A Night To Dismember (1983)

JULY 3, 2008

GENRE: INDEPENDENT, SLASHER, WEIRD
SOURCE: DVD (ONLINE RENTAL)

It wasn’t long into A Night To Dismember that I realized I was in for something truly special... maybe 2 minutes tops in fact. As I watched a rapid fire collection of scenes with little cohesion speed by, endlessly narrated (by a guy that sounds like Charles B. Pierce) to hide the fact that there was no source audio, I decided that the film was simply divine. And it just got better as it went on, peaking at the halfway mark when the narrator describes a dream sequence thusly: “Vicky felt as though someone faceless was making love to her in bright flashing colors that were changing from one second to the next.” Of course, this is precisely what we are seeing, which leads me to believe that they stuck some guy in a booth and had him narrate whatever he felt like saying as this incoherent and mute film played before his hopefully astonished eyes.

And if you wonder how the narrator (a character in the film) could possibly know what she was dreaming, fear not – he even explains that. At the very end of the film, as a sort of cinematic P.S., he informs us that every single character in the film kept detailed diaries, which he presumably stole.

At first, I actually thought the film was some sort of joke by film students, where they just took assorted footage that they found and assembled a loose narrative from it, similar to what Joe Dante did with The Movie Orgy. But apparently, what really happened was, a fire at the film lab destroyed nearly half the footage, and director Doris Wishman couldn’t afford to reshoot all of it, so she made do with what was left. Apparently, incoherency and ineptitude was her style (I’ve never seen any of her other films – most of which seem to be pornos), so whether the fire story is true or not, I don’t know. It’s probably the only bit of actual trivia to be heard on the entire commentary track, most of which is simply Wishman yelling at her cameraman for ruining the movie and asking him if he likes whatever nonsense happens to be on screen. I can’t tell if she’s seriously under the impression that she’s made a good film, but she’s at least 80 at this point (she was born in 1918 and they reference South Park and Everybody Loves Raymond on the track – dating it late 90s, early 00s) so maybe she’s just senile.

I also love that a film without a single moment of source sound actually has a credited sound man (plus a boom operator!):

Was this before or after Civil War allegedly took his life?

As for the movie itself, you got me. It’s another one of those “evil family members plot to make another family member crazy” movies, in theory. Many scenes don’t quite fit into this plot, but whatever. After a while I stopped trying to understand what was going on and just focused on the movie’s real charms – hilariously dubbed dialogue (which is very rare anyway – most of it is narrated), cutaways to things unrelated to what is going on, frequent murder/nude scenes featuring the absolute worst fake violence ever (one scene involves a guy being lightly tapped with an axe – and then his head just falls off).

The music also deserves a mention. It seems to be all library music, and in several cases, I can only assume they didn’t even get the whole track. At one point, we hear the same 30 second loop 3-4 times over a single scene; it cuts off abruptly and starts over. And it’s not appropriate to the scene either. In fact, none of the music seems to fit with the onscreen action – we have goofy cartoon style music over dialogue scenes, “Sweeping shot of a vista” style stuff over the kill scenes, etc. Again, all part of the unparalleled charm of A Night to Dismember.

Like Cathy’s Curse and Scream Bloody Murder, this is one of those wretched movies that I love anyway, and rejuvenates my drive to do this whole Horror Movie A Day thing. There’s no way in hell I ever would have seen this were I not forcing myself to watch one every day. Bless my random whim!

I want to point that about half of the trailer isn't in the film, and seems to be advertising a movie with a different plot entirely to boot. Again, part of the charm.

What say you?

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Independent, Slasher, Weird,

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Slaughter Party (2005)

JULY 1, 2008

GENRE: COMEDIC, MAD SCIENTIST, SLASHER
SOURCE: DVD (ONLINE RENTAL)

When you have a movie in which a midget (Mighty Mike Murga) is raped by a mountain man in the first 15 minutes, the last thing you should say about the film is that it’s dull. But that’s exactly how I would describe Slaughter Party, a Troma film that seems oddly held back on several occasions and manages to make even nonsense like Terror Firmer look like solid storytelling in comparison.

At no point in the film was there any evidence that I was watching a completed film. Characters come and go without any real rhyme or reason, subplots arise out of nowhere, leaving other plots abandoned as a result, etc. After the life-affirming rape scene, we cut to a nubile blonde going to meet an internet date – who turns out to be the midget we just saw get attacked. How long the two scenes are supposed to be apart is never made clear, but we just have to assume that the raping resulted in Murga turning psychotic and killing girls at random. Hilariously, shortly after this scene we are given a “Three Weeks Later” title to bridge two scenes that clearly take place quite some time apart anyway. Later in the film, we see the killer stalking a group of girls by the lake in the middle of nowhere, and then cut to him inside a suburban apartment, where he attempts to kill a girl who escapes and leads him to... the same damn lake he was inexplicably seen at 5 minutes before. Whatever.

But I usually don’t care about such things when I see a Troma film, because there’s usually a plethora of gore, nudity, bodily fluids, piñatas, etc. But that’s not the case here. The usual Troma lesbian action is limited to a single brief smooch between two of the random girls introduced halfway through the film. The gore is clearly just some fruit punch, and pretty minimal at that. And the star of the film, Sleepaway Camp’s Felissa Rose, doesn’t seem to be aware she’s in a piece of crap, and actually tries to act and bring sympathy to her character. Not what we’re here for, ma’am, but thanks for trying!

She’s not the only one who keeps putting effort into the wrong areas of the movie. The director (who directed it I can’t tell, Lloyd says it’s a guy named Chris Watson, the IMDb says Fred Rosenberg, and the film itself says Buck Jones Jr. Take your pick, I guess) keeps tossing in insert shots of things like cigarettes hitting the ground or whatever – but can’t be bothered to actually show the goddamn killer in this scene:

That’s the most we ever see him during the attack.This film is shot on consumer digital video (hell, might even be analog), so there’s no excuse for shit like that. You’re able to instantly watch what you got and if something goes wrong, like, I dunno, you failed to get the goddamn subject of the scene in the goddamn frame, you should re-tape (not film, it’s tape!) the scene/shot and do it right. It’s one of the things that DV defenders will use to claim their format is superior to film – but this guy couldn’t be bothered.

Strangely, the most amusing thing about the movie is the commentary track. It’s done by actor Ford Austin, in character as the mad doctor (sort of like the track on Blood Simple, only with Troma flair). It’s filled with the sort of anti-PC irreverent humor the movie itself failed to deliver, and he also mocks the film’s meager production value (he points out a particularly overlong shot of 2 guys walking and wonders if it’s there to pad the film to feature length) and numerous plot holes. Hell, just watch the movie with the commentary on to begin with; it’s the only way to enjoy it IMO. There’s also a bizarre interview with one of the film’s other co-stars, some porn jackass who spends the entire time he’s on camera making cookies or muffins or something. There’s also an interview with Rose (pointless) and some other crap that just hawks Troma in general, which I skipped as I assume it’s the same stuff I’ve watched on other DVDs.

It’s actually pretty rare I watch Troma films (I believe this is the first for HMAD), so when I DO watch one, it’s because I am in the mood for their peculiar brand of comedy/horror/crap. Nice job on my part to rent one that even their die-hard aficionados were disappointed with. Oh well.

