SKINNED ALIVE is a very much a bargain basement film that has stylistic similarities to The Texas Chain Saw Massacre in the story of a group of travelling weirdos who go around selecting victims and skinning them. The whole thing is so ridiculous that it plays out as a spoof of the horror genre, but it's never funny or horrifying, so it does feel like a pointless exercise.The film has a concession to Z-grade movie fans in the casting of Scott Spiegel and J.R. Bookwalter, both B-movie directors (of INTRUDER and THE DEAD NEXT DOOR respectively). Most of it is an unfunny character comedy in the Troma style, with actors goofing off in supposedly funny scenes. It's quite horrible, and not in the right way.

I've read a lot of other comments and I have to say that this movie does not suck and it's certainly not stupid. You just have to have an open mind and a taste for this kind of stuff. It's not a horror movie in that it will scare you but there is some gore (albeit not very authentic gore, but they were on a miniscule budget) and some seriously twisted characters in it. Admittedly, all the stuff with the former cop neighbor is very lame (I skip it usually). But, the joy of this flick is to watch Scott Spiegel and Mary Jackson together. They are an absolute riot! Spiegel really makes the film worthwhile. He pretty much did it as a favor to the director and producer and boy did he deliver! He's an innately funny man and the lines that he and Mary Jackson exchange are incredibly funny. The physical comedy is superb as well. I ordered this sucker on DVD without seeing it first and was not disappointed at all. Those of you who are familiar with the 'Fake Shemps' (Spiegel, Sam Raimi, Bruce Campbell, Rob Tapert, Ted Raimi, etc) will enjoy this flick. Trust me.

To try to pass this off as a horror movie is a joke. I rented this piece of sh*t on DVD, falling prey to the cover, expecting to settle down and watch a horror, but what I actually got was a dose of pure and absolute garbage. The acting was dreadful, the plot, well, on a budget of $10, what do you expect. I wouldn't recommend this to anyone, horror film fanatic or not. Pass on this one.

I can't believe that people actually like this film. I suppose i was lured in by the DVD cover thinking this could be an enjoyable gory-horror-comedy type of film. Boy, was I wrong. This movie was so horrible, I barely made it to the end. The acting was terrible and the gore was lame. The sound quality and dubbing was absurd. This is the kind of movie I watch every now and then and think... why the hell am I not making movies? I can't even recommend this for a good laugh. For something in the same genre, but actually good, try Dead-Alive or Bad Taste. Hell, I would even recommend an HG Lewis film over this.