Census Bloodbath: Amish Paradise

Year: 1981

Director: Wes Craven

Cast: Maren Jensen, Sharon Stone, Ernest Borgnine

Run Time: 1 hour 40 minutes

MPAA Rating: R

Wes Craven directed four slasher films in the 1980’s. Two of them were forgettable piffle, and one of them changed the genre forever. Really, that’s not a bad track record. But today we’re here to talk about that fourth slasher, a little-discussed 1981 flick called Deadly Blessing.

Deadly Blessing was Craven’s third theatrical outing following the grisly grindhouse duo The Last House on the Left and The Hills Have Eyes, and it finds him flexing a lot of the same muscles he would later use to carve out the more refined Nightmare on Elm Street. Though it is notable mostly as a breeding ground for the more sophisticated ideas he would mull over in the future, Deadly Blessing nevertheless has its share of indelible horror moments.

Like that outfit. Ick.

Deadly Blessing regales us with the tale of Martha (Maren Jensen), a young city woman who is celebrating her first anniversary with her husband Jim (Doug Barr of The Unseen) in their country home. Their property is located close to a group of devout Hittites, a religious group that “make[s] the Amish look like swingers,” who have banished Jim from their town for going to college and embracing modern technology. The group is led by this father Isaiah (Ernest Borgnine), who insists that Martha, Jim, and their secular neighbors - Louisa (Lois Nettleton) and her daughter Faith (Lisa Hartman) – have been brought here by the Incubus, a demonic boogeyman he uses to frighten people into following his rules. 

After Jim mysteriously perished in the middle of the night, Martha’s friends Vicky (Susan Buckner) and Lana (Sharon Stone of Calendar Girl Murders and, you know, Sharon Stone) come to visit. Before long, the ladies and the Hittites find themselves beset by a shadowy killer. Both assume that the murders are being perpetrated by the opposite group.

But just like Lost fans, it’s dubious if they’ll ever discover what’s really going on.

The core of Deadly Blessing is 100% grass-fed Craven, from the diad of opposing mirror-image families to the callous and controlling father figure and the repressed truths in a community erupting into violence and terror. In this film, he tackles the organized religion that dominated his sheltered early life and cements in his intent to flush all the skeletons from the closet of the American family. Unfortunately, the halting, stop-and-go pace prevents the film from being thoroughly entertaining, but as an intellectual catalyst it’s superb.

Deadly Blessing teeters on a dangerous precipice between the jagged mountains of insightful fright and the loamy valley of early 80’s mediocrity. For every step up (Craven’s audacious ideas and sterling kill sequences), there is an equal and opposite slip down (low budget TV movie-esque sets, plodding conversational scenes). But we all have our flaws. Hell, I’ve seen Jason X three times. This flick certainly has its share (and damaging ones, at that), but there are a handful of moments so unequivocally stunning that I want to et the negatives out of the way right now before we push on.

First off, man oh man does Ernest Borgnine not give a crap about this movie. He goes through the motions, puffing himself up like an indignant frog, but one gets the sense that his soul has completely vacated his body and is currently 30 feet away at the craft services table deciding between a raspberry of cheese Danish. Then the film is assaulted by an opening narration so cheesy you could melt it and pour it over nachos and a smattering of gaudy effects that would hardly impress in a community theater production.

That said, if anybody wants to produce a musical based on the collected works of Wes Craven, I will buy a ticket for opening night.

But for all that Deadly Blessing feels like a low-fi slog, there’s a sinister power that fuels the horror sequences. Craven elegantly frames a chilling nightmare that directly informs his future dream logic aesthetic for Freddy Krueger’s domain, and every death hits with the impact of a cannon blast. Whether it’s the delicate reversal of the sinister William Gluntz (returning Cravenite Michael Berryman) finding a knife sheath on a window sill before being butchered, or a hideously prolonged snake attack in a bathtub, every single moment of terror excels, jam-packed with thrilling switcheroos and hair-raising layers of tension added with each passing moment. One scene in particular, a knock-out, drag–down fight between two women, is the most kinetic, fast-paced, harrowing combat sequence of the year, hands down. With its strict realism and maniacal energy, it wouldn’t be out of place in a kung-fu movie.

Every one of these sequences is remarkably crafted, proving Craven’s acumen for high-wire thrills, but they are scattered at great distances between long swaths of stuffy religious drama. Until the absolutely bonkers final twenty minutes, watching the film is akin to the experience of sitting through a History Channel documentary with shoddy period reenactments, during which random scenes from The Texas Chain Saw Massacre have been spliced in. It’s decidedly off-kilter, but the sheer power of those moments when they finally arrive is worth every politely strained second.

And though the Hittite scenes are a challenge to get through, there is at least a slight reprieve in the form of the three women, whose chemistry is top notch. There are some genuinely sweet undercurrents about the strength of female friendship and each woman has her own distinct, shaded personality. Mind you, it’s not Little Women, but Craven has always had a specialty for strong female characters and eloquently expresses that.

When it comes down to brass tacks, Deadly Blessing is certainly one of the weaker Wes Craven efforts, but there’s enough stimulating material to keep a seasoned viewer invested. If you’re a horror newbie, stick with the Nightmares and the Screams, but for anyone of an irrationally analytical bent, this flick might just answer your prayer.

Killer: [Faith (Lisa Hartman) and Louisa (Lois Nettleton)]

Final Girl: Martha (Maren Jensen)

Best Kill: [Martha is abruptly dragged into Hell by the Incubus who, it turns out, actually exists.]

Sign of the Times: Martha digs up a grave while wearing a fringed patent leather jacket.

Scariest Moment: Sharon Stone has a nightmare about a spider falling into her mouth while a grey-skinned demon caresses her.

Weirdest Moment: Faith says she understands Martha’s grief because her pet bird died once.

Champion Dialogue: “You are a stench in the nostrils of God!”

Body Count: 7; not including a snake beaten with a poker.

1. Jim is run over with a tractor.
2. William Gluntz is stabbed to death.
3. John is stabbed to death.
4. Vicky dies in a car explosion.
5. Louis is shot to death.
6. Faith is stabbed in the back.
7. [Martha is dragged into Hell.]

TL;DR: Deadly Blessing is an intellectually stimulating, if slow, early Craven effort.

Rating: 6/10

Word Count: 1161

Census Bloodbath: The Lame Street Electrical Parade

For our podcast episode about this very film, click here.

Year: 1989

Director: Wes Craven

Cast: Michael Murphy, Mitch Pileggi, Peter Berg

Run Time: 1 hour 49 minutes

MPAA Rating: R

1989 was not a good year for slashers. Time and again, we’ve run through the mind-bogglingly long list of nails in the subgenre’s coffin that were released in theaters that year, but we’re about to alight upon one of the most storied and baffling of them all: Wes Craven’s Shocker.

Conceived as an answer to A Nightmare on Elm Street (on which Craven was pretty much cheated out of profit participation), Shocker was an attempt to kick-start a new franchise, done right this time. That patently failed to happen, and Shocker ended up a funhouse mirror vision of Nightmare, wanly trudging through the exact same story beats to lesser effect, both thematically and entertainingly.