What say you?

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Comedic, Independent, Mad Scientist, Slasher,

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School Killer (2001)

JUNE 26, 2008

GENRE: GHOST, SLASHER
SOURCE: DVD (ONLINE RENTAL)

With such a generic and lazy title, I wasn’t expecting much out of School Killer. I certainly didn’t expect it to be so damn convoluted and dialogue heavy. I also go to the school of “the actor listed first has the most screen time”, so I was a bit bummed to see that top-billed Paul Naschy only appears in the film for about 10 minutes total.

Before I talk about the movie itself, I want to make a few notes on the DVD itself. In addition to not providing a scene selection menu (what is this? Corpses?), the main menu is in Spanish, even though the title is English. I can sort of figure out what "Promosionales" and "Comienzo" mean, but again, this is a movie called School Killer – my brain has already been turned off. In addition, there is no subtitle menu, so if you are using a rather half-assed universal remote that doesn’t have a subtitle button, you are shit out of luck. Come on guys, little effort here.

I bring up the subs because the biggest problem with this movie is that no one ever shuts the fuck up for more than 5 seconds. Some of the dialogue is just your standard modern slasher shit, i.e. referencing other horror movies (strangely, they namecheck Scream 3, not, you know, one of the other two which actually have scenes set in schools), and assorted banter. That’s fine. But I’d say at least 2/3 of the dialogue in this movie is just explaining, overexplaining, and even RE-explaining every goddamn plot point. It’s not enough for someone to see a light and wonder how when the electricity should have been turned off (its an abandoned school). No, in School Killer, we get countless exchanges like this:

Guy: A light!
Girl: How can that be? The power has been turned off.
Guy: No, the permits haven’t gone through yet, it might still be on.
Other guy: But look, the line is cut.
Guy: That’s not the main line. The light we saw may be separate.
Other girl: No, look, the main line has been stolen! (huh?)
Guy: Maybe it was a gas or battery powered light.
Girl: No, the light was definitely from an electrical source.

I am not making this up, that is almost word for word an exchange in this movie. And we get one for just about everything that occurs in the film; a cell phone not working, how the tire got flat, why someone hasn’t come back from the bathroom yet, etc. It’s almost sort of comical how determined the screenwriters are to keep the audience from saying “Oh come on!” about any particular horror movie cliché occurring in the film – they will offer at least a half dozen explanations to choose from.

Another issue is a nearly half hour long flashback in which we see what happened to another group of kids about 30 years before, including one of our main group’s father. Apart from the ridiculous length, it’s just a giant waste of screentime, because we already know they all die except for the father. And at first it seems like we are about to watch an entire movie’s worth of their story, as we see them enter the school, joke around, etc, just like the stuff we just saw 20 minutes before with our original group. The only difference is that they don’t reference any horror movies.

Plus, it’s not really a good trade off to lose nearly a half an hour’s worth of suspense in order to provide 2-3 minutes’ worth of exposition. Also, a few of the scenes involve things that occurred where no one present has survived – how does our hero know what happened? That said, director Carlos Gil did a damn fine job casting and dressing the flashback group – they look like a traditional early 80s slasher group, and even the film stock itself seems older – you can almost imagine that this is footage from a genuine movie from the era.

And finally, the music. It is fucking terrible. It sounds like its on a loop and reminds one of the library stuff one would use in a film school project. Awful. Occasionally we get some Spanish punk music that doesn’t fit either, but at least it’s not as generic.

Otherwise it’s OK enough as a slasher. The look of the film is nice, and the cast is good (none of them are really annoying either, another plus). Naschy is a great villain in his few scenes (though he also suffers from an abundance of dialogue – before killing one girl in the flashback sequence, he asks how she was able to sneak out at night, and we are told her dad is on a business trip and her mom gave her permission to go out with her friends – all of this for a girl we already know is dead). And it’s nice to see one where they sort of know they are in danger almost all the way through, as opposed to the circular nature of some of the Friday the 13th movies, in which two kids go off, die, two more go off, die, etc, until our heroine realizes that all dozen of her friends have vanished.

So in short – the technical aspects are fine, the acting is good, but it’s all for nothing due to the overwritten script (except for the ending, which is as abrupt as any film I’ve ever seen). Here’s hoping the Gil and his crew get a better script and composer (and DVD release) next time.

What say you?

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Ghost, Slasher,

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Botched (2007)

MAY 24, 2008

GENRE: COMEDIC, SLASHER
SOURCE: DVD (STORE RENTAL)

There's a reason why so few horror-comedies work - a lot of people just simply can't write funny stuff. Actually scaring an audience is something so rare for a horror film, it's hardly an issue anymore. So when a movie like Botched attempts to wring laughs out of the umpteenth "Robbers and hostages unite to fight a common enemy" horror movie, and pretty much fail miserably, the result is a film that really isn't worth much of anything, though I should point out it does have its fans (such as HMAD reader Damian, who recommended it to me months ago.), somehow.

On the positive side of things, it's a well made/shot film, and despite a rather confusing geography (the entire movie takes place on a single floor of high rise, and I never could get the general idea of the layout), it's edited together quite well. And the pacing is never really an issue - it may not be very interesting a lot of the time, but it moves along all the same.

But that's really all I can say about it that can be considered positive. Otherwise, it's, well... botched. It's never funny; I think I smuckled (that's a smirk crossed with a mild chuckle) maybe three times during the entire film. The horror elements are rather weak, after the first kill (which is presented mysteriously, leaving the audience to wonder if its a supernatural force or not) the carnage is incredibly bland and half-assed (one kill is off-screen entirely, which is fine for a big body count movie, but not one with only like six kills, two of which are just shootings.

The problem with the humor is that the characters aren't actual characters, they're caricatures. Stereotypes. We get the nerdy meek guy, the good hearted criminal, the tough girl hostage who will fall for our good hearted criminal, etc, etc. The reason films like Shaun of the Dead and Severance work is because they are well developed characters you care about. And that's why Shaun simply asking if anyone wants a peanut is 10x funnier than the best joke in this film, which is about a guy getting angry over a sandwich (and that was only funny because I have a strange affinity for the word sandwich - it pretty much makes me laugh in any context). This movie's idea of high comedy is misspelling the subtitles that accompany a character whose mouth has been injured (so like "Move!" is spelled out "Mooof!" - which doesn't even make sense when you think about it, why even have the subs at all if they aren't going to translate his muffled delivery?).

The film also has the absolute worst "cut off hand" prosthetic I have ever seen in a motion picture. Not only does the stub look incredibly fake, but the guy's arm is noticeably LONGER after the hand is lopped off, not to mention a fairly visible bulge where he is hiding his real hand. When you don't have a good makeup effect, just skip the gag entirely! It's not like his lack of a hand has any real bearing on the plot; it could just as easily have been broken or something.

Stephen Dorff is the star of the film, and I feel sort of bad for him. He used to get good roles and star alongside top tier actors, but now he's relegated to this sort of junk. He's fine in the movie, but since he's playing the "straight man" to the alleged comedy around him, he becomes sort of a non-factor in his own film. Dexter's Jaime Murray, playing his eventual girlfriend, is sexy enough to keep you interested, but it's not even nearly enough to warrant a recommendation of this dull by-the-numbers entry in the increasingly prolific "Gore and laughs" sub-genre.

