Tag Slashers

• AKA:


• Director: Robert Hiltzik


• Writer: Robert Hiltzik


• Starring: Vincent Pastore, Michael Gibney, Paul DeAngelo, Jonathan Tiersten


• Run Time: 86 mins

Alan, a clumsy, overweight and slightly-retarded camper at Camp Manabe, is constantly picked on by the popular kids. Soon just about everyone who has victimised him begins to turn up dead in terrible ways. Camp counsellor Ronnie, who survived a bloodbath at Camp Arawak years earlier, is convinced that the killer, Angela has returned. Or is a copycat killer on the loose?

Robert Hiltzik wrote and directed the infamous 1983 summer camp slasher film Sleepaway Camp, a film which featured one of the most unforgettable endings I’ve ever seen (go and watch it if you don’t know what happened – even Tarantino loves it) and which went on to become a cult horror hit. A couple of sequels followed, neither of which had anything to do with Hiltzik and which starred a new actress as the gender-confused killer, Angela. A third sequel went into production in 1992 but that was canned when the production company went under. But with the dawn of the internet age, Hiltzik realised that there was a demand out there for a direct sequel to the original and, not having directed a film since the original, decided to make the sequel that everyone wanted. It took him five years and numerous re-cuts and re-shoots but finally he managed to create Return to Sleepaway Camp, a 2000s slasher which for all intents and purposes looks like it was made back in the mid-80s.

In some ways you wish he’d never bothered. Return to Sleepaway Camp is a poorly acted, haphazardly edited (what’s with the constant fade-to-black screens after every scene?) and rather humdrum slasher which was obviously hindered by its drawn out production. But on the flip side, Hiltzik has captured the look of the 80s summer camp slasher down to a tee, so much so that I had to double check the date to make sure that it wasn’t a lost film that had been uncovered. Shot in 2003, it was finally released in 2008, hence the reason why the late Isaac Hayes is able to make a cameo (a pointless two-minute role which no doubt got him a decent pay cheque). Perhaps it’s the nostalgia weighing heavy but the film’s low budget 80s-style charm is the precisely the reason why this works way better than it has any right to.

Fans were on board from the get-go with the announcement that some of the surviving characters from the original would return alongside the same actors who played them. On a continuity note this is great for a sequel. But the returning actors seem to have learnt little in their years between summer camp stints. Paul DeAngelo reprises his role as Ronnie, one of the counsellors from the original who decided to stay in the summer camp business. He’s all muscle and no acting chops. Like seriously, this guy could be one of the worst actors I’ve ever seen. His delivery and timing is terrible. Equally as bad is Jonathan Tiersten as Ricky, Angela’s cousin who survived the original, but has since decked himself out like some boy band wannabe. Neither man brings anything to the table except that linking value to the original and what they were able to get away with (i.e. lack of talent) in the 80s is brazenly exposed in today’s market.

It’s the new stars who are the most inept and this is aimed squarely at Michael Gibney who plays Alan. He is quite simply the most irritating person ever to grace a slasher film. There’s no way he’d have any friends at a place like this. He acts like a total asshole to everyone, picks on kids less fortunate than him but then whines and cries like mad when the older kids pick on him. Gibney completely overplays the role, shouting and raising his voice during every sentence and having this constantly gormless look on his face. I don’t know how Hiltzik can expect us to sympathise with him, in fact it’s the opposite and you wish him a slow and agonising death from the very first scene. “Your ass stinks” is his favourite catchphrase and it’s a phrase which is repeated time and time again.

Slashers live and die by their metaphorical swords so at least Return to Sleepaway Camp delivers plenty of the sub-genre’s required inventive death scenes. One poor guy has his penis attached to a length of wire which is also attached to the bumper of a car – guess what happens. A stoner is downed with petrol and then burnt to death. Another one has a sharpened broom handle rammed through their eye. Someone is crushed underneath a mattress of spikes. And so forth. The kills are creative, mean-spirited, and above all gory. I can’t say that they’re anything amazing but the whole 80s feel to the proceedings gives them a slightly more grimy edge.

Return to Sleepaway Camp also sees fit to throw in a blatant plot-twist right at the very end. I don’t like using quotes like this for obvious reasons but the fact is that even the likes of Stevie Wonder could see the twist coming! The shock sight of naked ‘Angela’ actually being naked Peter in the original is replaced by a token surprise which will barely register on your radar because you sussed it out in the first time the ending is set-up earlier in the film. It’s a twist for twist’s sake and not a very good one.