Though, admittedly, Shocker has it over Nightmare in the “wall-to-wall Alice Cooper songs” category.

Shocker tells of the exploits of TV repairman Horace Pinker (Mitch Pileggi), who moonlights as a serial killer with a predilection for offing entire families in their homes. When he quite rudely annihilates the family of the detective on his tail, Lt. Don Parker (Michael Murphy of Strange Behavior), Parker’s foster son Jonathan (Peter Berg) gets dragged into the mix as he begins to have dreams conveniently highlighting Pinker’s whereabouts. Pinker is subsequently caught and sentenced to the electric chair, but not before performing a Satanic curse that will transfer his soul INTO the body of a doll an electrical current, allowing him to possess other people’s bodies in his pursuit of Jonathan.

…Wes Craven was a humanities professor, not an engineer. Horace pursues Johnny in a variety of bodies before remembering hat an electrical killer is actually an OK concept as long as it’s serving a satire of how reliant Americans are on their gadgets. After about 80 minutes of meandering (this is an astoundingly long film – civilizations have fallen in less time than it takes for Pinker to get to the chair), he converts entirely into an electrical current and travels into his victims’ homes via TV. Now it’s up to Jonathan to save his life, avenge his murdered girlfriend Alison (Camille Cooper), and stop the killing spree once and for all.

He needs to hurry too, before the FX budget gets too high.

Look, Shocker is not an outright terrible film. Wes Craven has certainly made some clunkers in his career, but when he’s behind the wheel of the script, you can be certain he’s at least attempting to engage with an idea. The biggest problem with the film is that it’s crammed into the Nightmare beaker, they aren’t quite soluble, leaving half-worked chunks floating around, knocking into one another.

Luckily, these problems don’t really arise until the halfway point, when Pinker makes his transition to wisecracking electricity demon. Again, this doesn’t speak well of Shocker’s flabby run time, but that leaves us with a good 45 minutes to spend with the human Horace, who is unpredictable, raw, and more than a little unsettling. Mitch Pileggi’s live-wire performance is riveting, thoroughly committed stuff, crackling with restless energy and minute tics while he dishes out the gore like a demented close-up magician.

The first act is really where Shocker’s personality shines strongest, because it hasn’t yet glommed onto its obligatory supernatural Krueger-lite framework. In addition to Pileggi carving the place up and getting a chance to have some blood (a throat-slashing and a lip-biting in particular are choice cuts of gooey mayhem), the ever-present silly humor is more character-driven and less reliant on quips that would make Carrot Top blush. Unfortunately, Shocker makes a dramatic shift hallway through, dumping a pile of deus ex machina, nonsense setpieces, and an excruciating abundance of dream sequences onto the already overloaded film’s back.

It does not do to dwell on dreams and forget to rock.

Not only are we saddled with the burden of attempting to comprehend the eternally shifting tapestry of rules that govern Pinker’s powers and Jonathan’s dreams, we are also forced to face a magical love necklace, a laser beam of pure virginity, and Alison’s ghost, who so frequently reappears in Johnny’s life that her death loses every ounce of impact. She shuffles off and back on the mortal coil without breaking  a sweat like she’s doing cosmic aerobics. Because death is clearly only a mild nuisance in this universe, the stakes are lowered into oblivion. The entire third act is like this, driven almost exclusively by deus ex MacGuffins. It’s nonsensical and scattershot, but worst of all, it’s boring.

This atmosphere of the second half is hardly helped by a severe lack of gore. Now that Pinker is… whatever he is, he finds less and less use for his trusty knife and the effects crew turns their attention from quality gore making sure that he looks as good as possible.

SPOILER ALERT: He doesn’t.

What we’re left with is Peter Berg doddering through a cavalcade of silly setpieces (including an evil Barcalounger – just when you thought it was safe to relax…), acting louding at whoever happens to be in the vicinity. Admittedly, the climactic battle inside the world of TV is a brilliantly edited effects extravaganze (that precedes the same tricks used in Forrest Gump by several years – suck on that, Hanks!), but this shallow, goofy, half-Jason Goes to Hell, half-Dream Warriors state-of-the-art slasher loses its bearings (and its marbles) long before its strong close.

There’s nuggets of intent buried throughout the film. At any given moment, Shocker threatens to become a satire of American TV culture, an indictment of middle class violent tendencies, and even a campy horror-comedy with a gleam of gritty despair. But as opposed to having too many cooks, Shocker has just one cook with too many ingredients. It’s a fun, scary, incisive movie but only in brief spurts. Mainly it collapses in on itself like an unattended cake in the oven, It’s a must-see fr Cravenites looking to understand the man’s feverishly artistic mind, but otherwise give this one a pass.

Killer: Horace Pinker (Mitch Pileggi)

Final Girl: Jonathan Parker (Peter Berg)

Best Kill: A cop’s head is twisted all the way around. He’ll never watch The Exorcist the same way again.

Sign of the Times: You’re not allowed to listen to this title track if your hair is under 12 inches long.

Scariest Moment: Alison is murdered while Jonathan heads off to practice.

Weirdest Moment: Jonathan somehow lives in an apartment even though he’s close with his family and is still in high school.

Champion Dialogue: “Pinker is dead, John. Go home and get drunk or something.”

Body Count: 17; not including several entire families that get murdered offscreen.

1. Bobby is stabbed to death.
2. Diane is stabbed to death.
3. Sally is stabbed to death.
4. Sarge’s throat is slit.
5. Cop #1 is stabbed in the gut.
6. Cop #2 has his throat slashed.
7. Cop #3 is strangled with a radio cord.
8. Alison is stabbed to death.
9. Cop #4 has his head twisted backward.
10. Medical Examiner dies in a car explosion.
11. Jogger is shot in the back.
12. Pastori dies when Pinker leaves his body.
13. Amanda dissolves.
14. Amanda’s Mom dies probably.
15. Pac-Man is stabbed to death.
16. Coach Cooper is stabbed in the chest.
17. Horace Pinker is killed by a power outage.

TL;DR: Shocker is massively creative film with a woefully short attention span.

Rating: 5/10

Word Count: 1241

Toy Guns

Year: 1991

Director: Jack Bender

Cast: Justin Whalin, Perrey Reeves, Jeremy Sylvers

Run Time: 1 hour 30 minutes

MPAA Rating: R

There comes a time in every young franchise’s life when they must embrace childish things. Specifically, I’m referring to camp and humor, which tend to creep up on even the hardiest of horror properties. It took Nightmare on Elm Street two go-rounds for Freddy to transform into a homicidal stand-up comedian, Jason Voorhees’ fifth turn behind the wheel of the machete was marked by self-referential comedy and even a James Bond homage in the opening credits, and Halloween: H20 featured Michael Myers battling a gaggle of Kevin Williamson-weaned teens.

Although Chucky’s humor heyday was still yet to come in 1992, Child’s Play 3 is a clear transition piece, still utilizing the killer doll as a source of fear, but upping the ante on his already-prevalent sarcasm. As a result, it teeters a bit on the brink of two genres, but returning screenwriter Don Mancini manages to hold it together long enough to see it through to the next phase.