What say you?

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Comedic, Slasher,

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Knock Knock (2007)

MAY 9, 2008

GENRE: SLASHER
SOURCE: DVD (STORE RENTAL)

Never heard of Knock Knock until no less an authority than Uncle Creepy told me that I would enjoy it, as it was up my alley (being a slasher movie and all) and featured hilarious Italian stereotypes. Rather than wait for the increasingly unreliable Blockbuster Online to send it (most of my top 10 movies are either long wait, or simply just not sent), I picked it up at the store so I could bask in the glow of its apparent greatness.

And surprise, it really ain’t all that bad at all. It’s incredibly well shot (on film, hurrah!), though a better editor would be helpful (in addition to some annoying strobe edits, it’s also a very dirty print – lots of blue light lines and large specs of dirt). With one major exception, the no-name cast is also pretty good, another rarity for these things. The one exception is sadly the closest thing the movie has to a female lead, Kim Taggart. She looks like Ann Coulter playing a cop, and her delivery for everything from simple greetings to large chunks of exposition is uniformly terrible.

Sadly the story isn’t very original, or, at all. It’s yet another “prank goes wrong/deformed killer goes after the kids of the people who did him wrong” movie. Slight bonus points for not making it a whodunit (there are like 3 characters with the same bushy dark hair as the killer, throwing you off track), but I wish writer/director Joe Ariola (who gives himself two credits at the beginning and one at the end – douchebag) could have come up with something that took more effort than seeing a DVD of The Burning next to one for Nightmare on Elm St and going “Hey wait a minute...”

One thing that was impressive was how brutal the kills were. No one gets merely stabbed or their throat slashed. This guy fucking EVISCERATES every victim. Guts hanging out, limps hacked off... it’s nuts. It’s also well done; none of it looks fake, particularly the scene where a guy’s leg is cut off around the knee. Sadly, the impact of the kills is blunted by the editor’s (or maybe Ariola’s) insistence on strobe editing/Avid farting these sequences to death, not to mention overlapping duplicate audio (and occasional footage). Sometimes, you know, less IS more. Had the scenes not been drawn out so we could leave absolutely nothing to the imagination, the film would be 5-10 minutes shorter.

The movie also contains one of my favorite slasher scenes in recent history. One of our group (and group is a bit of an overstatement, after 20 minutes we never see a single one of these kids unless they are about to be killed, nor do they ever hang out with each other again) is walking down the street, singing to himself with his teeth guard (he’s a football player) still in his mouth for some reason. So he’s just going “mush mumble rawr flar gwar” and then all of a sudden the killer jumps out and begins stabbing the shit out of him. It’s fucking hilarious. And it’s a common theme in the film, the killer coming out of nowhere. I think there were only two scenes in the film that showed the killer doing any sort of stalking; usually he just jumps out without any build up or suspense. Usually I hate this, yet it sort of worked for this particular movie. And I’m actually glad that the kids never really interacted after the first 20 minutes, because all they did was mock one another, even after one of their friends died. You know, I mock my friends a lot too, but I also occasionally, like, SAY THINGS to them.

In my notes I have written “Dom/Boot/Shop”. It took me a while to remember what the Christ it meant, but then I remembered – it’s short for “domestic violence, bootleggers, and shoplifters”. At one point, the horrid female detective woman says that her previous cases were primarily those three crimes, “and usually the same people.” What kind of person is a bootlegger AND a shoplifter who beats his wife? “My wife got pissed that I stole a spindle of DVD-Rs, so I punched her in the face.”

Sadly, Ariola was too busy making sure his name was listed 3495 times in the credits to record a commentary, but there are four featurettes concerning different areas of the production such as sound/music and the special FX make-up (Ariola is missing from these as well – he’s the Terence Malick of indie horror). Hardly groundbreaking, but like the movie itself, they are reasonably entertaining anyway. And also like the movie, it features pointless duplication – the composer is introduced twice over a 40 second span. I like when the features have thematic ties to the film itself.

What say you?

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Slasher,

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Splatter Disco (2007)

APRIL 26, 2008

GENRE: COMEDIC, SLASHER
SOURCE: DVD (FANGORIA CONVENTION SCREENING)

Maybe it’s just me. I thought I had a pretty broad sense of humor, and that it doesn’t take much to make me laugh – I giggle when someone says “sandwich” for Christ’s sake. But I didn’t laugh a single time during Splatter Disco, which is a big problem when the filmmakers were more concerned with jokes and humor than they were making a slasher movie. Christ, there are more musical numbers than kill scenes.

At first I thought it would be an amazing movie – a tongue-in-cheek slasher set at a fetish club? There are myriad possibilities for humor! Hell, who doesn’t want to see a Furrie get his/her animal head cut off, played for laughs? But for whatever reason, it simply doesn’t work. Ever. At all. In fact, on an entertainment level, this may be one of the worst films I’ve ever seen. It’s technically proficient (ugly digital video aside) and all that, but at no point during the entire film would I say I was having “fun” or “enjoying myself”.

Here’s an example of why the humor doesn’t work. At one point, this nerdy dude is fighting a jock douchebag type guy. Some guy goes to stop it, and Ken Foree stops him from stopping them. “Let them fight” he says. Someone asks Foree if he wants the kid to fight to prove himself, and Foree is like “No, I have 100 bucks on this!”. Ignoring the fact that Foree somehow found the time to bet on an impromptu street fight, it’s just a generic joke we’ve seen a bunch of times in other movies. But that’s fine-ish. What kills it is that after the fight is over (the nerd wins), Foree starts crying. The SAME GUY asks if he’s crying because the guy triumphed and became a man, and Foree is like “No, I lost 100 bucks!” That’s the same fucking joke! Which wasn’t funny to begin with! With the same two people!!! Christ!

Most of the humor is Police Academy-esque, albeit dumbed down and more obvious. As for the slasher scenes, they are entirely without suspense or buildup, though reasonably gory. And I kind of like how many folks are left standing at the end of the film – even if it meant an almost total lack of kills, it gave the ending a hint of originality not often possible in a slasher film. And it's nice to see Providence, RI used in a horror movie (for real I mean - Stuck took place there but was filmed in Canada).

And I should note that I was one of the few people in the screening that wasn’t laughing (actually I was one of the few people to stay for the entire movie – I saw a lot of walk outs and no one who came in late bothered to stay much longer). They might have all been cast/crew or friends, but hey, at least they seemed to be entertained. I would have walked out myself, but then I’d have to watch something else for the day. So I pressed on, just for YOU!

In closing, I’d like to note that this is the 100th slasher movie watched for Horror Movie A Day (including non canon reviews and October Extras). Hurrah, I guess.

What say you?