Return to Sleepaway Camp is strictly one for series fans only: the original was unforgettable; this direct sequel is immediately forgettable. It wasn’t worth the twenty five year wait and the other sequels do a far better job of providing similar scares and slash with a dash of charm and self-awareness. It runs purely on nostalgia but the fumes aren’t enough to keep it going for long.

• AKA:


• Director: Kevin Greene, Adam Johnson, Tripp Norton


• Writer: Kevin Greene, Alex Weir


• Starring: Allelon Ruggiero, Bruce Taylor, Ron Lester, Steve Rickman


• Run Time: 90 mins

Assistant green keeper Allen allows his friends to hold an after-hours party in the country club that his step dad owns. However Allen doesn’t count on the legend of the old murderous green keeper to actually be true. So when the maniac shows up and starts offing his friends, Allen must do everything he can to rescue the love of his life, Elena, before the green keeper takes her life.

You can now add green keepers to a list of stock characters who have gone on killing sprees in slasher films. Janitors. Police officers. Ice cream men. Teachers. Dentists. They’ve all been there and done that, piling up the body count in the process. Though kind of similar in job role to the killer caretaker Cropsey from The Burning, I guess this slight twist on the character’s daily duties means that this is the first time a green keeper has gone berserk.

A predictably dull slasher flick, The Green Keeper runs like a low-rent modern day rehash of The Burning coupled with the token post-modern approach of Scream. Let’s face it, there’s no new mileage to be had in the slasher film. It’s been done to death more than any other genre flick and with an odd one or two exceptions, there’s just no surprises left to be had in them. We know how they’re going to pan out. We know which characters are going to survive and which characters will die, more often than not we’re also able to predict the order of death. But that hasn’t stopped the sub-genre from continually pumping out new films every year.

The Green Keeper milks its novelty-gimmick theme about the green keeper for all its worth and so the bulk of the kill scenes revolve around said theme. Characters are killed with golf hole flags, tennis ball machines filled with nails and, in the film’s silliest (and most amusing moment), one unlucky character is impaled on a lawn sprinkler whilst the killer starts pumping it out. It’s not art at its purest but the kills do what they need to do with a modicum of amusement and a generous dose of black humour. The kills are gory but the effects aren’t very convincing.  Though marks should at least be given for keeping everything ‘real’ and using the old techniques instead of CGIing everything.

Whilst some of the low budget slashers of the 80s looked grimy and grindhouse-esque due to the way they were filmed, some of these modern day straight-to-video slashers follow in the same footsteps but with highly polished cameras and editing techniques to get rid of that dirty ‘I shouldn’t really be watching this’ feeling. The Green Keeper looks to have been shot on a camcorder by a few mates and they raided the local shop for ketchup. The whole thing looks like it was filmed for a home video TV show – I know we’re not supposed to take this stuff seriously but it helps if it actually looks like I’d want to spend ninety minutes watching it rather than expect the canned laughter or annoying commentary from the TV presenter to be around the corner. That’s the problem of shooting on digital as opposed to film but times are changing so I’ve got to live with it. The Green Keeper isn’t the only film guilty of this but it gives off a distinct low-budget feel made even worse by some poor lighting decisions.

The influence of Scream also hastens the film’s spiralling towards the ‘avoid’ section. Though the film tries to hark back to the 80s, the script is clearly post-modern with a scene involving the characters watching a slasher-film-within-a-slasher-film on a TV set in the club. The script also keeps things too jokey and wacky throughout, leading to a rather mish-mash of ideas which bounce between deadly serious and comically acceptable. Having said that the film is reasonably well acted with Allellon Ruggerio making for an unlikely hero and there’s plenty of hot chicks around for good measure (including former Playboy Playmate Christi Taylor, fulfilling the quota of breasts for about ten slasher flicks with her desirable chest shot).

Slasher films live and die by their body count and kill scenes and thankfully The Green Keeper delivers on these, as well as the other token slasher ingredient – the nudity. I knew what I was getting myself in for when I sat down to watch and it did exactly what it said on the box. It’s silly, stupid and wholly unoriginal but The Green Keeper has just enough mileage in it to see itself to the end. There are worse slashers out and there and for $80,000, The Green Keeper provides adequate, if unfulfilling, value.

