Slash Mountain Mission

Do you love Slashers? If you are reading this you probably do. But, how much do you really know about the genre? Sure, the big three have been shoved down your throat and you ate that shit up with a goofy-giddy smile on your face. You happily jammed every sequel of Friday the 13th, Halloween, Nightmare on Elm Street, and even Scream, right into your eyes and said “thank you!”

What about all the others? What about the gritty and cheap movies that take place on every random holiday you can think of? What about the other Slasher villains out there chopping away at the teens we love to watch get dismembered for having a good time? What about the movies your folks rented on a Friday night in the 80’s laughing and screaming the whole time, then forgetting as they dropped it in the return bin. Those are the movies I am interested in.

I’m setting out on this slasher quest in an attempt to find forgotten Slasher films that deserve to stand with the big boys, or maybe even above them. I will rate these movies based on story, music, characters/slash fodder, villain and of course kills. Which movie will stand atop Slash Mountain? Join ME, Mack “The Knife” East, on the Slasher Quest and lets smash the fucking canon.

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Intruder (1989)

Intruder is directed by Scott Spiegel, friend of Sam Raimi, Co-writer of Evil Dead 2, and guy who gets his pizza jacked in Spider-man 2. I think he actually does a really good job considering the whopping budget of $130,000 bucks he had to work with. I like what he did with some of the camera work, getting some cool aerial shots of the supermarket making it feel really big and ominous. Of course, it helped that he brought along his buddies the Raimi brothers and Bruce Campbell for a little star power (Campbell and Sam Raimi get top billing). Spoiler alert though, Bruce makes a very short cameo that still had me popping way too hard. Sam Raimi is in it a decent amount (as is his brother) but probably doesn’t deserve top billing either. One more thing about the casting before we get into the ratings. They did manage to cast Renée Estevez who, as you probably guessed by the name, is the sister of the Mighty Duck man...

Black Christmas (1974)

Merry December everyone, let’s talk a little Black Christmas. Full disclosure, this is an all time favorite of mine. I watched it a few years back and was blown away, especially when I realized how early this movie came out. It was four years before Halloween, a few weeks after Texas Chainsaw Massacre, this movie lays so much groundwork for the slasher genre I was so surprised that I had never really heard of it. Even if you disagree with how good this movie is, if you are a slasher fan it is a must watch as an important work in the genre. Don’t believe me on that? John Carpenter really enjoyed Black Christmas and asked the director Bob Clark if he had any ideas for a sequel. Clark had no interest in making a sequel, but did say if he did it would be about the killer escaping from a mental institution to terrorize people and he would call it…Halloween. That’s right the movie often held as the slasher was very much inspired by the man that directed A Christmas Story . Oh fud...

Blood Rage (1987)

Blood Rage (1987) is a slasher that takes place on Thanksgiving. It doesn’t have to though. It could have been set on any random day, and it would not have changed the events of the movie in any substantial way. That being said, the killer does have a great Thanksgiving themed catchphrase. A few times he looks at his bloody weapon and says “It’s not cranberry sauce.” For that alone, I am happy with the holiday theme. It is also a movie about twins. It doesn’t have to be though. Outside of a few key points, the movie is really just a bare bones slasher that has a twin plot drifting around in the background. Story/Setting Twin brothers are at a drive-in movie with their mother and her boyfriend. They sneak away from the car and one of the brothers murders a movie-goer with an axe. He then goes on to frame his twin for the murder. Ten years later is when the movie takes place and the framed brother has escaped from the psychiatric hospital on Thanksgiving. It’s definitely an in...

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