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Comedic, Slasher,

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Prom Night (2008)

APRIL 12, 2008

GENRE: REMAKE (?), SLASHER
SOURCE: THEATRICAL (PAID SCREENING)

Well I was wrong. The new Prom Night IS an improvement over the original, at least in general. It would be easy for me to join the bandwagon, and say that this movie is an abomination, complete waste of time, etc, etc. But that's not the case. If I had to choose to rewatch either of them, I'd definitely go with the new one, and would recommend it more than I would the original as well. And hell, it's literally a 'remake' in name only; absolutely NOTHING is carried over, not even a name (it's worth noting that the original's screenwriter is not given a "Based on a screenplay" credit that is customary for remakes, even those with little to do with their predecessors). Why it's been damned from its announcement I have no idea - I'm hardly the only one who dislikes the original, and it wasn't being made by Platinum Dunes (poster child for "Let's hate it before we see a single frame of the film" mentality). And no, it's certainly no masterpiece, but it's definitely worthy of a better reception. Christ, it's not even the worst movie I've seen this week (hello there, Scarecrow Slayer)!

Let's get the bad out of the way first. For starters, the final third of the film is a bit of a letdown. Like Assault on Precinct 13's remake, and Red Eye, the screenwriter opted to set the entire finale of the film somewhere completely removed from the film's focal point, in this case, the goddamn prom. Having run out of things to do, I guess, the action shifts to the less interesting locale of... the Final Girl's house. It'd be like if the finale of Halloween was set on Christmas. This is the exact opposite of the problem the original had, which took fucking forever to GET to the prom. Again, it's an improvement, but it severely breaks the tension.

Also, the 2nd in command cop, played by James Ransone. Who the fuck is this guy? (uh, James Ransone.) He resembles a video store geek or maybe one of the extras in Chuck's computer store. They don't try to make him a badass or anything, thank Christ, but still, it looks like most of the high school kids could take him out with a stern look.

And they somehow managed to make a costume LESS impressive than the original's ski mask. Our killer wears... a baseball hat. That's it. Granted, his identity is not a surprise, we are told who he is right from the start (the movie is refreshingly straight forward - there are zero twists or last minute revelations), but even so, if the movie's a smash hit, thousands of jock douchebags will be accused of dressing like the Prom Night guy.

And yes, there are a lot of fake scares. We are supposed to accept them because Final Girl (Brittany Snow) saw her family killed and thus is jittery, but they go a bit overboard. At one point she gets scared of her own boyfriend, sitting next to her in bed (something she had initiated to begin with). It's not as bad as When a Stranger Calls (The wind! The phone! The ice machine! The sprinklers!), but I would be happy with a few less.

But that's about it for complaints (oh, those and putting the beautiful Jessica Stroup under a pound of unflattering makeup. She's made to look like Lohan at her crackwhoreist). There is actually quite a bit here that is impressive. It's completely solid on a technical level (2.35:1 to boot!), which automatically puts it higher than most of the shit I watch (even other theatrical releases). And while the rating obviously means we are spared excessive gore, there is some light splatter. More importantly, it's actually pretty violent. The body count is higher than I expected (though many are off-screen), and it's even a bit sad when a few of them die. That is due to the fact that the kids are all likable, albeit in stereotype form. There isn't much in the way of characterization, but the actors are all good in the roles. Also, and this is surprisingly rare in slasher movies, we actually see the aftermath of how the deaths of friends affects our heroine (one benefit to the disjointed finale). One of my favorite scenes in Scream 2 is when Sidney says that she has to call Randy's mom and tell her that he is dead, and then Dewey lets her know that he "already made that call". It's a sad scene, and makes the death carry more weight when you know it's actually made an impact on the other characters. Same thing here - the boyfriend of one of the dead girls gets a nice moment of grievance.

Speaking of which, the guy in question is "the black guy". And yes, he survives. As does the resident bitch girl. These two archetypes are pretty much guaranteed knife fodder, but they survive (as do one or two other "sure things"). And this was surprising to me not just as a slasher fan, but as someone who read a review where the writer bitched and moaned that the killer was killing people for no reason. If you ask me, he was pretty selective - he even had the opportunity to kill the black kid and didn't bother. The review specifically pointed out the "pointless" killing of a maid, when in fact he killed her to get a master key which he used to get around. Fine, it's hardly the most original motive, but it's SOMETHING. It's not like the Halloween remake*, where Michael was seemingly going out of his way to kill people at random.

It's also reasonably suspenseful, and ironically I think the rating has a part of that. Since it's PG-13, we know that it won't be wall to wall killings. So when someone goes into a room by themselves, we aren't quite sure whether or not they will be killed, whereas in an R rated film it's pretty much a sure bet. They're also smart enough to avoid putting Snow into any such situations until the final half hour, as we know damn well she won't be killed or even harmed until the finale. I should point out that Variety, in their surprisingly positive review, made note that the kids separate for smarter reasons than usual. And they're right - I think this is the first slasher which put a girl by herself because she was starting to get her period. And since they aren't aware of any danger, there's no reason why they WOULD constantly stick together in the first place. The only exception is when one couple sneaks off to the room to fool around, 10 minutes before the announcement of Prom King and Queen (which they are both in the running for).

Idris Elba was the best thing about The Reaping, and he's damn good here too, as one of the better horror movie cops in recent memory. He's smart, he's not an asshole for no reason... he's a cop doing his job. The fact that Elba is a solid actor doesn't hurt, and he even pulls off the exposition scene (which comes surprisingly early) admirably.

Is it the best slasher movie of all time? Of course not. But is it the worst? Not even remotely. It's entertaining, it's well-made, the pace is good (we get a kill every 10 minutes, not too shabby), it has a cameo by Josh Leonard and the movie Can't Hardly Wait, and there wasn't a single point in the film where I was ready to throw something at the screen (except maybe the boyfriend scare. Come on!). I even went in expecting it to be decent, not listening to the reviews (most of which were seemingly written in the writers' heads prior to seeing the film), and it was even a bit better than my expectations. If it wasn't for the poor box office of The Ruins (why is no one seeing this??), I would wholeheartedly recommend going out to see it, so long as you can accept that anyone old enough to vote is not the target audience. As it stands, it's the year's best remake, and a reasonably decent slasher to boot. It's kind of depressing that simply doing what it set out to do and absolutely nothing else is enough to warrant a recommendation, compared to all the abysmal shit that comes out nowadays, but that's the reality.

What say you?

*The highlight of the screening was when it was over, the 60ish woman in front of me said to her husband: "Rob Zombie would have made it a lot worse!" If I was 30 years older...

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Remake, Slasher, Teen,

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Nightmare Man (2006)

APRIL 5, 2008

GENRE: SLASHER, SUPERNATURAL
SOURCE: DVD (STORE RENTAL)

A word of advice for horror filmmakers: When you set out to make a fun horror movie that’s not supposed to be taken too seriously, make sure it’s actually fun. Because if it’s not, you end up with a movie that eventually just bores, such as Nightmare Man. There’s nothing particularly BAD about the movie (other than the horrible digital video, made worse by a lazy and flat transfer), but there isn’t much to recommend, either. The films that the movie emulates and pays homage to (Evil Dead, Trilogy Of Terror, and even The Entity for some reason) are all vastly more entertaining and a better use of your time.