• AKA:


• Director: Patrick Lussier


• Writer: Todd Farmer (screenplay), Zane Smith (screenplay), John Beaird (1981 screenplay), Stephen Miller (1981 story)


• Starring: Jensen Ackles, Jamie King, Kerr Smith, Betsy Rue


• Run Time: 101 mins

He’s gonna break your heart.

Ten years ago, inexperienced miner Tom Hanniger caused an accident in which led to the deaths of five miners and sent the only survivor, Harry Warden, into a coma. Exactly one year later, Harry woke from his coma to head to the town of Harmony and murder twenty-two people before he was killed. Ten years later, Tom Hanniger returns to Harmony, struggling to cope with the past. His ex-girlfriend has now married his best friend and he is unwelcome in the town. But no soon as he returns to the town, the murders start up again. It seems that Harry Warden isn’t so dead after all.

I’m not a fan of remakes. That’s a bit of an understatement but I’m just sick of the current Hollywood trend to constantly remake older films instead of actually using it’s imagination to create new material. There are remakes which modernise classic films that everyone knows well. For horror fans, this is the likes of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, Halloween and A Nightmare on Elm Street. Classics which have no business being remade as the originals still pack a punch today. Then there are those remakes of films which hardly anyone outside of the genre saw in the first place or aren’t as well known. You’ve got your likes of April Fool’s Day, Night of the Demons and The Toolbox Murders. I don’t usually mind these type of films being remade as usually the originals aren’t much cop and the majority of the audience don’t have the same affinity to the originals as they do the classics mentioned above.

The original My Bloody Valentine could arguably fall into either category. The original, whilst not well known outside of the genre, is a classic slasher and is one of the genre’s true greats which was savagely treat by the censors and is usually seen as one of the poster boys for the anti-censorship bandwagon that began rolling in the 80s when horror films were being cut left, right and centre. However it wasn’t perfect and whilst it’s clearly adored by many horror fans, the fact that it’s not mentioned in the same breath as the likes of Halloween and Friday the 13th meant that it was less likely to receive a big backlash against remaking it. At least not from me anyway.

Truth be told, My Bloody Valentine does exactly what it sets out to do. It hardly insults the original but it doesn’t change the formula much to be able to do that. Faithfully sticking to the majority of the original’s premise, this remake not only succeeds in bringing it to life in a more modern setting but also improves some aspects of the original in the process. That’s not to say that it’s an overall improvement as some of the key ingredients from the original are sorely lacking here, in particular the sombre mood which is virtually absent in this one and is instead replaced by a lighter tone. Of course the polish and gleam of modern day slashers also detract from the gritty, low budget feel of some of the earlier 80s slasher greats. The holiday itself doesn’t play a huge part in this one either which is a bit of a shame but once the action starts heating up then this is a minor inconvenience.

If you’ve been lucky to catch the 3-D version then you’re in for a right treat with blood and guts flying around the screen like confetti. If you think you’re going to survive without a pickaxe being aimed in the direction of the audience then think again. The gore is one of the film’s strongest points and great use is made of the pickaxe – in fact the killer hardly uses anything else. Despite this sounding repetitive, there are all manner of creative kills involving the pickaxe from decapitations to eye-gougings and impalements so you’re never going to see the same thing time and time again. It’s obvious that whoever came up with the kills was having a blast doing it and this enjoyment is reflected on the screen. You shouldn’t cheer when they happen but they’re so damned entertaining that it’s hard not to applaud. There is a solid body count too so once the killer miner gets doing what he does best, the pace of the film rarely lets up. The film may run for about ten minutes longer than it needs to but it’s never boring.

The cast isn’t particularly great but they’ve been cast for aesthetic reasons alone. The norm for this day and age is to cast hot young actors from teen-targeted TV series and this time they’ve recruited Jensen Ackles from Supernatural and Kerr Smith, formerly of Dawson’s Creek, into the fold. I guess the target demographic will be happy with that casting. Thankfully, though their appearances smack of cheap casting techniques to attract a certain audience, the characters that they portray are a bit older than usual: young adults as opposed to teenagers. They spend less time with the mushy making out and shows of teenage petulance that bog other slashers and instead focus on the different directions that their lives have taken. Hardly riveting stuff and you’ll want the miner to intervene in some of the dramatic scenes to silence the cringe-worthy dialogue but at least it’s different to the norm. Veteran Tom Atkins has a small role as the local sheriff and he’s one of the best things on show, firing off some witty lines and adding a touch of class. The role is meatier than I expected which at least shows that someone had an ounce of sensibility to cast a genre character actor in it.