Phase 2: Chucky squares off against Iron Man and whatever Avenger has the cheapest contract.

Child’s Play 3 continues the story of Andy Barclay (now played by Justin Whalin), who has been shuttled through a series of foster homes but had trouble adjusting, probably because they had a severe lack of blondes in rad leather hats. As a last ditch effort, he is sent to military school with the hope that a little straightening out will quell his killer doll fantasies.

Unfortunately for everyone, the greedy Play Pals corporation has restarted production on their popular Good Guys line of dolls, and it just so happens that the plastic used to make the first model was unknowingly spiked with Chucky’s blood. Before OSHA Safety officials could arrive on the scene, Chucky has been resurrected and quickly ships himself off to the Academy. While there, he realizes that this is a new body, so he can transfer his soul into a new person. He picks Tyler (Jeremy Sylvers), an impressionable kid with an absentee father who is desperate for a friend. Now it’s up to Andy to stop Chucky from possessing Tyler’s body, though he must fight through strict military officials and meathead bullies to get there.

Those nine months were hard on him. Stress has a way of aging a boy.

Coming out only a scant 9 months after Child’s Play 2, it’s a miracle that anything in the film works at all. Hell, it’s a miracle that Chucky isn’t just a paper cutout glued to a popsicle stick. And while this is Don Mancini’s least favorite screenplay and certainly his shallowest, it nevertheless scrounges up a decent setting, a handful of engaging characters, and throws in a scant theme or two when nobody’s looking. Even though it could certainly use tightening up and the low budget hobbles the capacity for particularly cool effects, it remains a fun, breezy watch, pepped up by Brad Dourif’s evergreen performance.

Dourif is like a sponge, absorbing any wacky tonal imbalances with no apparent effort and embracing the ludicrous fun yet chilling otherness of being a killer doll. The best scenes are those that put him front and center, where he leads the film from beat to prearranged beat like a demented drill sergeant. The plot itself might just be a tarted-up rehash of the first two films, but he pummels it along at a steady clip, whether he’s frustratedly pursuing his naïve yet slippery quarry or spouting haircut puns while slashing a manic barber’s throat.

However, while the character comedy is spot-on, Chucky’s tendency toward quipping renders the film a bit of a shallow clone of the later Elm Street films. Mancini would find the proper balance for his humor in Bride of Chucky (which I can’t wait to write about), but for the time being we’re stuck with but a shadow of the comic monolith Chucky would become. However accomplished the performance is it can’t completely save a rushed, lackluster script.

It's a tough pill to swallow.

Despite its shortcomings, Child’s Play 3 does at least bring some new elements to the table. The military school setting provides ample opportunity for unique setpieces and a set of characters at least slightly to the left (left, left, right, left) of the typical slasher milieu. Instead of a parent refusing to believe their child’s story, it’s the brass refusing to allow insubordination, and instead of Chucky causing “accidents’ with assorted household objects like a homicidal Martha Stewart, he wreaks explosive havoc with armory equipment. It’s the same set of stock situations, but the new setting (which I believe hasn’t been used since 1981’s plodding Evilspeak) wrings the last droplets of life from them.

The downside of this is that every actor has the exact same outfit and haircut, so they’re about as distinguishable as the members of ZZ Top. But there is also an added dimension of Chucky stalking people trained in the art of combat, although the film’s most promising character (a kick-ass chick with an attitude) is shunted aside in the finale like a ten dollar wedding present.

Salt shakers? That's the last time we invite Jenny and Brad anywhere.

The kills are also only intermittently successful. Whether they were limited by budget or time, they’re generally unremarkable (save Chucky’s gloopy demise, which comes after the film’s longest sustained period of tension – a battle inside a funhouse ride). If I’d wanted to see people keel over without a hint of blood, I’d have watched a 50’s Western instead of a Chucky sequel. Fortunately the circumstances surrounding the murders muster up frissons of fright, especially the very first, in which Chucky uses the various toys in the Play Pals CEO’s office to menace him before taking him out.

So really, though Child’s Play 3 may very well be the weakest of the franchise, I’s still worth a look for Chucky devotees. There’s enough material to render it an affable 90 minutes while the franchise uses it as a stepping stone to greener, bloodier pastures.

Killer: Chucky (Brad Dourif)

Final Girl: Andy Barclay (Justin Whelan) feat. DeSilva (Perrey Reeves)

Best Kill: Colonel Cochran dies of a heart attack before Chucky can get to him.

Sign of the Times: Andy shows up at school with a mullet that looks like he was the victim of a drive-by perpetrated by a gang of Billy Ray Cyrus’ rejected stylists.

Scariest Moment: When Chucky is menacing the Play Pals CEO, he sets two Good Guy dolls on the desk to talk to each other in a continuous loop.

Weirdest Moment: Chucky somehow figures out how to mail himself places

Champion Dialogue: “What are children after all, but consumer trainees?”

Body Count: 8; including Chucky, who sure as hell dies a lot for somebody with six movies under his belt.

1. Mr. Sullivan is strangled with a yo-yo.
2. Garbage Man is crushed in a trash compactor.
3. Colonel Cochran has a heart attack.
4. Sergeant Botnik has his throat slit with a razor.
5. Shelton is shot in the chest.
6. Whitehurst throws himself over a grenade.
7. Security Guard is shot in the head.
8. Chucky is slashed to pieces by an industrial fan.

TL;DR: Child's Play 3 is a decent, if rather generic second sequel.

Rating: 6/10

Word Count: 1224

Reviews In This Series

Child's Play (Holland, 1988)
Child's Play 2 (Lafia, 1990)
Child's Play 3 (Bender, 1991)
Bride of Chucky (Yu, 1998)
Seed of Chucky (Mancini, 2004)
Curse of Chucky (Mancini, 2013)

Do The Harlem Shake

Appropriately enough for my spring cleaning period, two of the films I watched this week are very perfect, equally strange echoes of one another. They both deal with the topic of urban education in Harlem, but one focuses on the plight of the white teacher and was directed by master of horror Wes Craven, and the other focuses on a black teen and was based on the novel Push by Sapphire.

Music of the Heart

Year: 1999

Director: Wes Craven

Cast: Meryl Streep, Angela Bassett, Cloris Leachman

Run Time: 2 hours 4 minutes

MPAA Rating: PG

A newly divorced single mother takes the only job she can get – teaching violin to underprivileged kids in a Harlem elementary school.

Music of the Heart is a very special film. It’s the only film in Wes Craven’s career that isn’t horror or a thriller, and I’m immensely pleased he was given the opportunity to make it, even if he did have to strong-arm the producers by threatening not to make Scream 3 (although a world without Scream 3 isn’t necessarily a bleak prospect). This film is but a taste of the world that could have been if Craven hadn’t been pigeonholed as a horror director by the one-two punch of The Last House on the Left and The Hills Have Eyes. Frankly, as a fan, I can’t say I’m sorry it worked out the way it did, but at least this film proves that the man was capable of expanding his horizons.