Remember that one Futurama where they try to explain something to Fry and after a few seconds he gives up trying to understand it and just goes “Magic, right”? That’s kind of how I feel about a lot of these horror movies that are supposed to be “fun”. Any plot hole, lazy screenwriting decision, etc, can just be chalked up to “Hey you’re not supposed to take it seriously!” But the problem is, there is a way to make a fun horror movie that DOES make sense, to a certain degree. There is nothing as glaringly stupid in Hatchet or Scream as the fact that the girl runs from her car to the house where most of the action takes place in about 5 minutes, yet it takes 40 for her husband to drive the car there. Or why the husband would say “You have company in the trunk” to his wife, when the trunk contains the very thing he doesn’t want her to know he has brought along. Fun? Not really, plus once the reveals started coming I was mainly just wondering why the guy would go through all this trouble to fuck with his wife (it's also one of those movies where the person being set up has to behave exactly as the villain needs them to for his plan to work, another pet peeve of mine).

Also, as I said, the movie has a bit of Entity in it, as our heroine is raped and presumably impregnated by the demon/ghost/whatever thing at the end. Uh... yeah that’s not exactly keeping in the spirit of fun, is it? Even though the movie never got a laugh out of me, it was at least better when they were trying, as opposed to the complete 180 for the ending.

Speaking of the ending, it’s partially spoiled by the film’s own opening credits, which promises an appearance by Richard Moll (who appeared in the more successful "fun horror" movie Headless Horseman). Since he doesn’t appear before the isolated action begins, nor is he revealed to be the killer, it’s pretty obvious that rescue WILL arrive in the form of Bull, so suspense is tossed aside as well.

And yes, I said that he wasn’t the killer. Despite the movie’s attempts to make us believe that the killer in the film is a demon, I never bought it for a second. Why? Because the fucking thing has tennis shoes on! Oh wait, “It’s not supposed to be taken seriously!” Then why bother with the whole ‘demon’ thing at all? The audience knowing for sure it’s just a guy in a mask, but not the characters, could lead to some fun situations. Or not, who knows.

And yet this is the most packed of all the After Dark DVDs so far for this year. There’s a commentary (buried in the setup menu) which actually isn’t too bad, as the director and Tiffany Shepis just pal around and point out some of the movie’s flaws. Plus some making of and deleted scenes, and Shepis’ own ‘video diary’ which is about 10 minutes longer than necessary but still kind of fun. Shepis is an engaging presence and can usually elevate a film with her natural charm (see, or not, Scarecrow) but even she can’t manage to get this one going, so at least the extras don’t betray her likability. All in all, not counting the commentary, there’s an hour’s worth of stuff here (which may have added to the abysmal transfer), which is far more than is necessary for a movie that stops cold for three solid minutes while a couple (non-amusingly) discuss their issues shortly after one of their friends is murdered by a demon wearing Converse.

I can’t call it crap, because everyone was clearly trying and having a good time, and it’s far from soulless. But it seriously needed another couple of drafts, possibly by legitimately funny writers, to make itself stick out amidst the 28 million other movies that throw a few young folks in a cabin and hope for the best.

What say you?

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After Dark Fest, Slasher, Supernatural,

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The Cook (2008)

MARCH 29, 2008

GENRE: COMEDIC, SLASHER
SOURCE: DVD (OWN COLLECTION)

Sometimes, you just wanna turn your brain off and be visually entertained for 80 minutes. And that is precisely what The Cook does. It’s not scary, and it’s not particularly funny, but for some reason it worked for me. It moves along nicely, it’s got a cast of incredibly cute girls (even the two nerdy ones are hot), the gore is plentiful, and the film’s sole primary male member (besides the killer) has a name for AND a conversation with his penis. What’s not to begrudgingly like?

The weirdest thing about the movie is how cheap it is in certain areas, but not in others. The actors aren’t the best, the audio seems to be recorded with the camera’s mike in a few scenes, even the (brief, contrary to what they try to make you believe) nudity is kind of half-assed (pun not intended, sadly). Plus they clearly didn’t bother hiring a proofreader:

And yet it’s also shot in the 2.35:1 ratio. I have no idea why, the frame is never filled, and it just looks awkward for such a small movie (the entire thing takes place in the house, except for the epilogue which was filmed in the Scrubs hospital, which ALSO looks strange in widescreen since Scrubs is pretty much the only non-reality show on TV that is still shot fullframe). Weird.

There’s also a scene that is bound to irk horror nerds. The two nicest girls and the penis talker are playing an extremely confusing trivia game, and one of the questions is about Friday the 13th part 4. At this point, they begin describing a scene from the film, and its intercut with the same thing happening downstairs to one of their friends. The problem is, the scene they are describing is not in Friday the 13th 4! You have offended my otherwise useless knowledge of horror movies, writer Nicholas Bonomo! Or Francisco Rodriguez.... or Dirk Van Fleet- why the FUCK did it take three people to write this movie?!?!?

Still, it’s endearing. The killer looks like a demented William H Macy/Greg Kinnear, and he’s chewing up the scenery with the best of them. And the cop at the end is so delightfully deadpan it made me a bit sad that he wasn’t in the movie for the entire time. You can tell everyone was having a blast, and taking any of it seriously even for a second would be your loss. And there’s even a rare Sling Blade reference! Besides, who can hate a movie in which the good Catholic girl stereotype is tied up and licked by another woman (however briefly)? Plus, the ending has a nice twist on who the Final Girl is, which is always welcome. So long as you’re drunk and/or can appreciate a completely cheapo slasher/comedy every now and then, you should have fun.

The commentary is OK, but nothing you’ll miss. They point out a few of the more ridiculous plot holes and laugh at the bad dialogue, but the guy playing the Cook seems to not be in on the joke, talking about lenses and shit. No one watching this cares, pal. Also, the director is not only absent, but its hinted that he didn’t get along with the producer/writers (like Poltergeist, it’s interesting to note how many of the same names pop up among the producers, writers, editors, etc, but the director isn’t listed anywhere else). There is also a making of (which is just random behind the scenes footage set to music), which is once again (for Anchor Bay) full frame but also anamorphic. So while widescreen owners have no problem, this makes the video seem windowboxed on a standard TV. How does one solve such a problem? I dunno, maybe frame the goddamn thing at the 1.78:1 ratio to begin with? The movie is 2.35:1, why go full frame to show a presumably interested audience how it was made?

What say you?

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Comedic, Slasher,

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Carver (2008)

MARCH 22, 2008

GENRE: SLASHER, SURVIVAL
SOURCE: DVD (OWN COLLECTION)

Attn: Whoever sent me Carver for review – thanks! I wish I could remember who you were or what site I was supposed to review the movie for, but I don’t even recall receiving the damn thing! I was looking for another movie on my shelf and spied the film nested properly in between Candyman and The Cave. No recollection of it at all. It’s as if the Direct to DVD Fairy entered my home, took careful note of my how I sort my DVDs (an impressive feat, to be sure), and filed it away for me to find at my own leisure.

And I was even more surprised to discover that it wasn’t bad! On a surface level, it’s the umpteenth Saw/Hostel wannabe to come along in the past few years, albeit fused to a standard woods-set slasher, but there are just enough fairly unique touches to warrant giving it a pass.