Half of the enjoyment from My Bloody Valentine comes from the 3D so make you sure you can catch it in that format to get the full package. As it stands, My Bloody Valentine works far better than it has any right to do with some inventive kills, a nice pace and general sense of good nature surrounding it. It nails the traditional slasher elements down to a tee, provides a few twists and turns along the way and delivers way more than it promised. It will at least put a mean-spirited smile on your face on Valentine’s Day.

• AKA:


• Director: Jean Pellerin


• Writer: Kenneth J. Hall


• Starring: Christopher Plummer, Margot Kidder, Sarah Lassez, James Duval


• Run Time: 91 mins

The lead singer of an opera house was brutally murdered after one of her fellow performers proclaimed his love for her and went into a jealous rage when he saw her with someone else. Years later and the singer’s daughter is now a college student who is now a part of a theatre group renovating the old opera house as part of a summer project. But the jilted killer is still lurking and proceeds to kill off the group one-by-one.

I had flashbacks to the entertaining Italian slasher Stagefright when I watched this. Not too many horror films are set in grand opera houses and it’s an underused setting in the genre. But forgetting the obvious comparisons with Stagefright, the most blatant bedfellow for The Clown At Midnight is Scream. Made in the wake of Wes Craven’s classic post-modern slasher, this one has all of the hallmarks of the teen slasher only without the self-referential nonsense and with more of an old school feel to it. Even the cover art for the UK DVD release looks like an unashamed knock-off, with glum-looking head shots of the young attractive cast plastered around the outline of the mysterious killer.

The Clown At Midnight is hardly the most memorable slasher out there but it’s actually half-decent for what it is. Derivative characters who are not unlike every other slasher character every conceived, a story which Stevie Wonder could see coming, twists and turns which would surprise no one and scares that wouldn’t frighten a patient waiting for a heart by-pass mean that the usual clichés are all present in abundance. This is a slasher after all and a sub-genre which is not known for its cutting edge take on new material. You’ll never once get behind any of the characters. You’ll never feel in danger for the Final Girl. You’ll expect everything to pan out in a linear manner and the film will gladly deliver those expectations.

But there are a few positives. For a start, the use of a clown as the killer is a bit of a cheap scare tactic. Most people hate clowns with a passion and so already there’ll be people squirming around in horror at the thought that their worst fears will be brought to life. This isn’t IT or Killer Klowns From Outer Space but those with a fear of clowns will most definitely not be sat comfortable throughout this one.

As I stated at the beginning of the review, the opera house setting is a nice touch. There are countless hidden passageways and secret entrances for use in the plays that the opera house would have hosted but are now used for the sadistic purposes of the killer. The opening half does a good job of building up a decent level of suspense and mystery. It’s not hard to guess who the killer is – like the typical Scooby Doo episode, there are only so many people that it could be and once the cast start to thin out, it’s practically impossible not to see where the film is heading. During the second half, the suspense is ditched in favour of cheaper gore tactics. Those looking for an old school 80s throwback will be disappointed – The Clown At Midnight handles its gore like the majority of post-modern slashers – minimal.

Quite what Christopher Plummer is doing in something as low brow as this is a mystery but he’s the requisite experienced hand to steady the ship alongside the young cast. Plummer is head-and-shoulders above everyone else in the way of talent and he doesn’t even need to try to better them. Margot Kidder, most famous for her stint as Lois Lane in the Christopher Reeve Superman films, also stars but time hasn’t been good to her and she’s wasted in a pointless role, destined to be high profile fodder for the killer. The rest of the cast are your typical fresh-faced teenagers and whilst they’re all not particularly great in their one-dimensional roles (you know the type: the bitchy girl, the jock, the rebellious one, etc), they’re not overly terrible. It’s like an anti-version of Noah’s ark. Instead of taking two of everything, the script makes sure that only one representative from each of the typical school social groups is represented. Why not two bitchy girls? Or a whole group of rebellious teenagers? These films never fail to amuse me in that respect.

