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Review

Forget higher math and reading test scores, hopefully the educational benefit that today’s students might get from the “No Child Left Behind” act will include:

1. Increased road trip skills such as “How and When to avoid taking detours down dusty side roads in the middle of nowhere.”
2. Increased awareness of the narrative pitfalls of making “kids on a road trip” based horror films.

Of course, people will never stop making these films because the impact on all the attractive, marginally talented actors and actresses who took part in the “No Actor Left Behind” program would be devastating. While everything is sorted out and the dust begins to settle, the wildly derivative The Butcher is reminiscent of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and might actually amuse some less discriminating audiences. Like a paint-by-numbers piece of art, the film has all of the trappings of the genre firmly in place, moves quickly and manages to be sufficiently diverting.

 -- David Greenberg