Unfortunately, that expansion was channeled into a heartwarming biopic, which might just be my least favorite form of cinema after straight-up snuff films. I would have preferred to bestow this movie with a full-ledged review, as I would with any Craven work, but this genre is just too daunting a prospect for the little ol’ horror nerd that I am. That said, the film itself is pretty decent, though woefully generic in the wake of thematically similar flicks like Freedom Writers, Stand and Deliver, Take the Lead, and even Danny DeVito’s Renaissance Man (a film I secretly love). 

Craven’s horror upbringing is totally buried (save for one instance in which the classic Vertigo shot – where the background seems to stretch into infinity behind a character – is reversed, with profoundly mystifying results), replaced with fluttering birds and warm, rosy lighting. The film spends a great deal of time cycling through an It’s a Small World-type array of every conceivable urban conflict and occasionally goes alarmingly far out of its way to be Meaningful, but as a low-key character study it excels.

Meryl Streep’s Roberta Guaspari is no airbrushed white savior to these Harlem kiddos. She’s a cracked and broken, immensely weak-willed woman with more character flaws than there are heads in Hannibal Lecter’s pantry. She’s not some perfect Barbie doll whose only flaw is Caring Too Much. This ain’t a Hillary Swank picture, and this ain’t that part of a job interview where they ask “what’s your biggest weakness?” There’s no sugar-coating off this rude, brash, selfish, scared, desperate woman who finds her inner strength through the course of a ten-year teaching career (the time jump in the film is startling at first, but it picks up fast).

Streep is excellent, it must be said, though you can figure one can just assume that at this point. Cloris Leachman (as her mother) seems a little lost in the words at points, but she’s hardly in the film long enough to really matter, and she’s bolstered by its supporting cast including a tough-as-nails Angela Bassett, a proudly subtle Gloria Estefan, and the second-creepiest Culkin brother, Kieran. But Streep is the cream of the crop with her unflinching, raw portrayal of a woman on the brink.

Craven’s typical sense of humor is also at play in Music of the Heart, allowing it to flow smoothly without becoming a dour, didactic treatise. There’s perhaps a bit of an overemphasis on full performances of musical pieces, without which the pace would be snappier and the run time blissfully shorter, but the film never stops being fun, which is much to Craven’s credit.

I’m happy such a singular film exists in the great master’s oeuvre. As a genre devotee I can’t say I’ll ever have the urge to watch it again, but Music of the Heart is a dashing and competent piece of filmmaking. What more could I ask for?

Rating: 7/10

Precious

Year: 2009

Director: Lee Daniels

Cast: Gabourey Sidibe, Mo'Nique, Paula Patton

Run Time: 1 hour 50 minutes

MPAA Rating: R

An impoverished, illiterate, overweight Harlem teen attempts to get a basic education while literally everything bad happens to her.

Lee Daniels will not be getting an invitation to my fantasy dinner party. My guess is that he’d more or less immediately start screaming about the hypocrisy of enjoying oneself while there is still turmoil in the Middle East. That said, a personality like that instantly lends itself to Oscarbait filmmaking, and Daniels’ audacious visual style make Precious a tremendously satisfying watch, even if it is never a truly enjoyable one.

For starters, he uses one of the simplest tricks in the book to lay a foundation on which to build his film: a realistic, faux-documentary filming style. Shot largely on handheld cameras that zoom in and out in the middle of shots and occasionally receive an obstructed view of the proceedings, this aesthetic puts the audience right there in Precious’ universe, almost subconsciously implying its authenticity. At intervals, Daniels goes overboard and one gets the impression of being yoked to a catnipped ferret as it runs back and forth around the room, but for the most part it’s not intrusive, in the style popularized by shows like The Office or Parks and Recreation.

With this structure in place, precious builds a mighty empire of daring aesthetic decisions. Many of these revolve around Precious’ fantasies of a better life, the sleek glitziness of which is captured by blissfully still, traditional camerawork. These frequent fantastical intrusions into her daily life can be subtle (a glamorous younger photo of her abusive mother coming to life to coo soft words to her daughter) or alarming (Precious escapes into a staccato fantasy world while being molested by her father – whee…), but they are always aesthetically confident and deeply impactful. These additional touches lessen as the film goes on, but presumably it’s intentional, although the film does lose some of its sparkle from there on out.

Precious is a film dominated by its visual schema, because as a plot there’s almost nothing to it. Something bad happens to Precious, she tries to make a positive change, something worse happens to Precious. Lather, rinse, repeat. The ambiguous ending isn’t nearly as dour as it could have been and – again – the lack of closure is certainly an authorial choice, but this is a film that can’t escape a thick cloud of Importance. It’s certainly an important story to tell, but one absolutely must be in the mood to receive it.

You see, the world where Precious lives, the world where beautiful white people are incessantly pumped into the living room through her TV, is our world, a fact which the film’s entire being endeavors to drive home. In addition to the gritty documentary aesthetic, the actors make great sacrifices to drive the point home. Gabourey Sidibe – hardly a traditional movie star – suffers abuse at the hands of everyone around her, painting Precious as a sort of social turtle, drawing back into herself and speaking almost inaudibly when she feels uncomfortable. Her performance is infinitely varied and certainly breathtaking.

The performers that surround her are likewise tremendously brave, and I don’t mean in the sense that they forgo movie star makeup, though they do. Mo’Nique (who plays Precious’ mother) overcame a childhood of repression to therapeutically portray a gut-wrenching, subtly human, yet startlingly evil role, Paula Patton channels her inner frustrated teacher, and Mariah Carey doesn’t sing a note. That’s true dedication.

Precious is a tough watch, it is a daring tirade, and it is overwhelmingly an actor’s movie. As a showcase for pitch-perfect film technique, it is untouchable, though as a story – even an Important one – it’s a little too unfocused to be truly special.

Rating: 7/10

Word Count: 1377

Marky Mark

For our interview with Mark Rosman, the director of these films, please click here.

Part two of my fabulous spring cleaning escapades is a set of three flicks that might otherwise have never entered the pages of this blog in a million years: the family-friendly fare directed by Mark Rosman (of The House on Sorority Row), who was kind enough to sit down for an interview on the podcast. We’re incredibly lucky we got a chance to speak with him, and it was the least I could do to rewatch his classic Disney/Duff flicks to prepare. Now that the statute of limitations has lifted on that interview, let’s see how these childhood classics hold up now that I’m old and world-weary.

The Perfect Man

Year: 2005

Director: Mark Rosman

Cast: Hilary Duff, Heather Locklear, Chris Noth

Run Time: 1 hour 40 minutes

MPAA Rating: PG

A teen girl is tired of her mom moving all the time after a series of bad breakups, so she invents a fictional secret admirer and catfishes her in order to get her to stay in one place.

Ah, there’s nothing like a pre-teen comedy centered around online fraud to get the laugh train rolling. Is it just me, or does the separation of a decade or two always make delightful movies seem so much more grim? Well, regardless of that trenchant observation, The Perfect Man is a fun romp through the angst and malaise of mid-2000’s teendom. If you can stifle your urge to smack Hilary Duff for complaining about the size of her family’s gargantuan apartment (which basically takes up an entire floor of a building and requires several long exterior tracking shots to navigate), there’s a snappy script and a silly sense of humor buried within the film.