Non-horror buffs may want to give this one a miss, but The Clown At Midnight is solid viewing for slasher fans, if somewhat unoriginal and remarkable in the genre. It’s got the feel of an Americanised giallo (if that’s possible) which isn’t a bad thing in all honesty.

• AKA:


• Director: Adam Green


• Writer: Adam Green


• Starring: Danielle Harris, Tony Todd, Kane Hodder, Parry Shen


• Run Time: 85 mins

Victor Crowley Lives Again

After Marybeth escapes from the clutches of swamp-dwelling maniac Victor Crowley, she finds out the truth about her family’s connections to the madman. With the help of Reverend Zombie, she leads a group of hunters back into the swamp to retrieve the bodies of her family and put an end to the legend of Victor Crowley once and for all.

Adam Green’s much-heralded 2006 slasher Hatchet might not have been the blood-soaked return to old school horror that it was cracked up to be but it was a solid gore ride which knocked the socks off any big budget slash that the mainstream Hollywood had produced for years. I’m not sure whether the genre needed another throwback slasher (as a lot of recent slashers proclaim themselves to be in order to distinguish themselves from the rest – but in doing so they create a new norm) and I don’t think it would have been a genre staple along the lines of The Burning had it been released in the decade it so craves to homage. But it was alright, certainly there are a lot worse out there. It met with a lot of critical praise whilst it did the festival rounds and its connection to the core audience meant that a sequel was inevitable. A few years later, and with a reported budget of only $800,000, Hatchet II comes along and follows on from where the previous one left of, albeit it with a different actress in the lead role.

Hatchet II had a bit of a choppy ride before it was released. The film was originally released in a handful of US theatres without a rating in an attempt to act a shining light to similar-minded film makers (not just horror film makers but anyone sick of the MPAA holding them back). Unfortunately it didn’t work out and after a bit of bad press, the film was pulled with the official response explaining this decision as ‘poor box office performance’ – but what do you expect when you only offer it to a small percentage of the population – you’re not going to get a Skyfall-esque opening weekend. The film has since been released onto DVD with the MPAA getting their way in the end and with it, the brutal crushing of a potential rebellion against the ratings system. Ah well, at least someone had to try.

So on with the review itself! If you’re expecting the same sort of over-drenched, tongue-in-cheek carnage as the original then you’re in the right place as Hatchet II does a faithful job of recreating the same sort of feel and atmosphere as the original. It does take time getting started and it takes over thirty minutes for the film to eventually get back into the swamp. Before then, you’ve got flashback footage of how Victor Crowley came to be. Let’s face it: people don’t normally watch sequels unless they’ve seen the first so anyone watching this should already know his back story and what happened. To me it just seems like a lot of filler to pad out the running time.

Even when the film switches focus to the swamp, there’s little real story to keep things moving. The group of hunters split up and then proceed to get killed off one-by-one before the final showdown with Crowley and the survivors at his ramshackle hut. Everything in between the kills seems like a real slog to get through. A lot of slashers have always been built around their set pieces and this is evident in Hatchet II, with stilted dialogue, thinly-sketched new characters and a tepid atmosphere which lacks any real tension keeping the pace of the film bogged down into the swamp. Clock watching until the next kill shouldn’t really be on the agenda here but it is. But at least they’re worth the wait.

Hatchet II ramps up the red level from the sublime to the ridiculous at times and the kills here are some of the most satisfying you’ll see for a long time. If it isn’t Crowley ripping off the jaws of his victims, he’s battering their skulls to pulp with hatchets, decapitating them using table tops and a conducting a final kill which has to be seen to be described. I mean basically the film is just a series of inter-linking jaw-dropping kills which are brought to life with amazing practical effects – you’ll not seen a sign of any CGI here. This is old school gore that Tom Savini would be proud of. It’s a slowly dying art but it’s nice to see people still have the passion and the ability to produce the goods when they need to.