For starters, our hero is the angriest man in horror movie history. He gets so frustrated at the simplest things, and it delighted me every single time. When his brother mocks him for asking him “how far?” one too many times during their road trip, he launches into a sarcastic, seemingly endless rant about how his brother’s non-answer was “exactly what he was looking for”. Later in the film, he shouts about how much he hates “stupid” wine glasses. There are a couple of other moments like this as well. Man, chill out!

He also has the film’s best line by far. He enters a stall, and the toilet is kind of dirty. He makes a disgusted sigh and opens the adjacent stall, which is ten times WORSE. He retches, and then notices a large pile of poop on the wall. “How do you shit on the wall?!” he asks no one in particular. It’s hilarious.

I should note at this time that the film has a particular fascination with bodily functions, particularly poop. After this sequence, another guy walks into another outhouse that is even MORE disgusting than the one with the wall-shit. The guy shrugs and sits down on the toilet anyway, and then the disgusting bowl is used as a weapon against him a bit later. We are also treated to the sight of a girl puking, and in the film’s most memorable kill, a testicle being plied, which results in blood and whatever the fuck else is inside a testicle to explode over the camera lens. Christ.

See, there are only two types of scenes I can’t handle: seeing someone get their teeth damaged (American History X – holy FUCK) and seeing dudes lose their genitalia. Everything else I am fine with, but if your movie has either one of those two types of scenes, you can guarantee that I’ll be squirming (or even looking away entirely). And since I guess that’s one of the reactions one SHOULD have when watching a horror movie, I guess in that respect the movie is a success.

The movie also has a fantastic soundtrack. And by that I mean there is a really weird and annoying (but ultimately catchy) song that plays throughout the movie. The chorus goes “Turkey in the straw, hee hee haw; Turkey in the hay, hey hee hey!” I defy anyone to watch this movie and not sing along with it by the 6th or 7th time it plays over a kill scene. Apparently, it’s an old ‘traditional’ song, much like your "Goin’ Round The Mountain When She Comes" and such, but for some reason it took a low budget slasher movie that mysteriously appeared on my DVD shelf for me to become aware of it.

It’s also a downer. Our Final Girl blows her goddamn head off, and our would-be hero gets HIS head caved in with a sledgehammer. And yet for some reason, the over the top gore/poop humor actually works well with the rather dark final act. Usually I abhor such things (Cabin Fever lost me on several occasions because of this imbalance) but it didn’t bother me here.

One thing that DID bother me was how poor the direction was. It seems like Captain John Tripod, ASC was the primary cameraman here, and several scenes have confusing and awkward blocking (particularly the scenes inside the bar). I wish writer/director Franklin Guerrero, Jr. had left the direction to someone else, as the lazy camerawork makes the film feel overly inert (DP Ryan Bedell can also be blamed). Ironically, the most frenetic camerawork we see in the film is in the snuff films that the killers are making. And this is a problem, because they seem to have been shot by at LEAST two people, when there should only be one (the hero doesn’t even figure this part of it out until the very end of the film). Things like that I am able to forgive, but other people are more stubborn, which is a shame, because Carver is much better (even at 100 minutes and only a few kills it feels fast paced) than I expected.

The DVD also has more extras than I was expecting. Two commentary tracks? I began listening to one with Guerrero and one of the producers, but he claimed that the track would be dry, technical, and “pretentious”, and that the other one would be more fun. So I switched it. On this track (which is Guerrero again, with a different producer), they get drunk, however they are annoying drunks. If you want to know how to do a REAL drunken commentary, listen to Cannibal: The Musical’s track. That thing is fucking amazing. There are a few tidbits to learn along the way, but someone needs to inform them that mispronouncing words and trying to ‘bring back’ forgotten insults is NOT the stuff of comic gold. There are also deleted scenes and a behind the scenes, nothing you’ll miss.

What say you?

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Independent, Slasher, Survival,

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Shrooms (2006)

MARCH 18, 2008

GENRE: SLASHER, WEIRD
SOURCE: DVD (OWN COLLECTION)

Sometime this week, Bloody-Disgusting will be posting a list of the 10 dumbest slasher motives in history (history being the ones I’ve seen, and then in turn, remember). Shrooms made the cut, but unlike most of the other movies on the list, I actually kind of liked the movie, so the motive didn’t really anger me.

It IS really stupid though.

I was surprised that I liked the movie at all, because all SIX of our main characters are druggies. Lame as I may be, I’m pretty much against all drug use, so giving a shit about 6 people who are SPECIFICALLY going into the woods for no other reason than to get high is asking a lot of me. But I kind of liked them to a degree, and luckily (surprisingly, in fact), little of the film is given to them sitting around eating mushrooms and “tripping” (not even as much as in The Tripper, in fact). In fact, the film had more in common with Severance, in both look (both movies look like they were shot entirely at 7 o clock in the morning) and structure (both films end in a large compound in the middle of the woods – sure, why not?). And you all know I love Severance.

However, it’s not all killing either (though there’s a lot more bloodshed than I was expecting as well). It seems everyone in this group dislikes everyone else, so there’s a lot of bickering and catfighting to put up with. In fact, I could have used a bit MORE “tripping” as a result; it was vastly more amusing to see a guy talk to a cow than listen to two girls fight over a guy who’s already dead (unbeknownst to them). There’s also a part where a guy grabs a slimy mass and says “You see this frog cum?” that had me laughing for like 10, maybe 12 seconds straight.

Also, the movie is smart enough to avoid having any of the characters fall into a giant mushroom and hallucinate for the entire episode. If you know what I’m referring to – is that also the moment you realized that show really started to suck?

In the end, my only real problem with the film was its confusing subplot of a certain mushroom giving the girl the ability to see the future. First of all, what? How the hell would that work? Second (BIG SPOILER HERE), this character turns out to be the killer! Why bother giving the one person who doesn’t have any need to prevent anyone’s demise a big idiotic superpower that renders certain sections of the film annoying/wholly implausible (plausibility being a relative term when it comes to movies like this)? Sure, it helps make the ending of the film a bit more of a surprise, but it’s still entirely unnecessary in the long run.

End spoilers.

Also, an important plot point relies on our believing that the main dude wouldn’t want to nail this girl:

Uh, no. He’s got her alone in the woods, they’re both a bit fucked up, and he’s gonna ignore her? I don’t buy it. Horror nerds may be interested to learn that she is Lindsay Haun, aka the main evil girl from Carpenter’s Village of the Damned remake. It’s good to know she grew up cute, and now there’s even more reason not to watch that movie (who wants to look at a little girl now that they know she’s going to be hot in 12 years?)

The DVD has a nice collection of extras: deleted scenes, alternate endings (which are the same in terms of who the killer is, they just have alternate epilogues), and an audio commentary that is much dryer than I was hoping for. They take the film very serious, and even though Shrooms is nowhere near as goofy as I was expecting, the track could have used the same amount of levity that the film had. And according to the track, the film was shot on HDD, and looks fantastic. More stuff like this, and maybe digital films that look good will be the rule, rather than the exception.

What say you?

