I HEART WILLIE (2025)

Recently in select theaters, coming soon to On Demand from Rubey Entertainment and Hewes Films!
Directed by Alejandro G. Alegre.
Written by David Vaughn.
Check out the trailer here!!

A quartet of paranormal investigators head to Mexico to seek out a local legend, the ghost of the menace known as Mouse Boy (played by writer David Vaughn). Mouse Boy was rumored to be the result of experiments done by Nazi scientists who then became a vicious serial killer. Donning a mouse mask full of stitches, it was Walt Disney who used the story of Mouse Boy to come up with his first cartoon Steamboat Willie. Now modern day, the investigators are going to find that this mass murderer is very much still alive and still killing.

Now, I’m not going to say that I HEART WILLIE is the best written or directed film of the recent deluge of Steamboat Willie turned horror flicks, but I do think it is one of the best. The film is capably directed by Mexican filmmaker Alejandro G. Alegre and the production is nice and dank, as the bulk of the movie occurs in Willie’s torture lair. The acting is better than most low fi horror films, so at least you don’t have to watch pretty people read straight from cue cards. One of them looks like a buffer version of Crispin Glover, so there’s that. You get one typical nude scene and a kill about every five minutes, so the pacing is pretty ok too.

But instead of trying to reinvent the wheel, I HEART WILLIE delivers a simple story, the most work seemingly put into the extremely specific backstory of the killer being the result of Mengele’s experiments. The film is simple nevertheless, basically putting four youngsters into the middle of nowhere Mexico and then having a masked monster hunt them down and kill them. There is a little story-meat involving one of the investigators having an experience with Willie when she was a kid, but the focus of this film seems to be having Willie torture his victims to death slowly. Those who dislike the torture porn subgenre of horror will want to steer clear of I HEART WILLIE, but the film does offer up a few gnarly scenes where Willie paralyzes and skins his victims. Unlike the uninspired gore in MOUSE OF HORRORS and the more cat and mouse heavy THE MOUSE TRAP, I HEART WILLIE takes the horror grimly and seriously providing tons of spatter and gruesome scenes.

Willie himself looks the scariest here as well. The Mickey Mouse mask is stitched together like a Disney inspired version of Leatherface and Willie’s pupils are obscured with white lenses, giving him an unnatural, Deaddite feel. Writer/actor David Vaughn is also quite big and buff, giving him an imposing image as he walks around most of the film shirtless.

I always get the sense as I watch these serial killer films, that the filmmakers attempt to make the next big horror icon. Now, I’m not saying Willie from I HEART WILLIE is going to be the next Art the Clown, but he is designed well and looks the best of the bunch. Even compared to pics of the upcoming STEAMBOAT WILLIE, starring TERRIFIER’s David Howard Thornton, I HEART WILLIE’s Willie looks the scariest and is the most memorable. Again, this is a very run of the mill written movie, but if you’re looking for shocks, gore, and that feeling that you’re watching something just plain wrong, I HEART WILLIE is the one that is going to deliver the most genuine of horrors.