A keen sense of directorial vision isn’t exactly a high priority in these types of films, but Mark Rosman successfully ushers it to safety. His presence can be felt in the roving camerawork that defines the film’s geography and the creative staging of the computer sequences, but for the most part he doesn’t try anything too fancy, preferring to let the story speak for itself. And while that story would hardly surprise any remotely awake audience member (the perfect man has been inside yourself all along…), it’s a charming and nostalgic trip back to the early days of the internet, where anything seemed possible and the world wide web was a wide open fantasy world ready to be explored, instead of just a repository for porn, kittens, and hateful YouTube comments.

It’s one of those films that you just need to let wash over you without a trace of cynicism. Luckily, the dialogue helps promote that, both with disarmingly intelligent Kevin Williamson-esque teenspeak and a series of witty, playful banter sequences, especially early on. Sure you can laugh at how Duff’s character thinks it’s appropriate to drop by her friend’s uncle’s apartment in the middle of the day or the arch selfishness present in every single decision she makes, but that’s all part of enjoying the experience.

A solid supporting cast likewise buoys the film, led by Rhea Pearlman in an undernourished but warmly human role as the mom’s best friend. While her talents may have been slightly wasted, people like Mike O’Malley and Chris Noth round out a credible group, and the teen cast (including Ben Feldman and Vanessa Lengies) provide excellent realistic urban foils for Duff’s squeaky clean Disney-informed performance. Even Heather Locklear sells us on the plight of her heartbroken character, though she may need to take her face to the shop to get it moving again.

Unlike the titular man, it’s not a perfect movie. There’s a frankly hideous gay stereotypes that prances through at shockingly regular intervals to completely lose his mind like a dog in heat any time a human man walks by, and there’s a bit of business with a fire escape and an orchid that could have used a great deal of polish, but when worst comes to worst, The Perfect Man pulls through. If youth-oriented, female-driven romantic comedies aren’t your bag, this film isn’t for you, but otherwise it’s a pleasant treat that doesn’t overtax the imagination. It’s a comfort film, like shoving macaroni and cheese into your eyes.

Rating: 6/10

Life-Size

Year: 2000

Director: Mark Rosman

Cast: Tyra Banks, Lindsay Lohan, Jere Burns

Run Time: 1 hour 41 minutes

MPAA Rating: G

When a young girl tries to use a magic spell to resurrect her mother, she accidentally brings her doll to life instead.

Of all the movies on this list, Life-Size can most easily be described s a cult classic, at least among members of my generation. The TV movie (which aired on the Disney Channel about 800 times a week in the early 2000’s) has burrowed its way deep into the subconscious cultural minds of the millennials. It was with no small measure of excitement that I revisited this film, and it was with profound disappointment that I received it, though I did bring back several valuable impressions that were completely missed by baby Brennan.

First off, this movie is dark. Beneath the wacky fish-out-of-water hijinks inherent in a doll joining the human world, there is a savagely strong riptide of bitter loss. Lindsay Lohan only had one shot at bringing her mother back and accidentally wasted it, so her performance is tinged by guilt and bitter despair. Family movies are expected to have “heart,” but the lessons garnered from this situation are rife with poignant, messy humanity in a disarmingly direct way. It’s about as surprising as, say, a Spongebob Squarepants episode where the undersea gang battle apartheid.

This depth and color of emotion is the film’s biggest strength. At its core, Life-Size is about learning to let go and not dwelling on the dead while forgetting to live. It even goes so far as to have Lohan’s football team lose the climactic game at the end, a narrative and physical impossibility in films of this ilk. It’s like Rosman forgot he was making a children’s movie and kept on careening straight back into cynical horror. But this is the really wonderful thing about Life-Size: It doesn’t treat children like blithering idiots. It has a discussion at their level about real issues that, unfortunate as it is, many of them may be facing. It’s brave, it’s real, and it makes an intelligent argument in favor of life.

And then there’s that Barbie stuff. I don’t mean to diminish what are a handful of decently amusing sequences, but the film doesn’t really engage with its concept as much as it could have. The script utilizes her doll identity as a means of combatting the expectation that women have to be perfect at everything (like I said, this flick is hella dark), but there’s a lot of potential comic energy that finds itself wasted. After a couple gags, her doll origins hardly come up, in favor of a rather forced and awkward family drama about Lohan being uncomfortable with the doll making moves on her dad. Also, the theme song “Be A Star” is bubbly, catchy stuff but in the world before autotune… Let’s just say I never thought I’d write that Tyra Banks should stick to acting.

By the end of the film, Life-Size has covered just about every emotional base it’s possible to cover on the Disney Channel, but it vanishes without a true delightful sparkle that would allow it to rise above its TV movie peers. It’s dashingly unique and heartfelt, but its humor is much too ordinary for its far-out conceit. It’ll always be worth a watch if it pops up on your TV station, but otherwise it’s not worth actively seeking out again.

Rating: 5/10

A Cinderella Story

Year: 2004

Director: Mark Rosman

Cast: Hilary Duff, Chad Michael Murray, Dan Byrd

Run Time: 1 hour 35 minutes

MPAA Rating: PG

The Cinderella fairy tale is updated to tell the story of a young outcast who works at a diner and the handsome jock who falls in love with her online.

Oh, nostalgia. Where would we be without you? The golden glow of the endless summers of yesteryear creates a kind of superpower in people, making them invulnerable to the terrible movies they loved during their childhood. Sergio experienced this firsthand when I sat him down to watch A Cinderella Story (on VHS, no less), a movie (that he was seeing for the first time) that I still largely enjoy, but it, for all intents and purposes, not a masterpiece.

This is nothing against Mark Rosman, who ushers the film in and out of existence so efficiently that you half wonder if you accidentally pressed the fast-forward button on your remote. No, the biggest cross A Cinderella Story has to bear is its script, which is so achingly 2004 that your pants sag a little just from looking at the poster. It’s an unforgivably treacly teen soap marred by some legitimately embarrassing slapstick that’s enjoyable on many levels, but true quality only rarely rears its head.

Fortunately, most of the not-so-good remains genuinely arresting. Just like The Perfect Man, A Cinderella Story is a sort of time capsule to a more innocent age of the Internet, where computers were enormous and you could leave a cell phone behind at a school dance without noticing for days. And you can’t help but find yourself tickled by certain details of the storyline, like the fact that Chad Michael Murray is so thick that he doesn’t recognize Hilary without her masquerade mask on (even though her hair, lips, body, and voice remain exactly the same) or the idea that “Cinderella”’s father could somehow tragically perish in his own home during an earthquake that doesn’t even knock her stuffed animals off their shelves. Although, interestingly enough, this scene links A Cinderella Story with the horror masterpiece Wes Craven’s New Nightmare, which also incorporated the real-life Northridge earthquake into its story. Well, it’s interesting to me at least.