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Slasher, Weird,

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Hack! (2007)

MARCH 17, 2008

GENRE: COMEDIC, SLASHER
SOURCE: DVD (STORE RENTAL)

Once again I totally forget to watch a Leprechaun movie for St. Patrick’s Day. I’ve only seen 2 of the 6 films (and the two I’ve seen I pretty much forget entirely), so they are perfectly eligible for a daily movie. So why am I watching stuff like Hack! on the holiday? Whatever.

Hack! is something I’ve never even heard of, despite a fairly genre-friendly cast (William Forsythe, Juliet Landau, Lochlyn Munro, and Kane Hodder in a rare turn as a victim). I saw it at the store and immediately shrugged and said “eh, why not,” armed only with the knowledge that it was yet another “killer kills the people making a horror movie” slasher film. However, either I read it wrong or they lied on the box (I’m too lazy to look), because as it turns out, the killer was the one making the horror movie; the victims were college kids doing some sort of eco-environment project on the remote island.

(Yeah, because it really makes a huge difference.)

Luckily the movie wasn’t all that bad. The movie references are pretty evenly split in terms of being funny or not; early on I almost broke the disc in half when someone comments “We’re going to need a bigger boat,” referring to one of the future victims’ excessive luggage. But later in the film, during the slasher staple “find all the dead friends” sequence, the hero points out the movies from which each of the victims’ deaths were paying homage to: “Hellraiser... Texas Chain Saw Massacre... Thirteen fucking Ghosts? Are you kidding me?” Holy shit, I almost pissed myself. Also, all of the characters are annoyingly named after horror icons, which is kind of stupid when they are all talking about horror movies – no one bothers to mention the “coincidence” that their teacher is named Mr. Argento? They also break the fourth wall when one character says “they always split us up in these movies!” or something to that effect. Look, it’s one thing to wink at the audience, but directly addressing them is another matter entirely, and since it’s the ONLY joke of its type in the entire film, it’s a bit stupid.

However, the same guy more than makes up for it when he suddenly breaks into dance and sings the theme from Fame for no reason whatsoever. They even pull a bit of a fast one on the audience here, because the guy is singing “I’m going to live forever!” over and over, yet he doesn’t get killed right away. Nice work. I also like that they referenced both modern and classic horror movies – some of these other types of “reference” movies seem to forget everything past 1980 or so, but we get references to Saw and even Jack Frost mixed in with Psycho and The Birds.

Another thing I was surprised by was the fact that, for the first time ever in slasher movie history, the resident jock douchebag character actually displayed a bit of humanity. There’s a bit where he goes into the freezing water and suffers from shrinkage. The others, obviously, mock him for this, but rather than punch out the nerd or act like a ‘roid freak, he laughs along with them, and later admits he thinks the nerd is an OK guy. The smallest touch like that (which is so rare it’s almost considered a plot twist) is enough to make you care about the guy a little. In fact, there’s a lot of genuine camaraderie on display (particularly between the black guy, the nerd, and the punk rock girl – the character stereotypes are actually part of the plot), which keeps the characters from being as annoying as they otherwise would be (and they ARE annoying at times).

The killers’ identity is revealed fairly early on, but there are still one or two other light surprises in store to make up for it. I’ll refrain from spoiling any, other than to say William Forsythe’s character is NOT the bad guy, for once. He plays a Scottish outdoorsman, and Forsythe positively revels in playing him so over the top and nutty. In fact, his character is one of the very few in his career that could be considered broadly humorous, so it was nice to see him take some time away from playing hardass authority figures or psychotic villains for once.

I was also very impressed with the film’s technical level. In addition to a surprising amount of bloodspray in the kill scenes (plus a few prosthetic effects, such as an eyeball popping), the film looked fantastic. The credits don’t provide any information as to what it was shot with, but some messageboard postings claim it was digital. If so, it’s among the best I’ve seen (then again I was watching it upscaled to 1080p, so it probably aided the picture quality). There’s a scene about midway through the film where some stock footage of piranhas is used, and it becomes even more apparent how good the lighting and quality stock for the actual movie is.

Then again, the quality is so good that it becomes even easier to tell that poor Drusilla is a LOT older than I thought. It also makes the digital effects easier to spot: there’s a horrible exit wound that doesn’t even stay locked onto the guy’s shirt properly, and apparently director Matt Flynn was unable to film this guy against a real sky:

That guy is Jay Kenneth Johnson. I knew the name, but for the entire film I didn’t recognize him from a damn thing. Finally I looked him up and realized why: he’s on Days Of Our Lives, a show I have created the end credits for every day for the past 2 years. Obviously I’ve never watched the actual show, but making sure his name and his character of Philip Kiriakis is spelled correctly from day to day is how I make my living. Nice to “meet” you, Jay!

The DVD is sans extras, and the humor is hit or miss (plus you gotta factor in how many people hate the idea of mixing horror and comedy to begin with), so while I enjoyed it, I can’t wholeheartedly recommend buying the film to everyone. But if you’re OK with this type of humor and like a sort of different type of slasher movie every now and then, you could do a lot worse.

What say you?

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Comedic, Slasher,

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Non Canon Review: Friday The 13th: The Final Chapter (1984)

MARCH 14, 2008

GENRE: SLASHER
SOURCE: THEATRICAL (REVIVAL SCREENING)

For some reason I started with part 4 for my two favorite horror franchises. Halloween 4 and Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter were my introductions to Michael Myers and Jason Voorhees, respectively, and both remain my 2nd favorite entries in the series (with Jason Lives being my favorite Friday). I saw it when I was like 6 or 7, and over the next couple weeks my mom rented V (New Beginning) and VI (Jason Lives), before announcing that she was sick of them. It would be a couple years before I saw the others (I think 3 was the last I got around to seeing, when I was like 14), thanks to friends and cable TV.

Final Chapter was also the first (and 2nd last) horror movie that ever scared me to the point where I had to turn it off. I was like 10 or so, up in Maine, where we “camp” in the summer (by “camp” I mean we have a fully functioning RV in a well lit and highly populated summer campground), and my parents had gone out to dinner or something, leaving me alone in the RV (NO they weren’t being negligent, our honorary relatives “camped” right next door and were home, plus I think my older sister was around), which had a TV/VCR. I put on the film, and by the time poor Teddy got stabbed through the projector screen, I was too freaked and had to shut the movie off until they got back (the fact that I slept outside of the RV, in a tent very much like the one the ill-fated Rob has in the film, didn’t help much).

(For the record, the other one was Halloween 5 – which I tried to watch when I was home alone at the age of 12, ON HALLOWEEN. I got up to the barn scene.)

Part of why 4 has endeared is that it was the last of the series to have any real ties to the others (other than the Tommy Jarvis character, introduced here via Corey Feldman). Parts 1-4 tell a sort of complete story of Jason’s origin, and the endings to all 3 sequels have thematic ties to the original. Also, 2-4 take place over the course of a few days; after this film, the timeline is pretty much the most convoluted in any franchise, including James Bond (if you go by this film’s claim that the first movie took place in 1979, and factor in the “it’s been 5 (or 10, or whatever) years” statements that occur in many of the sequels (which were all filmed no more than a year after the previous one), then part VIII would take place in the early 2000s). There is a minor plot hole with this set up (Rob has all of these clippings and research about Jason, due to the fact he killed his sister – but she would have only died about 2 days ago. Can’t he wait until she’s buried before hitting up the library and going on a revenge mission?), but otherwise it works OK enough. It’s nice to know that at one point they were at least trying (anyone who can figure out how Jason went from a tiny boy in New York to Hell, then to Space, and finally back to Springwood is certainly welcome to explain here).