Kane Hodder is back as Victor Crowley and he’s as physically impressive as ever. I dare you not to laugh out loud at the moment his deformed killer strides out of the woods carrying THE biggest chainsaw ever committed to film. Tony Todd had a cameo in the first one but his role is given centre stage this time around and the film is all the better for it by having such a genre great in a pivotal role. Todd oozes class and charisma and his Reverend Zombie character is one of the best parts of the film, switching between protagonist and antagonist whenever the situation suits him. Danielle Harris is a perennial favourite of mine for obvious reasons but she brings little to the role that she took over from Tamara Feldman other than her good looks. The rest of the cast is made up of generic-looking actors who fulfil the variety of redneck and psychotic hunter character roles without even trying. If you look like a redneck, that’s good enough characterisation for this film as the audience does the rest.

Hatchet II is just about as good or bad as the original depending on whether you like your slashers gloopy, gorey and a bit dopey or want a bit more meat to your meal. The film is definitely not up to the hype and publicity it received but it works fine as a low budget slasher homage. I was going to suggest that film makers leave the whole “80s slasher throwback” cliché alone for a while as it’s in danger of becoming saturated but then I have seen that there is a further sequel in the works. At this rate, The Hatchet series is going to become part of the problem, not the solution.

• AKA:


• Director: Jack Messitt


• Writer: Jack Messitt, Mark Garbett


• Starring: Rebekah Brandes, Daniel Bonjour, Greg Cirulnick, Mandell Maughan


• Run Time: 82 mins

Radford is Back!

Film maker Ted Radford made a low budget horror flick called The Dark Beneath but he was institutionalised soon after for going insane. One his doctors decides to allow him to watch the film again as part of his therapy but this leads to a massacre at the hospital and the disappearance of Radford. Five years after he vanished, a small theatre is showing a midnight screening of The Dark Beneath for the very first time since that fateful night. As the film unfolds, the selective audience soon realise that the killer in the film is very much real and loose inside the theatre.

OK, so what we have with Midnight Movie is basically another modern-day low budget slasher which both simultaneously pays tribute to the 80s slashers and attempts to fashion a new horror icon out of its clichéd raw materials at the same time. With winks to old school horror films and a definite eye on the new torture porn trend, Midnight Movie was never going to reinvent the wheel as far as the sub-genre goes. I’m pleasantly surprised that the film actually manages to be consistently entertaining, something which many a modern slasher fails to deliver. But how many more times am I going to be able to stomach another slasher which pays tribute to the glory days? That in itself is becoming as cliché as the formula by which this sub-genre has strictly adhered to over the years.

The main difference between Midnight Movie and its recent slasher counterparts is solely the idea of the killer being able to transport himself out of the film, into the theatre and then back in again. It’s an idea which is basic in its conception but works a lot better on the screen than it has any right to. As Radford begins to kill people in the cinema, those scenes become part of the film, The Dark Beneath. This works pretty well for the majority of the film as Radford can come and go as he pleases. Unfortunately all of this alternative reality/film-within-a-film nonsense spirals out of control in the finale and the story gets messy. The film has a reasonable short running time so an extra ten minutes or so to flesh things out and slow things down at this point would have been a welcome addition.

The film-within-a-film, The Dark Beneath, is expectedly terrible enough to try and imitate the grim backwoods horror style of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. In fact the film itself is virtually a homage to Tobe Hooper’s classic, from the camper van full of teenagers breaking down in the middle of nowhere, to the first shot of Radford springing out from behind a huge door and then the final sequences of Radford chasing the final girl out of the house and down the road. It’s been made to look grainy and has been shot in black-and-white to give it an old school vibe.

Aside from the story itself, not many risks are taken with the standard slasher prototype. You have the less-than-the-norm setting of an old theatre house, complete with many twisting staircases, projector rooms, basements, etc. The location is clearly a nostalgic look back to the glory days for low budget films, when small one-screen cinemas could operate as they saw fit, free of the shackles of the big cinema chains and their brainwashed blind devotion to the big Hollywood blockbusters.

You’ve got the requisite cast filled with plenty of stereotypical characters. The teenagers aren’t particularly great but they’re not terrible either. They’re just paint-by-numbers. Particular mention here must go to Stan Ellsworth, who plays the big biker Harley. At first the character comes off as a big asshole but as the film progresses, your initial expectations of his character are blown away.