Another unintentionally hilarious conceit in the script is that gorgeous, blonde, convertible-driving Hilary Duff is somehow a nerdy outcast. Sure, her car could use a fresh coat of paint, but the way people go on about it, you’d think it was a 1972 Gremlin with the bumper taped on. And the main insult that flies her way is “diner girl,” because apparently it’s uncool to have a job. It’s like the screenwriter’s only human contact came from reruns of The Real Housewives. Or, to be fair, maybe people who live in the Valley really are just that terrible.

The only unforgivably bad elements of A Cinderella Story are the wicked stepsisters. Their vain, pugnacious screeching is absolutely murder to get through. The pair of them are introduced with an underwater fart gag and it only goes downhill from there. Luckily, their screen time is severely limited, or you’d have to chew a handful of Tums before putting the movie on.

But enough of that Negative Nancy crap, because the movie has an ace up its sleeve. The wicked stepmother, that paragon of sinister vanity, is played by Jennifer Coolidge, mistress of spinning twenty minutes or less of screen time into cinematic gold. She’s pure, hyperbolic evil, and consistently hilarious throughout the entire affair. Lin Shaye (of the Insidious franchise) also makes a brief but delightful appearance as the school’s daffy secretary.

I really enjoy A Cinderella Story for what it is. What it is isn’t a great film, but it’s a window into another time and I madly appreciate it for that. So you can feel free to utterly ignore my numerical score if that sounds up your alley. If not, stay away. Either way, you won’t regret it.

Rating: 4/10

Word Count: 1969

Endless Summer

Alrighty, buckaroos. It’s September and things have slowed to a crawl around here because the sheer mass of movies that I’ve watched (among other real life obligations) is dragging behind me like tin cans on a “Just Married” car. Try as I might to knock out full reviews for each of these suckers, I’m but one fallible human being trying to have a good time. So it’s high time for some spring cleaning. Or rather, end of summer cleaning. I’m opening the windows, letting in some air, and clearing off those cluttered shelves to make way for the rich splendor of the Halloween season, where we can once again kick things into high gear. Buckle your seatbelts, kiddos.

The Return of the Living Dead

Year: 1985

Director: Dan O'Bannon

Cast: Clu Gulager, James Karen, Thom Mathews

Run Time: 1 hour 31 minutes

MPAA Rating: R

Despite the splendors of American Army engineering, a chemical agent at a medical warehouse leaks into the nearby cemetery where a group of punks are partying, causing zombies to rise.

80’s horror is kind of my thing, in case you hadn’t noticed. As an extension of that, I deserve a lifetime sentence in nerd hail for having waited so long to see The Return of the Living Dead. Having been written and directed by Dan O’Bannon (frequent John Carpenter collaborator and the man who wrote the story treatment for freaking Alien), and starring Clu Gulager (The Initiation, A Nightmare on Elm Street 2), James Karen (Poltergeist), Thom Mathews (the cutest Tommy Jarvis, from Friday the 13th Part VI), and Linnea Quigley (everything), I’m basically a Benedict Arnold to my cause, but I’ve rectified that now.

For its first thirty minutes or so, RotLD is unimpeachably the funniest horror comedy ever to walk this freshly-dug earth. The script is tight, fast-paced, and the tongue is so firmly in cheek that the teeth keep biting it every time they try to talk. The punk ensemble is a pitch perfect Greek Chorus of prickly delinquency led by a fearless Quigley with fire engine red toilet brush hair. You haven’t lived until you’ve seen Linnea crab walk her way over the hood of a car. The fact that she spends almost the entire remainder of the film naked certainly doesn’t tarnish the film’s cult reputation, but it’s also a dastardly hilarious shock gag that keeps on giving.

While the punks are pure bubblegum fun, the adult cast knows exactly what type of movie they’re making and have no qualms about pitching their performances up to the rafters. Karen and Gulager seem to be locked in a fierce battle to see who can burst their own blood vessels first, and the winner is us.

The set design is pretty top notch, too. Although the film never escapes the “this was made in somebody’s basement” feel, each element of the set is integrated into the storyline in a unique and clever way, from the eye test chart decorating the office wall to the pinned butterflies in the storage room.  Everything has a purpose, whether it’s a sight gag so subtle you’re liable to need further viewings to even notice it, or merely a feature that will come in handy later.

Unfortunately, Return of the Living Dead runs out of steam faster than me after foolishly assuming I can run a mile without warming up first. The characters are too thin to hang such a good movie on, and it ends up ripping right through them by the hallway point. The film never ever let up being entertaining, but its nonstop, careening clip flags in favor of a more standard house in siege movie that gives an inexplicably heavy level of focus to Miguel Nuñez (of Friday the 13th: A New Beginning, in which he was nominated for Best Supporting Actor for the role of Demon, the enchilada-scarfing biker who gets impaled while Hershey squirting in an outhouse).

And while the lead zombie has an impressive visage and a terrifying mien, the effects in the film are surprisingly demure for an 80’s zombie epic. For all the obsession with brains, there’s hardly a flash of the pink stuff, and what little we’re left with doesn’t exactly hold up all these years later.

It’s a very cheap, unassuming, slapdash little movie, but that’s exactly what allowed it to harness the gonzo anti-establishment energy that drives its engine for so much of the time. Do I wish it were more consistent? Yes. Would it be better with a gore top-up? Undoubtedly. But it’s still Return of the Living Dead, and its ratty, clever, indefatigable energy refuses to be held down. Nor would I want it to be. Let your freak flag fly, baby.

Rating: 7/10

Night of the Creeps

Year: 1986

Director: Fred Dekker

Cast: Jason Lively, Tom Atkins, Steve Marshall

Run Time: 1 hour 28 minutes

MPAA Rating: R

Two college freshmen accidentally unleash an alien experiment that turns people into evil zombies.

If I deserved a lifetime sentence in nerd jail for missing out on The Return of the Living Dead, having seen Night of the Creeps certainly qualifies me for parole on good behavior. The film, which has unfortunately almost been lost to the mists of time, is a true gem that deserves to be unearthed, packed with goodies from director Fred Dekker (of The Monster Squad, a much more recognized flick).

For starters, I’m a sucker for college movies and Night of the Creeps is an excellent depiction of the freshman year experience. Within relatable situations (crushing on the unattainable girl, rushing the unattainable frat, experiencing freedom for the very first time), Dekker (who also wrote the screenplay) etches out a genuine friendship between two teens, ride with rich humor and poignant humanity. With such a strong core to branch out from, Night of the Creeps is free to explore all sorts of crazy side streets and as such is one of the most explosively creative, jubilantly hilarious horror-comedies of the decade, hitting both sides of that hyphenate in nearly equal measure.

Admittedly though, one side does dominate through seer strength and willpower so let’s begin with that one: the comedy. There’s so much going on in the film (frat pranks, alien ray gun fights, parasitic zombie worms, a black and white sci-fi prologue, and even a mad axe-wielding slasher) that it would rattle with pure energy even without a strong creative vision. But Dekker must be French for “duct tape” because the man holds all the disparate elements together like a pro, infusing them with laugh-out-loud wit every step of the way. The film traffics in self-referential, winking humor in the vein of Jason Lives, but just like its plot, it can’t nail itself down to one single style. High camp, sophomoric frat comedy, goofy sight gags, and intellectual barbs are tossed into the mélange and blended expertly.