This is also one of the few films in the series to feature actors you may have actually seen in something else. Other than Feldman, the big name here is Crispin Glover, who stars in the series’ most famous non-kill scene (his ridiculous dance). But Bruce Mahler from the Police Academy movies also shows up as Axl, the horny morgue attendant, and Lawrence Monoson appeared in the “not as bad as it could have been” Starship Troopers sequel (and according to the commentary, his casting was actually a demand from the studio). And the guy who plays Rob showed up in an episode of House. Plus, the no-names are better actors than average.

In addition to the casting, the film even has some actual production value. The morgue scenes are a nice change of pace from the “how many goddamn cabins ARE there on Crystal Lake” feeling you get from the other movies, and the opening scene has helicopters, ambulances, police cars... it’s great.

And Tommy plays Zaxxon. Badly.

Like all movies I re-watch at the New Beverly, there’s a lot of stuff I never realized how silly it was. Like the newspaper claiming “MASS MURDERER’S BODY MISSING” as a headline (and ignored by the reader), or the idea of a young kid taking a very odd stranger up to his room with little suspicion from his mother. I also lost count of how many times the one girl says “Paul?” as she goes for a skinny dip (and how does her inflatable raft remain inflated when Jason spears the goddamn thing?), because the entire theater began laughing every time she asked again. Look, if it’s him, he’ll answer! Also, possibly the dumbest “chase” moment in the entire series occurs here – Trish goes to one door, but there’s a body on the ground. Then she goes to another door, and again, a body. So what does she do? Smashes a window and climbs out. Is there some religion that prevents followers from stepping over or around a corpse?

This movie also began implementing Jason’s teleportation abilities. Most obvious is when he kills Jimmy, the twin, and then Teddy in rapid succession. Jimmy is killed in the kitchen, some 10 feet away from Teddy. Teddy doesn’t hear his screams or anything, but that’s sort of par for these movies. But then it gets weird. The twin is then killed by Jason on the 2nd floor (from outside no less), and then Jason somehow gets back downstairs and behind Teddy to turn off the projector, then behind him AGAIN (Teddy spins around) to stab him through the throat. What?

Still, it’s one of the best sequels, easily. Savini’s gore effects are amazing, the kills come along at a nice clip without becoming a parody (like in part 5), and you’ll even like a few of the characters. Also, the fact that it started to “open up” the series (with an adult for once, plus a kid) was a good thing, because it made the movie feel “bigger”. And damned if that one dude getting stabbed through the groin (after sort of cheating on his girlfriend) doesn’t make me wince. Well played, Joe Zito!

What say you?

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Friday The 13th, Non Canon, Slasher,

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Final Exam (1981)

MARCH 14, 2008

GENRE: SLASHER
SOURCE: THEATRICAL (REVIVAL SCREENING)

One of my favorite things on the internet has to be the “mash up” of two Nickelback songs. If you play “How You Remind Me” and “Photograph” (or whatever the hell their other big hit was) at the same time, you’ll see they have the exact same structure, with the chorus kicking in at precisely the same time (accompanied by a “duh duh duh DUH DUH DUH!” buildup) and clock in at just about the exact same length (one is like a second longer I think). I thought about that while watching Final Exam, because I am pretty sure one could superimpose the film over Halloween and come away with a similar result.

Ignoring quality, the films are curiously similar. Both have one kill at the very beginning, and then about an hour of no kills. Both have a scene of the (very bookish) girl seeing the killer outside her window, mixed with scenes of her talking to her very slutty friends. The score is similar. The finale finds the killer falling over a railing. Etc, etc. Of course, the difference is, Final Exam isn’t QUITE the masterpiece the ‘Ween is, but it’s still a fun enough little forgotten slasher that doesn’t deserve its current status (i.e. unreleased on DVD). If fucking Prom Night got like 3 DVD releases, there’s no reason why Exam can’t get one.

The most hilarious thing about the movie is that the killer makes Michael Myers look like the most complex killer in slasher history. While his motives were unclear, he at least had a name and a mask. This guy doesn’t even have that. He’s just some guy with an Anton Chigurh haircut. No mask, no name, and certainly no motive. Even He Knows You're Alone gave its vague killer a backstory with the film’s final line. In a way it’s kind of admirable that at the time the film came out (1981), when everyone was trying to make its own memorable slasher, the Final Exam team couldn’t even be bothered to give the guy a paper bag.

The movie also hates chemistry. During the “character development” phase of the film, we are treated to at least 12 slams on chemistry’s purpose in real life, to the point where it’s almost mean-spirited. My guess? Screenwriter/director Jimmy Huston failed chemistry in college or high school, and wrote a slasher film around it, and was so focused on chemistry bashing that he forgot to provide his killer with any sort of... well, anything.

Our heroes are ripe for loving mockery. The girl (Cecile Bagdadi) never stops smiling (it’s the creepiest thing in the movie), and our hero (Joel S. Rice) is named Radish. He’s sort of like Ian Sera in Pieces, and I kept hoping a kung fu professor would kick his ass. There is a hilarious scene where he’s at the girl’s door, telling her to be careful and all that. She CLEARLY wants him to come in and fuck her to sleep, but he’s oblivious. So he walks away, and then..... he knocks at her OTHER door! Yes, her dorm room has two doors for some goddamn reason. And he again reiterates his desire for her to be careful while ignoring her desire for some Radish love. It’s the first time I’ve felt sexual frustration for another (not to mention fictional) person.

Well he gets his fucking head smashed thru a door and neck cut by the glass, so it evens out.

It’s moments like this that make this movie a must for “big crowd” viewing. On a surface level, it’s a boring fucking movie (in Halloween, they constantly had Michael watching from the shadows; but here it’s like the killer is an after-thought), but there are so many “what the FUCK?” moments of absurdity that it seems a lot better than it actually is (or would be if you were watching it alone). Por ejemplo, one of the girls is fucking her professor. That’s fine, but she has a FRAMED PHOTO of the guy on her desk! Discretion? Why bother? There’s also a fraternity initiation scene (lifted verbatim in Scream 2), except with the added “bonus” of a cop pouring whiskey into the kid’s underwear.

But that doesn’t even come CLOSE to the levels of homoeroticism that are displayed by the film’s resident bully character: Wild Man. At one point he literally spoons a dude (the aforementioned frat pledge) and begins kissing his ear as the other guys strip him down to his underwear. It’s amazing. There’s also a subplot about pills that never quite makes sense (we’re led to believe that they are steroids, but there are like 50 different sizes and colors).

In my notes I have written down “Two lousy people!”, but I have no idea what this means.

In the annals of early 80s slashers, it’s both one of the worst (worst killer ever, for certain) and one of the best (due to its unparalleled levels of unintentional comedy). If you still have a functioning VHS, check it out, but only with friends. I think watching this movie alone might be detrimental to the health of both you and radishes.

What say you?

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Slasher,

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