeremy Steel). A gas station attendant offers our heroes directions to the best Barbecue place around, which turns out to be a home in a suburban neighborhood. The weary travelers are invited in for food and lodging by Andrew (Sasha Andreev) who seems like a nice well-groomed young man in the style of Norman Bates. Tyler seems suspicious of their host's generosity, but the obvious sexual chemistry between him and Randi leaves him with other things on his mind. Soon, characters are wandering off by themselves to meet their respective gory demises, and we learn about Andrew's unorthodox dietary habits.

Compared to a lot of films I watch for Killer B's on DVD, See Jane Run has a distinctly professional feel to it despite the obvious low budget. Director Ryan Webb doesn't go the route of intentional camp, but takes his material seriously and tells his story with a fair amount of skill. The characters are well fleshed out, the actors are quite good despite being mostly unknowns, and the story unfolds at an engaging pace, which is why it's so disappointing that the movie never rises above its obvious influence. I felt for certain that the movie was going to morph from a modern suburban Texas Chainsaw Massacre homage/knock-off into something new and different, but that change never took place. Between Texas Chainsaw's sequels, a remake, and sequels to the remake, do we really need an imitation? I think not. See Jane Run (and for the record, we don't see her run at all) works as a fine example of how good an ultra low budget movie can look, but the story fails to do anything original.

Joe Estevez fans will rejoice over the collection of his outtakes. Other extras include a featurette on the film's special effects (practical and digital), cast and crew bios, and an interesting audio commentary from the producers.