You’ve also got the kills, which get bloodier as the film progresses (the film shies away from the first couple of kills, which I thought would set a dangerous precedent but thankfully you do get to see some decent stuff later on). Unfortunately the deaths get extremely repetitive as Radford uses the same weird metal corkscrew-like weapon to kill his victims. It’s pretty nifty the first time around but not when you’ve seen it a handful of times. I think too much emphasis has been placed onto Radford’s killer persona in an attempt to create a new slasher icon. He’s got the half-skull mask and the weird hand-weapon he uses to smash into people with to make him stand out from the rest but he’s not going to catch on any time soon. I’m not sure whether they intended him to look this way but he reminded me a lot of the killer from Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon. The sequel-pleading ending would not convince many to shell out cash for a further instalment.

Midnight Movie is never going to win any awards for originality and, like the majority of modern day slashers, you’ll never really have a burning desire to see it again….or remember anything about it once the next carbon copy comes along. Despite some nice ideas and the fact that the director clearly ‘gets’ the sub-genre he so obviously loves, Midnight Movie will most likely end up at that – something for drunken frat boys to stick on at crazy o’clock when they’ve come home from an all-day booze session.

• AKA:


• Director: Jack Bender


• Writer: Don Mancini


• Starring: Justin Whalin, Perry Reeves, Jeremy Sylvers, Travis Fine


• Run Time: 90 mins

Look who’s stalking!

Years after the events with Chucky, Andy Barclay has grown up and is about to start military school. In the meantime, Play Pals decide to re-release the Good Guys doll line, thinking that enough time has passed since the original murders ruined their public image. Re-using old materials to create their dolls, one of the new dolls is possessed by the vengeful spirit of Charles Lee Ray who immediately seeks out Andy in the hope of finishing him off.

As with the first sequel, that’s about as much story as you’re going to get from Child’s Play 3. Let’s face it, there’s no real need to create anything complicated for the story to follow. Chucky has unfinished business with Andy and wants his soul so instead of rolling out yet another film with Andy as a child, Child’s Play 3 wisely decides to move the entire story forward a few years to try and give the audience a different spin on the tale. At least that was the idea but what we end up with is more damaging to the series than one could have expected. Perhaps the decision to rush it out nine months after the last sequel was a poor call and a bit more time spent in pre-production, especially on the screenplay, would have worked wonders.

Child’s Play 3 works to some extent but for the most it’s the weakest entry in the series. It’s nothing special simply because there are no great plot twists, no dramatic occurrences and no real changes in direction from the material that we’ve already had in the other two films. Though Andy is now a young adult, Chucky conveniently finds another child to attempt to swap bodies with and so this sequel just retreads the same story as the first two and simply places the story in a different setting. This time it’s a military academy and the object of his pursuit is a young boy named Tyler. This kid is annoying – the actor (Jeremy Sylvers) is a little too over-awed in the role and he’s also a little too old to believe in dolls. Compare him to Alex Vincent in the first two films and the difference in quality is staggering. Vincent was able to balance the precious innocence of his youth alongside a resolute, almost adult-like self-determination to stop Chucky to make a huge impression.

The story is little more than signposting to get from one death scene to the next and from early on, you know that’s little more than you’re going to get. Chucky’s resurrection into his new body isn’t well explained (at least it was the same doll in the first sequel) and the film skims over the requisite scenes of him working out what he needs to do in order to become human again. This allows him plenty of time to get doing what he does best and that’s kill people. The film is the bloodiest of the series to date, with Chucky going to work on everyone and anyone with whatever he could get his hands on. With the ante upped on the gore and set pieces, the slower-burning suspense and tension of the first two films is replaced with a quicker, more frenetic pace. In attempting to outdo the previous two films, the script here shows a bit too much of Chucky and not enough of the other characters we’re supposed to root for.

Chucky is now firmly in the role of anti-hero, a character that the audience knows that it shouldn’t be cheering on but they do because he’s fun to watch (and because the characters we’re supposed to empathise with are either dull as dishwater or total assholes). I’m sure you’ll feel guilty for cheering on such an evil, psychotic murderer but the way his character has easily been manipulated by the demands of the audience into such an anti-hero will leave a bitter taste in your mouth. Chucky gets to fire off his usual one-liners and witty remarks but you also know that he’s a truly nasty piece of work, killing people here not because they are getting in the way of his plan but simply because he gets kicks out of it. Brad Dourif returns to voice Chucky and he’s as excellent as ever.