No single actor exemplifies this movie’s personality more than Tom Atkins (of Maniac Cop and Halloween III: Season of the Witch). Atkins swallows the script, digests it, and expels it from every pore of his body. His “Thrill Me,” catch phrase is iconic, but every aspect of his character (the detective investigating the strange happenings on campus) from his deadpan one-liner deliveries to his clipped, decisive movements and hyperbolically serious demeanor is explosively inexplicable and outrageously mirth-inducing. It is also thanks to Atkins that the horror portion of the film works even a quarter as well as it does.

The gravitas he lends to the proceedings allow the scarier moments to get under your skin and claw their way firmly around the base of your spine. Between him and the excellent special effects (which render what could have been totally silly parasite worms as utterly menacing, absolutely autonomous creatures with drive and sinister purpose), Night of the Creeps lands some square sucker punches when you least expect it.

And the filmmaking ain’t half bad, either. When you compare Night of the Creeps to Return of the Living Dead, another goofy horror flick directed by its writer, it’s light years head behind the camera. There’s some daring cinematography, including an immensely memorable spinning shot that outstrips any single visual moment in RotLD, and the lighting scheme (especially when it veers into pulpy pinks and blues) is quite dashing.

All in all, Night of the Creeps is an easy film to fall head over heels for. It’s a heap of fleshy, flashy fun, and it really deserves to stand shoulder to shoulder with classic titles like Evil Dead II and Ghostbusters, if I do say so myself. It’s my blog. Sue me.

Rating: 8/10

I Still Know What You Did Last Summer

Year: 1998

Director: Danny Cannon

Cast: Jennifer Love Hewitt, Freddie Prinze Jr., Brandy

Run Time: 1 hour 40 minutes

MPAA Rating: R

Julie James is back and wetter than ever – on an island vacation ruined by monsoon weather, the rain slicker-clad killer returns to claim the lives of her and her friends.

I Know What You Did Last Summer is hardly a classic teen slasher, so the fact that it more or less instantly dove into the realm of ludicrous, crappy sequeldom shouldn’t come as a surprise. In a way, it almost improves the series, and in many ways it makes it a whole lot worse. The instant backslide into pulpy nonsense is fondly reminiscent of 80’s slasher dreck, but the film is so inextricably stupid that – like the Eskimos – I was forced to come up with 50 different words to differentiate the various gradations of stupid that I encountered. Here is but a small sample.

Idiotsplosive: This is a word for something that’s loudly, obnoxiously idiotic. You can’t possibly ignore it because it’s in your face with a bullhorn shouting “Here I am!’ and sharing Facebook posts about Donald Trump.

This word is the exclusive domain of characters like Jack Black cameoing as the local pothead. Yes, that Jack Black. He runs through nearly every scene in the first act, practically flapping his arms and shrieking inane stereotypes. It’s sheer bliss when he gets a set of hedge clippers buried in his chest. This word also handily describes the score, which is mostly content to busty itself combining rip-offs of Friday the 13th and The Exorcist, but the second anything remotely tense happens, gets overexcited and lets loose with a cacophony of bleats and squeals. Someone touches Julie’s shoulder? BWAMP! A mote of dust lands on a lamp in the foreground? BWLEH! It’s exhausting.

Infinidim: This is a word for something so richly, complexly stupid that it borders on incomprehensible.

This word was created for scenes like the opening red herring, which assume that nobody in the audience knows the capitol of Brazil and that no angry bystander will have irately shouted the correct answer before the reveal an hour later. This word also comes in handy for a film that bases two entirely separate scare scenes around clothes dryers. If you care to extrapolate from that, there’s rather slim pickings when it comes to decent frights in this flick, though one of its jump scares is suitably goosebump-inducing.

Stupidndous: This is a word for something so outrageously daft that it can’t help but be heaps of fun.

Here’s a line from I Still Know What You Did Last Summer: “That was like, heart attack time!” In short, this is a fantastic party movie if you’ve got a big bowl of popcorn and a pile of quip-ready friends. From the high camp of the killer’s reveal and the epilogue (“I love my electric toothbrush!”) to the nonsensical voodoo subplot and the daring decision to put Jennifer Love Hewitt in a sports bra while a hurricane rages around her, this movie does everything wrong in all the right ways.

Micromoronic: This is the word for when the stupid hasn’t entirely gone away, but has temporarily subsided to manageable levels.

Believe it or not, there’s a couple almost completely decent elements to ISKWYDLS. For one, the cinematography is gorgeous, capturing long summer nights with a crisp honey glow and shooting the hotel hallways with an almost (dare I say) Dean Cundey-esque precision to the placement of light and shadow. And I must admit that a stormy tropical island is a pretty awesome place to set a slasher movie, Brandy or no Brandy.

At the end of the day, I Still Know What You Did Last Summer is harmless. If you’re lactose intolerant, you won’t be able to stomach its lethal levels of cheese, but otherwise it’s a half-decent flick for a summer marathon as long as you never take it seriously. It’s not as well made as its predecessor, but it might just be more fun to watch, so take your pick.

Body Count: 9

1. Dave is hooked through the mouth.
2. Derek is hooked to death.
3. Housekeep has her throat slashed.
4. Titus is stabbed in the chest with hedge clippers.
5. Hotel Manager is knifed in the skull.
6. Tyrell is hooked through the neck.
7. Hestus is harpooned in the back.
8. Nancy is harpooned in the gut.
9. Will is hooked in the chest.

Rating: 5/10

Word Count: 2194
Reviews In This Series
I Know What You Did Last Summer (Gillespie, 1997)
I Still Know What You Did Last Summer (Cannon, 1998)

Census Bloodbath: Alma Murder

For our podcast episode about this very movie, please click here.

Year: 1987

Director: Bill Froehlich

Cast: Lori Lethin, Brendan Hughes, Alex Rocco

Run Time: 1 hour 35 minutes

MPAA Rating: R

Well, it’s that time of year again. The sun is beating down, the kids are pulling themselves up by the backpack straps and heading back to school, and... I’m not one of them. That’s right, I’m just another college grad, facing the endless void of the unlimited future. Like so many film majors before me, I’m clinging desperately to my wall of DVDs, hoping they won’t fling me off into eternal limbo. But unlike those chuckleheads, I have supremely bad taste and I’ve chosen to commemorate Back to School week with the 1987 meta slasher classic Return to Horror High. Contrary to popular belief, this film is not a sequel to anything. It might not even technically qualify as a film, but hear me out here.

Return to Horror High is a very special brand of late 80’s slash-‘em-up. It was so far into the rapidly deflating slasher boom that hardly any of the films actually took themselves seriously anymore. 1987 was the year of A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors, the film which saw Freddy’s full metamorphosis into quipping carnival huckster, and many contemporaneous flicks like Sleepaway Camp II: Unhappy Campers, Slumber Party Massacre II, and Cheerleader Camp followed suit with goofy, Hannah-Barbera antics. Horror high is silly enough to be lumped into that category, and yet it transcends it with some legitimately intriguing satire.

