Vacancy 2: The First Cut (DVD)

Vacancy 2: The First Cut

Experience the gruesome beginnings of Mr. Smith and his hotel of horrors in this terrifying prequel to Vacancy, starring Agnes Bruckner (Murder by Numbers). Suspecting only a night of hard beds and tacky dcor, Caleb, his sexy new fiance Jessica and his sarcastic best friend Tanner, check into the Meadow View Inn. They have no idea that it is not just another lonely motel, but a horrific trap where guests are brutally tortured and murdered while the sadistic maniac Mr. Smith and his greedy accomplices film the grisly slayings for profit. Caught in a deadly game or cat and mouse, the three young friends now must fight to survive.

Set years before the first film, the movie takes place in and around the Meadow View Inn, a small roadside motel in rural North Carolina. The manager, Gordon, oversees an operation of using cameras within the motel to videotape his guests' sexual activities and then sell them as low budget pornography for extra profits.

Unfortunately for him, a trucker who delivers the videos to people informs him that this sort of market is not selling very well and profits are down. Later, a serial killer (Scott G. Anderson) who checks into the motel, known as simply 'Mr. Smith' brutally murders a woman he brought with him in one of the motel rooms. The horrified staff see the whole crime on videotape and then subdue the man. They however do not know what to do with him as they will endanger their operation if they call the police. Smith manages to convince Gordon and his staff to hire him to torture and murder the motel guests on videotape and then sell them as snuff films.

The trucker confirms that this is indeed a functional market and Gordon agrees under the conditions that he is the leader of the operation. Smith mockingly agrees. A couple of days later, a young couple (played by Trevor Wright and Agnes Brucker) and their friend (Arjay Smith) check into the Meadow View Inn for a night's rest, unaware of the inn's sick-minded employees and their nefarious intentions. As the killers begin to terrorize the hotel guests, it quickly becomes apparent that Smith is a loose-cannon, with no intention of following Gordon's lead. He fashions a crude mask out of wire and proceeds to murder two of the hotel's three guests as well as an elderly couple at a house nearby.

Jessica manages to outsmart and kill two of the killers, including Gordon, and badly injures Smith by setting him on fire. While Jessica informs the police of the murders, it is revealed that Smith has survived. He and the trucker remove all the cameras and bodies from the motel. When the police arrive, they find nothing to confirm Jessica's brutal story and classify all who were murdered as missing.

In the epiloge, at another hotel (it is disputed as to whether or not this is the Pinewood Hotel seen in the first film), a badly scarred Smith informs the trucker that he will have the motel up and running in a few weeks just as soon as the cameras are set. Smith gives the trucker the very first snuff film that features one of the guests he murdered at the Meadow View Inn. He tells the trucker that he will burn more copies as soon as he can.