Unfortunately it’s the entry which has been saddled with the most negative press due to the tragic death of young James Bulger in the UK, whose horrible murder was stupidly pinned upon his two killers apparently watching Child’s Play 3 numerous times – a fact which was proven untrue during the court case. But the damage had been done and despite being falsely labelled, it has never fully repaired its reputation. Granted it’s not the greatest entry in the series but there is a heck of a lot worse films out there in the market both in terms of film quality and brutal content.

Child’s Play 3 isn’t the greatest of slasher films, nor is it the worst by a long way. It’s pretty serviceable and at ninety minutes, it’s certainly a brisk film. You just come to expect more from a franchise which started out so superbly but has descended into little more than average within the space of three films. This is one toy that has outgrown it’s use.

• AKA:


• Director: Jamie Blanks


• Writer: Silvio Horta


• Starring: Jared Leto, Alicia Witt, Rebecca Gayheart, Michael Rosenbaum


• Run Time: 99 mins

It Happened To Someone Who Knows Someone You Know… You’re Next.

With a spate of murders taking place on their college campus, a group of students believe that someone is killing them off based upon famous urban legends.

Thanks to Scream’s success in 1996, the slasher film was back in vogue. Whereas the 80s featured low budget slashers made for peanuts and mainly starring no-namers looking to hit it big, the 90s brought the slasher film right into the studio system. With full blown studio budgets, production values that the likes of Sean S. Cunningham would have dreamed about when he made Friday the 13^th, a cast full of hot-property TV actors from American teen dramas like Dawson’s Creek and a streak of self-awareness, this new wave of slash turned the humble slasher film into credible (well maybe not the right word – profitable is more appropriate) horror films. One of the first of the post-Scream teen horror slashers to hit the big screen, Urban Legend probably seems a bit fresher than it has any right to be thanks to the glossy production values, the big named cast and the addition of genre legend Robert Englund.

With the now-standard poster featuring moody headshots of the young cast and a killer who wears a costume with which they can hide their identity with until the finale, Urban Legend came along just at the right time when the slasher genre hadn’t become re-saturated. The entire novelty value of the film stems from the killer offing the characters courtesy of famous urban legends. It’s a film which has a gimmicky one-note premise but never totally outstays its welcome in this regard. You won’t forget things like the ‘microwaved pet’ in a hurry but this killer is still adept at offing the characters anyway he sees fit, including by car at one point. Urban Legend is never outright gory but the manner of some of the deaths is more violent and shocking than usual.

Director Jamie Blanks went on to film the weaker Valentine but here his direction is pretty solid, managing to sustain interest and throwing in plenty of decent scares for good measure (even if he does go down the ‘loud noises’ route a few too many times). Though the script has the usual cars not starting, mobiles ringing at inopportune moments and cats jumping into the frame, Blanks is able to balance this out with a fair smattering of creepy moments: the silhouette of the killer rising in the back seat of a car being the highlight.

It all goes a little pear-shaped in the finale third when red herrings, plot twists and attempts to subvert the audience are all used but raise more questions than answers, such as how the killer could have been so and such person in one scene when they were in two places at once. The script seems determined to throw you off the real culprit but it ends up unwinding a lot of the solid work that had gone before it.

The cast is one of the best assembled for a teen slasher, or at least full of the biggest names: Alicia Witt, Jared Leto, Michael Rosenbaum, Rebecca Gayheart, Tara Reid, Joshua Jackson and Danielle Harris (all grown up now from the Halloween sequels) star as the teenagers and manage to fill all of the usual clichéd roles. Veterans like John Neville, Brad Dourif and Robert Englund on hand to provide the necessary red herrings and experience. Englund is especially creepy as Professor Wexler.

Ultimately what lets Urban Legend down is that it is just so similar to the endless supply of teen horrors that were released in the wake of Scream. The cinematography, the soundtrack, the dialogue, the look of the characters – it’s all very formulaic. Whilst Urban Legend was one of the earlier films out, it still doesn’t hide the fact that you’ll probably feel like you’ve seen it before.

Urban Legend is one of the better of the recent teen horror films with an original premise and decent production values. But it just doesn’t do anything worthwhile with the idea apart from use it as novelty value and completely disintegrates towards the end. The atmospheric opening scene will at least get you hooked, even if the rest of the film doesn’t really capitalise on it.