It’s still a shallow microbudget exploitation scudbucket, but it has a flash of intelligence that lodges it firmly between the superficial parody of a Shriek if You Know What I Did Last Friday the 13th and the insightful skewering of Scream. Unlike any of its peers, it actually has something to unpack. Even if most of that is Styrofoam fluff, it’s a remarkable achievement.

I’ll elaborate, but I should probably explain the plot before this review turns into a Tolstoy novel.

Return to Horror High tells the story of Crippen High School, a campus that was rocked with a series of murders in 1982. When a film crew descends upon the now-abandoned campus to shoot a movie based on those very killings, they soon realize that whoever perpetrated them might never have left as they begin to disappear one by one. This story is told though evidence collected after the fact from the only survivor - the screenwriter Arthur Lyman (Richard Brestoff) – by the stoic Chief Dreyner (Pepper Martin of The Outing) and the sexily irreverent Officer Tyler (an exultant Maureen McCormick, finally free from the shackles of Marcia Brady) on the front lawn, which is strewn with dismembered bodies.

The cast and crew include Callie Cassidy (Lori Lethin of Bloody Birthday and The Prey) the effervescent leading ldy; Harry (actual notable Alex Rocco of The Godfather), the sleazebag producer with a bimbo in one hand and a sandwich in the same hand; Steven Blake (Brendan Hughes), a corn-fed and studly local cop who winds up with a role opposite Callie, who just might be interested in loving him; and Oliver (underrated character actor George Clooney), the leading man who gets whisked away on a cushy pilot gig and becomes the killer’s first victim.

There’s nothing better than watching Oscar-winning actors kick the bucket in movies that cost less than their most recent grocery run.

The truly flabbergasting thing about Horror High is that it’s actually consistently, intentionally funny. Its sense of humor might be too daffy for the more highbrow epicures among us, but if that describes you, how did you even find my blog in the first place? Crew members pile out of a bathroom stall like a clown car, the director and the FX guy get into a fight over a set of exploding breast implants, and the janitor mops up the blood after every kill. It’s like an Abbott and Costello routine gone haywire, mixed up with the already ever-present 80’s camp that looms throughout the film like the truly outrageous amount of smoke in its hallways (from the looks of things, their smoke machine budget probably outstripped their payroll budget, which would explain why Clooney is only in one scene).

Because of its ludicrous tone, Horror High allows itself a stroke of genius that many of its slasher brethren are denied: it turns its low budget into an asset rather than a liability. First on the chopping block are the kills, which have to share about a thimble of blood between them like it’s Christmas morning in a Dickensian orphanage. The film converts a great deal of these into sight gags, using match cuts to imply a bigger impact through a silly juxtaposition or using a silhouetted and/or offscreen kill as a punchline to another scene. SPOILERS [An attempt to explain it all away by having every death be a hoax goes totally awry in a nonsensical, almost psychedelic closing sequence, but I admire the screenwriters’ chutzpah in attempting to push the film so far over the top that the top is just a distant, happy memory.]

But the cleverest integration of its low budget mojo is also the film’s postmodern heart and soul. Utilizing its nature as a film within a film, Return to Horror High goes hog wild, unabashedly exposing its own lighting setups, revealing the edges of its sets, and generally reveling in its own artifice. And why not? The plot takes place on a film set, so nothing is off limits.  The scenes being shot are based on a true story, so they also serve as flashbacks, and any flaws in the scenes shot in “reality” can be explained away by the superficialities of life on a film set [as well as the fact that the story being told by Lyman may well be entirely fabricated]. Everything coils back in on itself like a bedazzled M. C. Escher piece and it’s mildly brilliant.

A slasher with any sort of brain in its head is like that horse that can do math. You wouldn’t notice in in a film of any other genre – rather, you’d expect it - but it’s something truly surprising and remarkable to behold under the circumstance. I just want to pet it and feed it a salt lick.

While Return to Horror High does have several layers to it (first and foremost a genuinely decent camp comedy horror flick, second a meta take on exploitation filmmaking), no matter how deep you strip mine, there’s not a shred of horror tension to be found in the entire thing (especially once you realize that not a single death is actually onscreen). That’s certainly not damning, especially considering how much of it undeniably works, but it definitely feels like there’s a final piece missing from the puzzle. Perhaps if the film’s denouement made more sense, or in fact any slight glimmer of sense at all, it would be rid of the somewhat bereaved quality it leaves the audience behind with, but as it stands it opens stronger than it closes. Kind of like when my mom packs my suitcase for me on a trip.

However, griping about Return to Horror High can be dangerous, because the film is a Rock Slide Zone of 80’s cheese. The noise of even a mild complaint instantly becomes buried beneath a teetering tower of relentlessly abysmal fashions, topsy turvy performances, and dazzlingly surreal scenes that defy the imagination. I’m hesitant to spoil the masses of riches that this film has to offer, so I’ll describe only one that you – dear reader – may test the water: Officer Tyler, drenched in blood, describes the carnage she just witnessed while fondling her own boob.

Marcia, Marcia, Marcia…

Return to Horror High certainly isn’t for everyone, but it’s one of the best bad movies of the late slasher cycle and it comes highly recommended from yours truly. It’s wacky, wet, and wild. You won’t experience anything even remotely similar to the classic slashers we know and love, but sometimes it’s nice to have a break and stare in incredulity at a screen for 90 minutes as something inutterably, ineffably, indelibly remarkable unfolds. Plus, if you’ve ever wanted to see George Clooney get ruthlessly murdered by a psycho in yellow dishwashing gloves, you’ll never have a better opportunity.

Killer: Principal Kastleman (Andy Romano) [But who actually dies?]

Final Girl: Callie Cassidy (Lori Lethin)

Best Kill: it’s not gory, or even particularly specific (Oliver is slammed against a door and blood pools – we don’t even glimpse a murder weapon) but seeing Clooney in a classically generic slasher sequence is a sight to behold.

Sign of the Times: Callie Cassidy investigates murders in a chic periwinkle jumpsuit.

Scariest Moment: In the film within the film, a Quasimodo-masked killer dissects a biology teacher.

Weirdest Moment: Steven tears the mask off an African-American janitor’s face to reveal the white principal and angrily shouts, “Kastleman, you honky!”

Champion Dialogue: “Would you care to walk around in the scene with your schlong hanging out? Only in your case, darling, it would be a schlort.”

Body Count: 10

1. Oliver is killed offscreen.
2. Actor is decapitated with an axe.
3. Grip is dragged into a sandbox.
4. Robbie is slashed with a fan.
5. Mr. Burnbaum is dissected in the film.
6. Blake’s neck is snapped in a dream.
7. Callie Cassidy is decapitated in a dream.
8. Freddy is killed offscreen.
9. Harry is decapitated.
10. Josh is decapitated.

TL;DR: Return to Horror High is a genuinely funny, if underfunded slasher satire.

Rating: 7/10

Word Count: 1600